Page:Downey•Quartz·Reefs·West·Coast•1928.pdf/108

Ulster Mine.—The early history of this mine seems to be shrouded in some mystery. It appears to have been known as the “Ulster” in the early “nineties,” and to have been prospected then by William McCloy. In 1896 it was visited by Professor Black, of the Otago School of Mines, who reported on it on behalf of Messrs. Forsyth and Masters, of Reefton. He describes the prospecting-work done up to that time as consisting mainly of two surface trenches 500 ft. apart, a winze 50 ft. deep, and an adit a short distance below the outcrop, which cut the reef at 40 ft. in from the portal. In one of the trenches he gives the width of the reef as 2 ft. 6 in., and in the other as 6 ft. 6 in., while in the adit it was 7 ft. wide, consisting of 2 ft. 6 in. of solid quartz on the hanging-wall and 1 ft. 6 in. on the foot-wall, with 3 ft. of mixed quartz and country between. As the winze had a lot of water in it he could not see what the width of the stone was in it, but a pile of quartz on the surface indicated that it had been sunk on rich reef. General samples were carefully taken from the stone in the trenches and the adit, also from the heap at the top of the winze, all of which on being assayed showed high gold values. A sample from the first-mentioned trench gave 13 dwt. 1 gr. per ton, and that from the other, taken right across the 6 ft. 6 in. of formation, gave 2 oz. gold per ton. Two samples from the heap of quartz at the winze gave 5 oz. 3 dwt. 6 gr. and 5 oz. 0 dwt. 15 gr. respectively, while a mixed sample from across the 7 ft. of formation in the adit gave 3 oz. 14 dwt. 15 gr. gold per ton. He estimated the average width of the stone throughout to be 3ft. In the face of these high results it seems strange that for ten years afterwards no active move was made to develop the property.

In 1906 the claim was evidently held by a party of Reefton mining-men known as the Phoenix Syndicate. This party erected a five-stamp battery which was driven by an 8-horse-power oil-engine, and commenced crushing. Operations seem to have been mainly confined to stoping on such ore as was in sight above the upper adit, and within the following two years 247 tons were mined and crushed for a yield of 200 oz. 12 dwt. gold, valued at £736 12s. This return was only equal to a yield of 16 dwt. 6 gr. per ton, which was very much below the values obtained by Professor Black.

In 1908 the property passed to the New Ulster Gold-mining Company, which drove a second adit, supposed to be about 30ft. under No. 1. This adit was driven for 1,200 ft., all of which, with the exception of 100 ft., was on the ore-channel. The whole of the country passed through is described as being crushed and broken, with only occasional stringers or bunches of quartz of low grade. Owing to an error in levelling, the adit, instead of being 30 ft. under No. 1, was, the writer has been informed by a prominent shareholder, directly under it, the timbers of the old adit having actually been picked up for part of the way, hence it proved the ground to no greater depth than the earlier working. This, however, is a matter of no importance, for it is clear that No. 2 adit was throughout on a fault. Having met with no success with this work, the company then ran out a crosscut due east from a point in the adit 212 ft. from the portal. This crosscut was eventually extended to 170ft., making a total of 382 ft. from the mouth of the adit, and at 24 ft. from the end a drive was put out north from it for 26 ft. on a reef-track. No solid stone was met with, and work was then suspended. The company asked for the assistance of a pound-for-pound subsidy to enable the crosscut to be advanced a further 500 ft., but in view of the nature of the development elsewhere in the mine, and the fact that no reef is known to outcrop to the east, the application was not entertained. In 1912 the company ceased operations, but during its working-