Mount Dockrell Goldfield, Halls Creek Shire, Western Australia, Australiai

Regional Level Types
Mount Dockrell Goldfield	Ore Field
Halls Creek Shire	Shire
Western Australia	State
Australia	Country

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The field was discovered shortly after the Halls Creek Goldfield in 1885. There was a short lived rush on the patchy and scattered alluvial gold. The most substantial of the fifteen mines was McNeill's and neighbouring Victoria. The isolation, drought, and hostile aborigines, soon led to these mines also being abandoned. There was some mining between 1935 to 1943, and at other times intermittently by local aborigines during the wet season. The goldfield was left largely undisturbed though for much of the time.

In the 1980's and '90s the goldfield was occupied by exploration company leases, although little exploration took place.

In 1988 the leases were held by the Mount Dockerell Mining NL. Then they were taken over by Maldon Minerals, which went through sixteen directors in thirty months, claimed to have discovered an anomaly 8 square kilometres in size, comparing it to Kalgoorlie's Golden Mile, despite no drilling taking place. It then went to Joe Gutnick's First Investor Resources, still with no drilling. In 1996 Mount Grace Gold Mining NL took over, then New Millennium Resources NL. In 2003 Chameleon Mining issued a prospectus in part over the leases. This company lasted thirteen months, before becoming embroiled in a series of court cases with individuals, other companies, and the Australian Securities Commission, with two of Chameleon's directors eventually serving jail time.

The old gold mines are part of the Dockerell Fault, in metamorphic mafic rocks of the Olympio Formation. This consists of highly inclined beds of sandstone and shale, with much mica, trending north north-east. Some sites carrying small quartz veins, with some gold near the surface. A number of nuggets have been found in the area up to 12 ounces. The quartz veins commonly contain a little galena, pyrite, arsenopyrite, and free gold. One of the mines showed an abundance of galena, with silver values.

The goldfield is about 100 kilometres south-west of Halls Creek. Take the Balara Road off the Great Northern Highway, near the entrance road to the Lamboo homestead. The Balara Road heads generally south-west, keeping right (west) at forks. The mines are south-west of the geographic Mount Dockerell (Mount Dockrell).

Commodity List

This is a list of exploitable or exploited mineral commodities recorded from this region.

Mineral List

Mineral list contains entries from the region specified including sub-localities

18 valid minerals.

Rock Types Recorded

Rock list contains entries from the region specified including sub-localities