- Why Mining Matters
- Jobs
- Safety
- Environment & Operations
- FAQ
- Links
- Fun Stuff
You are here
Tributers
E. Percy Brown and the Brookfield Mine
Barachois
Nova Rich Mines
Shad Bay Treasure Hunt
Montague 1937 Accident
Father Lanigan’s “Prospect”
George V. Douglas
The Stewart Brothers
Goldboro
Moose River's Touquoy Mine
Camerons Mountain
Jim Campbells Barren
Stanburne's Puzzling Gold Mine
Pockwock
Beaverbank Lake
Banook Mining Company
Deep Gold Mining
Wellington
Arsenic and Gold
Dynamite
War of Words
King of the Klondike
Oliver Millett
Kempt Gold Mining Company
Carleton
The Memramcook Fiasco
Love and Gold in Oldham
Montague 1893 Disaster
Central Rawdon Consolidated Mines
Cochrane Hill
Amateurish Early Gold Mining
Sable Island Gold
The Sea Wolf
Trueman Hirschfield
Alexander Heatherington
Prospector Joe Cope
Killag Quicksand
George W. Stuart
Wellington
Billy Bell
Cooper Jim Mine
South Branch Stewiacke
Walter Prest
Lake Charlotte
Acadia Powder Mills Company
The Ovens Anticline
Moose River Anticline
Avon Mine Explosion
Montague
Waverley Claims Dispute
Avon River
Moose River Disaster
Mooseland Scam
New York and Nova Scotia Gold Mining Company
Rosario Siroy and the South Uniacke Gold District
Blockhouse
Killag Gold District
Miller Lake
Baron Franz von Ellershausen
Mooseland: Nova Scotia’s first Gold Discovery
United Goldfields of Nova Scotia
Pleasant River Barrens Gold District
Lochaber Gold Mining Company
Rawdon Gold Mines
MacLean Brook
Gold in Clayton Park?!
Forest Hill
Meguma vs. Placer Gold
Uniacke
Voglers Cove
Gold River
Moosehead
Goldenville
Westfield
Indian Path
Harrigan Cove
Centre Rawdon
Nova Scotia’s Gold Mining History
WWII Gold
Middle River Gold District
Early Gold Discoveries
Halifax 1867
Paris Exhibition 1867
Mining and Tourism
An Act relating to the Gold Fields
Molega Gold District
Brookfield Gold District
Gays River
Halifax Gold
Caribou Gold District
Renfrew Gold District
Oldham Gold District
Whiteburn Gold District
Country Harbour Mines
Waverley Gold District
Robert Henderson and Klondike Gold
George Mercer Dawson
Cow Bay Gold District
Lake Catcha Gold District
Wine Harbour Gold District
Miller Lake
In the mining industry, we often say new mines are often found next to old mines. The Miller Lake Gold District is an example of why.
Gold was discovered in a large quartz boulder in Miller Lake, Guysborough County, by R. W. Naugler around 1900. The boulder was subsequently traced back to its source: a gold-bearing quartz vein that came to be called the Naugler Vein.
By 1902, the Liscomb Falls Gold Mining Company, run by Robert Brownell, had opened shafts on the Mill Lead and a 5-stamp mill was built.
By 1903, a number of veins had been exposed and some had been prospected for short distances by open-cuts or shallow pits. Of the veins then discovered, the Naugler and Lone Cloud leads were the most important, and shafts were sunk on them.
According to a prospectus issued by the Miller Lake Gold Mining Company in 1905, the company had found many gold-bearing veins of quartz while sinking a shaft 105 feet and digging a 240-foot crosscut (horizontal tunnel).
The Lone Cloud lead had been traced 3,600 feet, a significant length, and was found to be auriferous (gold-bearing) throughout. To help attract investment, the Miller Lake Gold Mining Company claimed that Liscomb Falls, just a few miles away, could produce 2,000 horsepower of electricity – a reminder that much of Nova Scotia was wilderness in that era, without the basic infrastructure we take for granted today.
In 1913 Dr. C. C. Ellis did prospecting and trenching on the Lone Cloud, Little North, Twin, and Little Rusty leads. A 16-foot-deep shaft was sunk on the Lone Cloud lead that year, and 1.5 ounces of gold were recovered.
In 1915, T. W. Fancy obtained nine ounces of gold. The Halifax Gold Mining Company installed a 10-stamp mill and surface plant equipment but did very little actual mining.
There are few historical records for the period from 1915-27 and only a modest amount of work was done from 1915 through to the end of the 1930s.
It was in the 1940s that the Miller Lake district saw its biggest years of production.
Seventy ounces of gold were recovered in 1940 and 96 ounces in 1941, apparently by Aubrey Dickson who was working the Boak Shaft on the Lone Cloud lead.
There are no records of activity again until 1945-47 when the Gold Syndicate Ltd. was active repairing roads, building an office and living quarters and investing in a 10-stamp mill and other significant equipment. The company dewatered a shaft on the Lone Cloud and deepened it by eight feet.
Dickson also did some work on the Boak Shaft in 1947 and recovered several ounces of gold.
Seventy-two ounces of gold were recovered in 1948 but work stopped after that.
In total, 483 ounces of gold were produced in the Miller Lake Gold District, most of it from the Lone Cloud lead which was impressively long.
Miller Lake was only a modest producer but that does not mean there isn’t gold there. A 1928 government memo says: “In spite of remarkable evidence of gold over such an extent of territory in this district, it may appear surprising that so little work has been performed… The areas were held by parties of limited financial resources. The carrying out of a small prospecting program was their limit. The one company which succeeded in accumulating a small amount of capital spent it almost entirely in the erection of a stamp mill and surface plant previous to beginning mining operations, leaving little for underground development. The operation thus failed, as there was no ore blocked out to keep the mill going, and no money with which to do it. Another case of the cart before the horse.”
The memo references only one company spending too much while mining too little, but it seems that both the Halifax Gold Mining Company and the Gold Syndicate were guilty of this.
Miller Lake is an example of why we say new mines are often found next to old mines. The historical activity there suggests there may be a significant resource. However, the obstacles faced by Nova Scotian gold miners in the 1800s and early 1900s – such as lack of funds and basic infrastructure, insufficient mining expertise, and primitive science and technology – prevented them from extracting it.
Today, historical sites like Miller Lake have the potential to be mined profitably and environmentally-responsibly with modern science and engineering. That is why almost all the activity in Nova Scotia’s gold sector is at historical gold mines that still have the potential to return to production and create jobs.
For example, the Moose River gold mine directly employs about 300 people and has become an economic anchor in Eastern Shore. It opened in 2017 and quickly became one of the most efficient, lowest-cost gold producers in the world. Moose River was first mined in 1876.