Warwick goldfields, Southern Downs Region, Queensland, Australiai

Regional Level Types
Warwick goldfields	Gold Field (Inactive)
Southern Downs Region	Region
Queensland	State
Australia	Country

The area is located approximately 20 km west of the town of Warwick in Southeast Queensland, centred on Thanes Creek.

The early mining history of the Warwick area is described in Volume 3 of the Gold and Ghosts book published by D.W. de Havelland (1987). The goldfields in the vicinity of Warwick include Talgai, Thanes Creek, Leyburn, Canal Creek, Palgrove, Pikedale and Lucky Valley.

Gold was first discovered at Lord John Swamp (Lucky Valley goldfield) in 1852. Alluvial gold was discovered at Canal Creek 50 km west of Warwick in 1863. In the following year the Talgai field (also known as Darkey's Flat) supported both alluvial and reef mining.

The richest alluvial gold was won from Dunn Gully, 5 km west of Pratten. The largest reefs that were worked on this field were located at Mount Gammie North.

In 1868 alluvial gold was discovered at Thanes Creek, with the first gold reef (Just-in-Time) located there in 1879. Further reefs were discovered in 1881 and included the Queen and the King mines. Other fields discovered include Leyburn (1872) and Pikedale (1877).

The mines were worked steadily until about 1884 when many of the mines reached water level and the ore became pyritic causing a general decline of the fields. Very little work was then done until early 1887 when another rush followed the discovery of gold at Glenelg to the south, when some existing mines were reopened but with little success. In 1893 the St Patricks (Talgai) and the El Dorado (Thanes Creek) were discovered, followed by Palgrove (1897).

The Canal Creek Goldfield produced approximately 20,000 oz Au prior to the 1900s, when the discovery of the much larger Gympie Goldfield led to a decline in mining at Warwick.

The goldfields are located on the Warwick SH5602 1:250,000 geological sheet and the Alora 9241 1:100,000 sheet and are dominantly underlain by rocks of the Devonian to Carboniferous Texas Beds, which form a thick sequence of interbedded lithic sandstones and mudstones with minor chert, jasper, conglomerate, and limestone units.

Three major Triassic intrusions are located on the southeastern margin of the goldfields: Greymare Granodiorite, Herries Adamellite and Stanthorpe Granite. The region also contains deposits of tin, silver, arsenic and copper, probably largely related to the granites.

The structural geology of the region is dominated by southeast-trending faults and subordinate northeast-trending faults. Some faults show a radial distribution around the granitic intrusions. Many of the known gold deposits are located on, or close too, these faults.

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