Unfortunately, as with so many of the large gold nuggets that were found throughout Australia and the world during those days, it was melted down for its gold value. Larcombe sold the nugget to the State Government for £5,438, a huge sum of money especially back then. It measured over 62 centimeters in length and required two men to lift it properly. When the nugget was eventually weighed, it was determined to be 1136 troy ounces, or roughly 35.3 kilograms. He had found plenty of gold in his life, but nothing like this. Larcombe had spent the majority of his life prospecting for gold in Western Australia, primarily around Coolgardie and the surrounding goldfields. When the nugget was unearthed, they immediately knew they had made a spectacular find. It was said that the nugget was located beneath a road that lead to a mining camp, and had been driven over top of countless times by miners. This convinced them to stay there and continue working. They were actually considering moving on toward richer ground, until a 6-pound nugget was unearth in the area. Jim Larcombe had only been mining the location for a few weeks prior to the unearthing of the Golden Eagle Nugget. The story of the discovery is an exciting one. Located roughly 400 miles east of Perth and 50 miles south of Kalgoorlie in Western Australia, it was the location of several rich gold strikes in the late 1800s. The find was made in a rich goldfield near the now abandoned town of Widgimooltha. It was found in January of 1931 by a teenage boy, the son of a miner named Jim Larcombe.
One of the largest gold nugget discoveries in Australia, and the largest gold nugget found in Western Australia, was called the Golden Eagle Nugget.
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