Curio

State Library of New South Wales
Gold chest

Gold chest

belonging to Thomas Livingstone Mitchell, c1851–55
Wooden chest with brass fittings, containing 46 mineral specimens in four trays
Bequest of Sir William Dixson, 1952
DR 157

During the winter of 1851, the NSW surveyor-general Thomas Livingstone Mitchell travelled west to survey the recently discovered goldfields around Bathurst. At the makeshift tent settlement of Ophir on the Summerhill Creek, he planned the streets and allotments for a township. He also collected a fine quartz specimen, which he catalogued and carefully stored in this wooden chest, along with other specimens collected from his various expeditions around NSW.

Inside the wooden chest are four specimen trays, three of which can be removed. These originally held 48 specimens (two are now missing), mostly quartz, varying in colour, shape and texture. Most have light concentrations of gold; a few have heavier concentrations. The chest also contains specimens of gold dust.

Found in NSW

A numbered list of the specimens inside the chest indicates that they were all found in NSW. Locations include: the river bed at ‘Ophir’, the Turon River, ‘from William St, Bathurst’, Louisa Creek, from ‘Sheep Station Point’, from Albury near the river Murray, from the Grafton Range (found by Mitchell’s son, Roderick) and from Molong. One specimen had been ‘washed from earth under the Surveyor-Generals tenton the Bodduldura Creek [sic], 28th July 1851’.*


Footnotes
*Notes by Sir Thomas Mitchell associated with the gold chest, Mitchell Library DLSPENCER 357, p 2. Viewable at http://acms.sl.nsw.gov.au/album/albumView.aspx?acmsID=457964&itemID=825628