Curio

State Library of New South Wales
James Harvey's All Nations Hotel (formerly belonging to B.O. Holtermann) and the Nonpareil Cafe, Hill End

James Harvey's All Nations Hotel (formerly belonging to B.O. Holtermann) and the Nonpareil Cafe, Hill End

1872
Glass photonegative

Pullen and Rawsthorne's Little Wonder Stamper Battery was situated opposite the southern end of Clarke Street. Built by Sydney engineering firm PN Russell, it featured a 20hp [15 Kw-h] steam engine driving a 15 head stamper, delivering 1050 blows a minute. It crushed the famous ‘Holtermann nugget’. Nearly 40 years later, William Pullen described the event in the Sydney Morning Herald, 10 January 1912.

It was with this battery I crushed Beyer and Holtermann's rich ore. It was Holtermann and myself that broke up the rich lump of reef, and crushed it with some 11 tons [10 tonnes] of ore from the same vein. The yield was 11,000 oz [312 g] in one cake.

From the Sydney Morning Herald, 3 Dec 1872

Away from home influences and settled life, many persons drink hard, and live loosely. I was told that there are not less than forty public-houses bidding for the earnings, and many of them no doubt, for the morals of Hill End. (‘To Hill End and back’, Sydney Morning Herald, 3 Dec 1872, p5)