An amalgamated operation of the Comet and Maestries silver-lead mines.
The Comet leases, pegged in 1888 by W. “Comet” Johnstone and J. Carnaham, are situated about 3 km east of the town of Dundas, and were the first leases in the Dundas district. They covered the most important lode in the area. Early in 1889, J. Maestri and P. Bear found “canary ore” (mainly cerussite and “lead oxide” (bindheimite?)), and pegged two leases about 300 m to the south-east of the Comet claim. The orebody that they found contained an oxidised zone that extended to a depth of 130 m, and was an extension of the Comet lode. They named it Maestri Broken Hill in an attempt to cash-in with speculators on the then booming Broken Hill mining field in New South Wales; it is now more commonly known as the Maestries mine. In 1895, the Maestri leases were let out on tribute, and then sold outright in 1900 to the Comet Silver Mining Company. They, in turn, ceased operations in 1904, but the mine was worked for several more years by tributers. From 1905 until 1913, the mine was worked mainly by open-cut for the ferro-manganese gossan that was used as a flux by the Tasmanian Smelting Company at Zeehan. Mike Phelan attempted to reopen the mine for specimens in the 1970s but with little success. It is presently owned by Andrew Farrelly, but no mining has been undertaken for many years.
These lodes resemble those of the nearby Adelaide and Red Lead mines, containing ferromanganese gossan above “manganosiderite”-galena ores, but differ in the comparative rarity of crocoite, though it was reported by Reid (1925) and Lancaster (2000). The rarity of crocoite is probably due to the distance from significantly chromium-rich host rocks. The lodes strike NNW, are 3-20 m wide, and about 400 m long, and occur in Precambrian schists and quartzites. Finucane (1947), however, described a dolomitised serpentinite host, insinuating that the lode lies along a narrow ultramafic dyke, and is thus would be genetically related to most of the other lodes in the Dundas area. Paterson (1970), in contrast, described the dolomite host as a primary sedimentary unit (perhaps serpentinised?), so this remains uncertain. The lodes produced over 183,000 t of high grade silver-lead ore and ferro-manganese gossan, recovering 22,000 t of Pb and 45 t of Ag.
The secondary minerals, were described as mainly “straw” cerussite, crocoite and chlorargyrite, remarkable for their beauty (Reid, 1925). Montgomery (1900) and Baker (1963) reported pyromorphite as being common, and dundasite was recorded by Liggins (1982). Montgomery also reported abundant anglesite and “canary ore” (bindheimite?). Significant specimens from the mine are now rare, and mostly consist only of white straw cerussite; no existing specimens of crocoite are known to the authors. A good pyromorphite is in the Australian Museum collection.
References
Bottrill, R.S., Williams, P., Dohnt, S., Sorrell, S. and Kemp, N.R. (2006). Crocoite and associated minerals from Dundas and other locations in Tasmania. Australian Journal of Mineralogy. 12, 59-90
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