[1] Payable gold was discovered on the Copperfield River in September 1907, leading to the Oaks Rush, as the field was initially known.

[1] Kidston, as the township for the Oaks diggings was named, was unusual for a North Queensland goldfield in that the citizens at first successfully excluded public houses and grog shops.

However, despite the temperance movement, there were two hotels by 1909, and Kidston developed the usual rowdiness of a bush mining town.

[1] Kidston settled into systematic mining and was not directly affected by World War I nor the closure of the Chillagoe smelters.

In May 1920, the Government Geologist, Dr Harold Ingemann Jensen, recommended that a modern battery be constructed at Kidston.

Between eleven and eighteen men were employed establishing a sawmill, supplying the timber and constructing the battery, which commenced operations in May 1922.

Consequently, most miners developed smaller, richer reefs which produced low tonnages of ore that were insufficient to keep the battery fully engaged.

The battery operated from January to November 1925 treating 27 parcels of lower grade ore totalling 1,601 long tons (1,627 t) producing 760 ounces (22,000 g) of gold.

[1] The cam shaft of the battery broke and the box drain for water from the river was insufficient in 1935, closing it down for repairs.

G. Price at the Town View open cut had 750 long tons (760 t) treated at the Kidston battery for a yield of 55.77 ounces (1,581 g) of gold.

The battery was reopened in 1947 with Alf Hooley as manager and 1,238 long tons (1,258 t) of stone were treated for a yield of 94 ounces (2,700 g) of gold.

The presence of an operating sawmill during the construction of the State Battery in 1921-2 may also explain the reason for the unusual number of weatherboard buildings.

Components of the crushing plant include timbered ore chutes to two primary crusher pits (one jaw crusher remains in situ), connected by two external ore bucket elevators to the core bins, self-feeding 3 five-head stamp batteries.

[1] Two large elevated iron tanks (riveted fabrication) alongside the battery are fed by pipes connecting with a partly intact twin-cylinder pump which is mounted beside the river.

[1] The built portion of the town reserve occupies the eastern side of the old Gilberton Road, north of the Kidston State Battery through to the western bank of the Copperfield River.

The largest structure in the town is the recent Kidston Gold Mines core store, which is housed under an expansive steel skillion roof.

[1] Another group of abandoned buildings, including three timber-frame houses, are located about 250 metres (820 ft) south of the battery.

The earliest headstone marks the grave of John Joseph Hall who died on 28 January 1917 at 4 years 3 months.

[1] Kidston State Battery & Township was listed on the Queensland Heritage Register on 21 October 1992 having satisfied the following criteria.

The Kidston battery (including the manager's house and pump) is significant because of the role it played in supporting and extending the life of gold mining in North Queensland after what became the second last major alluvial gold rush in Queensland's history (the Oaks Rush of 1907).

Kidston, through the operation of the State Battery, supported the continuation of gold mining on the Etheridge field until the mid-twentieth century.

The battery demonstrates standard technology of the period and the high degree of self-sufficiency common to most isolated and remote mining operations in North Queensland.

Some of its built characteristics reflect its twentieth century origins and distinguish it from earlier counterparts with evolved vernacular building forms.