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BIG RIVER GROUP.—DOOGAN’S LODE-SERIES.
This series was next in a southerly direction from McGee’s series, about sixteen miles by road from Reefton and eight miles in a direct line. Gold-bearing quartz was first found on it by H. F. Doogan in 1880. In 1882 the Big River Gold-mining Company was formed to work the discovery, but for some time, owing to the inaccessibility of the locality, no very active development was carried out. By 1886 a road sufficiently graded to enable machinery to be carted out was completed, and in the following year a ten-stamp battery was erected. By the time this plant was ready to start crushing, about 200 tons of stone were at grass, which was estimated to be worth fully 2 oz. gold per ton, but when it was crushed the ore did not come up to expectations. In the same year, 1887, another shoot of stone was struck, however, which gave better promise, with the result that by the end of the year 510 tons had been put through the mill for a return of 645 oz. gold, equal to about 25 dwt. per ton.
The first active mining-work took the form of putting in two adits, with their portals only a short distance one from another, one of which was driven north-eastward towards the outcrop first discovered, and the other north-westward and then eastward to a point where it made connection with a shaft sunk from the crown of the spur in which the lode occurred. This later working was known as No. 1 level of the mine, and was 220 ft. below the shaft-collar. Several isolated blocks of stone of no great size were met with in these adits. The fact that they did not live far above the level is shown by the small amount of quartz won from them, the total crushings up to the end of 1890 amounting to only 1,210 tons, which yielded 995 oz. gold, valued at £3,893 6s. 8d. During the same period £7,450 had been called up. No. 2 level, 420 ft. from surface, gave more ore, and evidently ore of better value, for during the year ending 31st March, 1892, it is reported that 1,625 tons were crushed for a yield of 3,704 oz. gold, valued at £14,807. Half of the expense of sinking the shaft from No. 2 to No. 3 level was borne by the adjoining company, the Lord Edward, and most of the work done on the latter level appears to have been carried out in the Lord Edward ground. That company did not succeed, however, in finding, either on that level or in any part of its property, any quantity of payable stone. A small parcel of 32 tons was crushed for 34 oz. gold in 1893, but this seems to have been the only quartz produced from the mine. On No. 3 level the Big River Company located one block 100 ft. in length and up to 12 ft. in width. Thereafter, for some years, the company continued operations with varying fortunes. Nos. 4 and 5 levels appear to have been fairly productive, but No. 6 was a poor level, only one very small block being found on it.
About the end of 1890 the Lord Edward and Big River Companies merged under the title of the Big River Extended Gold-mining Company, but after the amalgamation the company evidently did not do much good. It continued the sinking of the shaft down to No. 9 level (1,375 ft.), but such blocks of stone as were found on the different levels opened out were scattered and small in extent. In 1907 another reconstruction took place, and the company became known as the New Big River Gold-mining Company, Ltd. This new company met with almost instant success. It consisted of 24,000 shares of 5s. each. Only one call of 6d. per share was made, and on this no less than £4 15s. per share was paid in dividends during the following years. Almost immediately after the reconstruction good stone was struck in No. 9 level, and the level proved a most productive one, large
