Arthur Clemes died in Johannesburg on 4th December, 1954, at the age of 51.
He entered Birmingham University in 1921 to study mining and metallurgy, and obtained the B.Sc. degree in 1924.
He joined New Consolidated Gold Fields, Ltd., in January, 1925, as official learner in the assay office and reduction works of Sub Nigel Gold Mining Co., Ltd., and in 1926 was made shift boss. Two years later he was transferred to the post of assistant mill foreman at the Maandagshock section of Lydenburg Platinum Areas, Ltd., being appointed reduction officer in December, 1930.
Mr. Clemes joined Union Corporation, Ltd., in the following year, for three months in 1931 in the capacity of mill shift leader and acting mill foreman with Geduld Proprietary Mines, Ltd., and then as reduction foreman and acting reduction manager, East Geduld Mines, Ltd. He returned to New Consolidated Gold Fields in March, 1935, when he was appointed assistant consulting metallurgist at the head office in Johannesburg. He had been consulting metallurgist since May, 1947. He was seconded for a period during the last war to the Department of the Director of Explosives.
Mr. Clemes was elected to Studentship of the Institution in 1924, and was transferred to Associate Membership in 1932, and to Membership in 1947. He was a Past-President of the Chemical, Metallurgical and Mining Society of South Africa, and had been a member of council of that Society since 1939. He was also a member of the American Institute of Mining and Metallurgical Engineers.
He was the joint author of several papers published in South Africa, and of the paper entitled ‘The treatment of gold ore containing pyrrhotite at the Sub Nigel, Ltd.’, published in the Transactions of the Institution (vol. 56, 1946-47).
Vol. 64, Trans I.M.M. 1954-55, pp. 527-8
