Researching old gold historic claims and leases in NSW

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Does anyone know how it is possible to find the records of old gold claims/leases in NSW?

According to this book page 122, once the miners found payable gold they used to have to hoist a red flag on their claim and file a report with the Mining Registrar giving the full particulars of "yield of gold, place of discovery and other general information".

Does this information still exist anywhere?

The state archives seem to keep information on the gold leases (which are sometimes also on DIGS) on Microfilm, available in their reading room only. Has anyone actually been there and seen what sort of information is available on these microfilms?

The year I am interested in is 1896 and I have the name of the miner and the size of the lease, a vague description of the general location obtained from old newspaper clippings on Trove.

Thanks in advance for your help.
 
Outside of Trove & DIGS, which you're already using, I'm not sure Dron.
My family held Gold Leases around Hill End & Windeyer during the first gold rush period then early 1900's but apart from some gazette notices on Trove when various leases were granted (or in some cases not) I can't find much other info. I did find a hand drawn map on DIGS showing the rough location of some of the GL's but nothing yet on yields etc. The best I could find on their yields was things like "a good amount of gold bearing material was brought to grass today" or "a large parcel of gold was taken to Mudgee for sale" etc.
On DIGS some of the various mines that did report are captured on reports on the whole area. You may have to search under the whole goldfield then wade through the reports - time consuming I know but it may lead you to what you're after.
Keep in mind that some mines/miners didn't report a lot, if any, of the "required" information. There is many a goldfield where the exact gold yield will never be known due to the lack of reporting. Would have been hard to keep a fairly wild bunch of nomadic gold seekers in line at the best of times let alone get them to submit their paperwork.
Good luck with it & if I find another way I'll let you know (& vice-versa please :Y: )
 
Good stuff mate! :Y: :Y: I can concur with you on this. I have gone 'crosseyed' 8) on occasions trying to get a feel for what was taken out of the Tambaroora and Hillend fields.My Great grandfather George was a school teacher and miner in both areas Circa..1900.
The hours I have trolled through the Trove pages..to no avail, seems now like 'Wasted Time.' I guess we will never know.Cheers :cool:
 
Hmmmm... look like a trip to the State Archives Western Sydney Records Centre at Kingswood might be on the cards.
 
Well I made a trip to the State Archives yesterday.

I spent all day (10am - 5pm) going through old records but unfortunately couldn't find the information I was looking for.

The staff were very helpful in providing suggestions on where to look, such as old surveyors field books and probate records, but the process of researching is very slow and laborious. The day just flew away.

The microfilm records of the old leases look like this:

1509145214_example3.jpg


They also have boxes and boxes of the original lease applications and transfer documents which you are allowed to go through in NRS 10134 but unfortunately I ran out of time. These are the actual lease applications and they are very old and fragile and sometimes have hand drawn maps.

Still these only seem to be the records of the larger and more expensive leases that were gazetted and displayed on the parish maps ... the smaller claims and the Chinese workings don't seem to be documented anywhere that I have found yet. A lot of the information I already had from DIGS and the old parish maps.

I will have to go back next time and look through some more boxes.
 

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