tarboat's photos

The front end of the boilerhouse at a disused textile mill.

Churnet Valley winter steam gala action between Consall and Cheddleton.

Underground again, but this time it isn't a mine. This is the tailrace for a large water wheel that powered a late eighteenth century cotton spinning mill.

More underground fun in a drift mine. Level in the coal seam with the site of an air door ahead. It could have done with an air door now as the atmosphere in here was very poor indeed.

The tidal Trent at West Stockwith. If you look closely the power station at West Burton can be seen on the left.

I am still learning the techniques of photography underground and this is not really as good as I would have wished. However, it does give a feel for the scale of this underground stone quarry where enormous quantities of gritstone have been mined, leaving extensive caverns of which many have been part filled with waste rock as seen here.

5197 between Consall and Cheddleton at the winter steam gala.

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. :-)

These days I seem to be spending more and more time underground. There is a special feeling to the architecture of culverts and tunnels and the shapes are often wonderful to behold. This is the Norbury Brook as it passes underneath the former Macclesfield, Bollington and Marple Railway at Middlewood - all nicely finished in gritstone. Plenty of ochre around, but then this is right in the coal measures.

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

A particularly appealing feature of the High Lane Limekiln is this carved keystone in the arch of the draw hole.

Cheshire is not a county well known for limekilns but there are a few examples to be found if you look carefully. This example at High Lane is situated against the bank of the High Lane Arm of the Macclesfield Canal. There were two bowls to the kiln which fed into a central draw tunnel. Limestone would have been brought by canal from Bugsworth after transport down the Peak Forest Tramway from Dove Holes. The kiln was already disused in 1868 so cannot have operated for long as the canal was not completed until 1831. Today it stands in the garden of a private house and is used for storage. A particularly appealing and unusual feature is the keystone .

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'.

A giant gasholder looms behind the SY shifting the slag ladles at Fushun Special Steel.

W Palmer & Sons' brickworks is listed in the 1904, 1924 and 1940 Kelly's trade directory at Leek New Road, Cobridge, Burslem. I think that this may be a product of their brickyard

Headgear at Caphouse Colliery.

A view of this crossing between Hazel Grove and Middlewood on the LNWR Stockport to Buxton line in the early years of the twentieth century. The view today .

Situated on a 'rat run' to the A6 the level crossing at Norbury Hollow has little room for vehicles to pass on either side of the almost right angle turns as you drive on and off. This is the former LNWR line from Stockport to Buxton between Hazel Grove and Middlewood. The present crossing cabin replaced a small single storey house a few years ago. The view at the start of the twentieth century .