ED Miles Mining Exchange is a heritage-listed commercial building at 65 Mosman Street, Charters Towers City, Charters Towers, Charters Towers Region, Queensland, Australia. It was designed by William George Smith junior, and built in 1887 by Ben Toll. It was added to the Queensland Heritage Register on 9 November 2012.
History
The former ED Miles Mining Exchange in Charters Towers was built in 1887 and extended in 1889, 1891 and 1901, to house the business established by Edward David Miles in 1883, and managed in partnership with Joe Millican from 1887. This was the first of a number of long standing mining exchange businesses established during the 1880s in Charters Towers, and thought to be the most successful business of this type in Queensland, operating from 1883 until it was liquidated shortly after the death of Miles in 1922.
The Charters Towers gold deposits were first discovered in December 1871, by an Aboriginal boy named Jupiter who accompanied prospectors Hugh Mosman and Adam Mosman and John Fraser, who were later joined by George Clarke. Jupiter found a rich vein of gold laden quartz. Mosman travelled to Ravenswood in early January 1872 to register the claim which he named Charters Towers, honouring the Gold Commissioner, William Charters. By March 1872 Commissioner Charters had issued 25 prospecting area permits in the vicinity of Mosman's claim and the rush began.
Two settlements were established, one which became Charters Towers and another distant which became Millchester. Charters Towers began with a number of stores, hotels and a butcher shop along a track that was to become Mosman Street, with the population reputedly 3000 by August 1872. There was rivalry between the two settlements, particularly after the courthouse was established at Millchester in 1873. However Charters Towers soon dominated. Its town survey was undertaken in November 1874 marking out allotments in a "T" formation, with the mines and the provision stores of Mosman Street on one axis, and the road to Millchester marked by Gill Street on the other. Charters Towers was declared a municipality in 1877 encompassing one square mile centred on Mosman Street. It included new churches, the Oddfellows and Good Templar Lodges, 21 hotels and 57 shops.
In the meantime, it had become evident the procurement of gold from the deep seams of Charter Towers required substantial machinery to crush quartz and sink shafts. This required working capital to find the gold, finance machinery and to pay the wages of workers employed on these time-consuming processes. The Queensland Gold Fields Act 1874 and Gold Mining Companies Act 1875 allowed for combinations of leases, claims and syndicates in order to work their leases at great depths. The legislation also underpinned the establishment of permanent settlement which would attract capital investment to the field. Early "no liability" companies were floated but were short-lived, known as "no reliability companies" by the banks which refused to finance them. Most mines were run by syndicates with financial backing by the town's businessmen. A number of share-brokers operated around town in the late 1870s, regularly advertising in The Northern Miner newspaper. Company shares were available to the general public, and this initiated the role of mining agent whose sole purpose was acting as secretary of these companies and dealing in their shares. From 1881 the Charters Towers Town Clerk Edward David Miles also filled the role of secretary for a number of these companies and by 1882 company mining became the norm in Charters Towers.
ED Miles, having first advertised his services in February 1882 became a full-time mining agent in February 1883 and established an office adjacent to the Miner's Arms Hotel in Mosman Street. A native of Wales, he came to Australia in 1862 attracted by the Victorian gold rush. He initially worked in Castlemaine and then moved to Ballarat. In 1875, he moved to Charters Towers and was employed as an engine driver, a miner and worked in the store of John McDonald. He was appointed town clerk in 1880. The first mining company he represented was the Day Dawn Prospecting Claim, one of the most successful in Charters Towers. Established in 1875 and floated as a limited liability company in October 1881 it later realised a record production of worth of gold in 1898. In May 1883 ED Miles was reporting to The Queenslander newspaper on 15 companies in Charters Towers, listing himself as secretary to five of these.