Dulverton was the first mill to be erected in the hill country on the north side.

In 1870, John Emmanuel Paine took up three small blocks totalling 344 acres, which he named Dulverton.  It consisted of portions 139 and 140 of the parish of Bassett selected on 27 January 1870 and portion 142 selected 6 weeks later. He bought a steam mill from John Walker & Co. at Maryborough in 1872 and it started crushing later that year.

In 1869, Michael Carroll had selected portions 130 and 27 in the parish of Bassett, 602 acres of land adjoining Dulverton.  He named this Miclere after both a place in Ireland and a gold field near Clermont where he had successfully mined.  An agreement was made between Carroll and Paine, whereby cane from Miclere was crushed at the Dulverton mill, the cost being half the sugar made.  Paine employed Edward Denman as manager.  Denman had much experience in the sugar industry in the West Indies.  A faulty design in the mill meant the clarifiers did not get enough heat, but Denman did not see that as a problem as he had learnt to "cold temper" juice in the West Indies, and sugar produced this way at Dulverton in early years left little molasses and fetched top prices in Sydney and Melbourne.

Paine believed white labour would be more reliable and cheaper than the Kanakas, and 12 Danes, Scandinavians and Germans from Bowen were among the men employed.  White labour proved unprofitable and after the 1873 harvest, Paine sold Dulverton mill to Carroll, who was by then in partnership with John Avery, for less than the cost of the machinery.  The mill name was changed to Miclere.  Carroll died on  26 May 1881 and Miclere was later sold to Farleigh.