Coal Mining

Fellow Flickrite Pitheadgear sits on a pile of fallen coal to give scale to this view inside nineteenth century pillar and stall workings exposed at the Cutacre opencast mine. This tunnel is in the Rams seam which is about 6ft thick and was operated until 1879. A significant amount of coal was left in the roof as support.

Soon to be dug up, washed, and the coal left within extracted. The Cutacre Tip at Little Hulton is thought to contain 850,000 tonnes of reclaimable coal.

Messrs Clayton and Brooke, proprietors of Norbury Colliery, erected a large beam pumping engine in the 1840s to manage the water in the workings. The water raised was allowed to run into the nearby Norbury Brook but the construction of the railway line to Whaley Bridge crossed the outflow necessitating the construction of a long brick-lined culvert to carry the water through the railway embankment. Although the colliery closed in 1892, water continues to flow through the culvert from the shaft which is around 900ft deep.

The fading sign indicates the hand of the long defunct N.C.B (National Coal Board) in the capping of this eighteenth century coal mine at Pott Shrigley. Having installed the cap over the stone lined shaft, the only danger that I could perceive was that of tripping over the concrete obelisk itself! Sadly, this sort of engineering has destroyed much of the archaeological evidence that had survived at the surface.

One of the ambitious projects currently underway at the excellent Anson Museum , is the diorama of Poynton as it was in 1900. This is being undertaken by the local history volunteers who have already put in 1700 hours of work on the model. In this view the centre is occupied by the Lord and Lady Pits with the Newtown Houses to the right and Petre Bank cottages behind. To the right of this is the Quarry Pit and in the left background are the Park Pits.

At the far end of the Hengshan division of the Jixi collieries is Zhangxin Mine. This is unusual for this area as it is a deep mine with conventional headgear.

On May 22nd 1819, the Macclesfield Courier published an advert for a colliery close to Congleton. "The public are hereby informed that the Daneinshaw Coal Works are now completely re-established by a rail road from the works to the Turnpike Road at the foot of Daneinshaw bridge where they may be supplied with any quantity of fine, large, and good coal as any in the kingdom. Countless carts may come up Park Lane toll free; it is a good road and the wharf is convenient for loading as every accommodation will be rendered for loading of carts, etc, at the wharf." It appears that the enterprise did not last very long as there was a sale of effects from the closed colliery in September 1834. In 1995 after a certain amount of detective work I identified some evidence of the tramroad and was able to follow the route to find the remains of the colliery. Today I thought I would see if there was still something to see of the shaft and indeed it was still there, about 5ft in diameter and stone lined. This is just inside Staffordshire although there are further colliery remains in an adjacent valley just the Cheshire side of the border.

Headgear at Caphouse Colliery.

Coal Mining was quite extensive across Pott Shrigley in the eighteenth century, although the coalfield was small and badly divided by faults. Above Long Lane, which forms the boundary between Adlington and Pott Shrigley, there are a number of abandoned shafts which are easily spotted due to the plantations of trees over and around them. The planting of trees was a stipulation in the leases from the Downes family of Pott Shrigley. When a pit was finished and abandoned it was to be walled or fenced round and trees planted. The fences have long gone but the trees remain. These pits were working the Bassy Mine (or seam) which averaged about 48ins thickness but was split up by a number of dirt bands. The shaft on the right is situated on the outcrop of the Ribbon MIne which was only about 10ins thick, whilst the Sweet Mine (18ins) outcrops just in front of the camera. Nab Farm can be seen in the centre, whilst to the left is another mound with trees which is probably the site of another shaft. Until the late 1970s these shafts were open, but they have since been capped.

In the baths building at Caphouse Colliery.

A small coal mine near Jixi. The winding house is top right and the top of the sheaves can just be seen above the steep slant into the mine. This mine was closed in early 2008 but was still in full production when this shot was made.

I don't often get angry, but to see the devastation that once was Cresswell Colliery really upset me. A fine example of a whole community thrown on the scrapheap for political ends. What was once one of the most productive collieries in the East Midlands is now a wasteland where even the underground cabling has been stripped out for scrap. The village institute, originally provided by the Bolsover Colliery Company, stands almost derelict and the sports fields appear to be under attack by bulldozers. Only the model village still stands after a massive investment of public money, but what future for the people who live there? I came away very depressed with a society that is prepared to throw people's lives away as they have been throughout the coalfields. The abandoned track of the former tub circuit leads to one of the shaft buildings which was retained after closure in 1991and used for ventilation and emergency winding for (I think) Welbeck colliery.

These massive walls are the remains of the Aspull Pumping Pit of the Wigan Coal and Iron Co. In the early 1870s work commenced to concentrate pumping from the Cannel and King seams at this location and a 21ft diameter shaft was sunk here. By December 1876 the work was completed and the water had proved so great that the pumphouse (seen here in the background) contained three direct acting steam engines with inverted cylinders working 20 inch ram pumps. An engineer with the company stated that 'these great pumping engines made a big noise when working, snorting, groaning and shaking everything when the pistons came to the end of their stroke'.

I went for a crawl into an old colliery and very interesting it was. I had a go at light painting but it came out rather grainy because of using my small camera due to the restricted space. This is a roadway dipping down along the seam which can be seen to left and right.

Cheshire is not widely known as a mining county but there is plenty of coal along the eastern fringe. This has been mined extensively and often on quite a large scale at places such as Poynton and Norbury. Coal seams can be found on the surface if you know where to look; this is the Gees or Silver seam in the bank of the Norbury Brook. It comprises about four feet of coal in three bands interspersed with shales and fireclay. Although the outcrop here is rather weathered, the coal still burns very nicely. :-)

This beautiful arched adit served for tramming out coal and fireclay from a small mine. The use of brick arching on stone walls is fascinating. View On Black

I nearly didn't get this shot. I had walked a considerable distance up the branch to the Lijing Mine on the Hengshan system of the Jixi coal railway. A few minutes earlier I had changed lenses and had not noticed that a small sealing ring had become partly detached. Shortly afterwards the loose ring stated to foul the mirror when it swung clear and the camera ceased to function. Detecting the fault and fixing it in the freezing temperatures induced mild panic as the train was about to set off. The spare camera was over a mile away in the minibus. Luckily I was able to sort it all out just as things started to move. I wonder what happened to the chimney on the locomotive?

Harworth Colliery closed in 2006 and has since been kept on care and maintenance by owners UK Coal. With the rising price of coal and the impending exhaustion of reserves at Welbeck Colliery there is now talk of a possible reopening here. The two shafts which were sunk in the 1920s are 900 and 1000m deep. There are estimated to be around 40 million tonnes of reserves in the Deep Soft and Top Hard seams. This view is taken from the south , looking over the devastation that was the adjacent light bulb factory.