COAL MINING
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| SECTION 1 General notes SECTION 2 SECTION 3 LINKS
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GENERAL TO ALL AREAS Coal a sedimentary rock which was formed about 300 million years ago during the carboniferous period. The Coal was formed in layers known as seams separated from each other by layers of other types of rock. The number, thickness and quality of the seams of coal varied from coalfield, area,etc. From the late 1500's the English began to prosper as the role of industrial production started to increase, but as it did they started to realise that wood was becoming scarce and expensive. The developing industries of brewing, glass making and most of all the Iron Industry looked for a more reliable and plentiful supply of fuel and turned to Coal. From this time there was a ever increasing demand as machinery was developed, the use of steam engines expanded and the iron and steel industries developed. The railways used steel for the tracks and coal to power the trains, so as they developed, the coal industry was developed and was underpinning the whole of the Country's development. Coal has been extracted from the earth in the Staffs County since the middle ages only in small quantities for domestic use and due to the small population and transport problems the coalfields were slower to develop in the area compared to other parts of the country because for it to be mined in large quantities it needed transport to move it around the country, in some of the more advanced fields around the country this was provided by river or sea transport. It was not until the development of the canals and railways that the coal of Staffordshire could find a wider market and it could be transported to where it was needed. WALSALL WOOD AREA Walsall Wood was like Brownhills apart of the South Staffordshire Coalfields and was known as Cannock Chase Coalfield. There was Coal in most area's of Staffordshire and at one time it was like one vast coalfield with mine shafts in every district. In 1896 18,000 men worked underground and over 6,000 worked on the surface in the mines of South Staffordshire.
WALSALL WOOD COAL MINE (THE COPPY PIT) Walsall Wood and the surrounding areas of Aldridge and Brownhills lie in an area known as the northern part of the South Staffordshire coalfield. Coal had been extracted from the area since the middle ages, but only as small single digs where a coal seam outcrop occurred,and usually near to a main road for transport reasons. Later shafts were sunk to seams close to the surface and the miners and coal were raised and lowered on a platform in and out of the shaft bottom by a man winding a drum on the surface with a rope wrapped round it, similar to a water well winding. Later horses were used to pull the platform up using a series of pulley wheels.
Coal mining together with Ironstone, which was also mined, as it lay next to the coal seams had been carried out around the Walsall area since the 1300's. The then joint Lords of the Manor of Walsall agreed to share profits from the coal and ironstone mines on their land. In 1583 Lord Paget's mines supplied all the Cannock Chase area with pit coal. Lord Paget was a great entrepreneur, owning Blast Furnaces and pits in the area.His blast furnaces were supplied with Walsall Ironstone and Limestone from mines in Hay Head, near Rushall. The coal mining spread north from Walsall and Bentley through Pelsall following the Deep and Shallow seams where they were at shallow depths along the Pelsall road, Birch Coppice and onto Brownhills and Brownhills Common. GETTING THE DEEPER COAL Upon till the middle of the 19th century mining in the area had taken place where the coal was close to the surface, namely in the Pelsall and Brownhills area's. The mines in these areas could not progress further east towards Walsall Wood and Aldridge because of what was known as the Clayhanger Fault. This was a wall of solid rock which sent the coal down to depths of 800 Yards and prevented the seams from carrying on close to the surface. These 2 faults, the one mentioned above, The Clayhanger Fault and one further to the east called The Vigo Fault eventually proved to go down that deep the deep mines of Walsall Wood and Aldridge could not get under them to continue getting the coal. The area between these two faults became known as the,'Concealed Coalfield', because it was hidden by the two faults and was overlain by, Etruria Marls, which was a red clay which was used for brick making and pottery. The thickness of the Marl increased in a northerly direction and eventually proved to be 300 yards thick at Walsall Wood Colliery. The first indication that there was a large coal deposit between the two faults was in 1841 when the Earl of Bradford's agent, Peter Bradford, who's responsibility was to capitalise on the Earls coal assets, suggested that a trial shaft be sunk between the two faults. It was not until 8 years later in 1849 that a trial pit was sunk at Red House in Aldridge to a depth of 437 feet. This revealed the first four seams of coal and showed them dipping down at an angle of 30 degrees to the north. The trial shaft did not produce any coal at the time, it was not until later in the1870's a second shaft was sunk and the Pit was called, SPEEDWELL COLLIERY. In 1857 the first colliery to extract coal from the concealed coal field was called, 'The Copy Hall Colliery', and was sunk by the,'Rev. Bailey Williams. This was sunk to a depth of 591 feet, it was situated by Stubbers Green Road in Aldridge and had the extra advantage of it's own canal arm. The pit was taken over by Mr E. Barnett and in 1896 the pit employed 177 underground workers and 64 surface workers, Arthur Parton was the manager and W. Hall the under-manager. The problem with the pit was that under the terms of it's lease the pit had soon worked out all the coal in it's area and so became un-viable and closed in 1909. The evidence from these first two pits proved that there were workable seams of coal over all of Walsall Wood and Clayhanger, and could be reached after sinking below the 300 to 600 feet of the red clay marls. WALSALL WOOD COLLIERY The owner of the land around the Walsall Wood area were, The Earls of Bradford, who were owners of large areas of land and were Lords of the Manor of Walsall, some land owners chose to mine for the minerals on their land, such has, The Marquis of Anglesey, who sank his own pits in Chasetown at his own expense, others like, The Earl of Bradford, chose to lease the land and let others take the risk of, mining the minerals, employing men and finding markets to sell the minerals and make a profit. The first lease for the coal in the area of Walsall wood was made to a partnership of 4 men who set up,'The Walsall Wood Colliery Company', these four men , who were wealthy Walsall people who had little or no experience of coal mining were Edward Copson Peake, Alexander Brogden, William Henry Duignam and Lauriston Winterbottom Lewis and it was dated 29th August 1874. A further 2 leases were drawn up in 1874 and 1875 transferring the lease from the four individuals to the Company itself. Further leases were taken out in 1903,1915 and 1937 which gave the Company mineral rights until taken over by Nationalisation. The terms of the lease were that the Company would pay an annual rent of £1,250 pounds for the first 8 years and £1,000 for the remaining years of the lease. It was not from his income from the rent however that The Earl made his money it was from the fact that he was paid royalties by the Company for every ton of coal brought to the surface. This varied according to the quality of the coal of between 1 1/2 pence and 4 1/2 pence per ton. He would also be paid one shilling for every 1,000 bricks that were manufactured and sold. When the mine was sunk the Walsall Wood shafts were the deepest, at, (576 Yards) and the largest, (15 feet diameter), in the Cannock Chase coalfield The upcast shaft (No 2) was sunk first and completed in record time. The down cast shaft, ( No 1) like the upcast was brick lined but also had a cast iron lining going down from about 100 feet to 300 feet feet to hold back loose sand and water. The cage which took the men down the shaft, had 2 decks and carried 24 men. The water that came into the shaft was piped into a sump at the pit bottom and had to be drawn up, using a large tank fastened to the cage. The first workings were in the 'deep' coal south of the shafts towards Aldridge. During the life of the colliery 10 more seams were developed. In the late 19th Century the Company acquired, Pelsall Colliery, which employed 250 men and The Pelsall Iron Company. An employee of the Iron Company was a Mr English who had been working on a coal cutting machine, this was used down Walsall Wood and was one of the first coal cutting machines in the Country. Another unique feature of Walsall Wood was the ventilation system that was installed in 1879 , in fact it was so good it was still being used until the 1950's. There was a large furnace near the bottom of the upcast shaft, this was kept burning continuously and worked by drawing air down the downcast shaft, through the mine and then out with the rising heat up the upcast shaft. The grate of the furnace was 6ft-9ins long by 4 feet wide, it was built of ordinary red bricks and lined with firebrick. The roof was of strong sandstone which prevented combustion into the surrounding strata of coal. In 1950 the furnace was removed and a ventilation fan was put in its place. In 1896 the mine employed 513 underground and 154 surface workers, the Manager was Percy Neville and F. Bradbury was Under-Manager. Between 1916 and 1949 aprox 1,000 men worked at the mine, including miners, surface workers and office staff. There were also 50 to 60 horses used down the mine - they were rarely brought to the surface as the light would damage their eyes and so spent all their lives underground. Coal from the mine, which was ideally positioned between the main road and the canal and the railway, was transported to all parts of the black country either by road, locally, by, The South Staffordshire Railway line, or by Horse drawn canal barges, as the coal could be loaded directly into the barges at the canal basin inside the colliery site. THE DEMISE OF WALSALL WOOD COLLIERY. The Colliery companies working in the concealed coalfield new they faced a problem in the long term. The coalfield was confined by the Clayhanger and Vigo faults. Any extension to the life of the pits which could have been another 50 years, was to the east beyond the Vigo fault, since early workings had taken out the coal to the west of the Clayhanger fault. Several attempts were made to prove the extent of the Vigo Fault and to find the coal beyond it. The main one was undertaken by, The Aldridge Colliery around 1910. The best guess was that if a road was bored through the fault from the,'Deep' coal seam the coal would be found again if the road dipped 1 in 4 at about 900 yards below the surface. Two parallel roads were commenced at a depth of 450 yards and 30 yards apart. Cross cuts were driven between the roads at intervals of 120 yards. They drove the headings in and down for a distance of 1,310 yards passing through several small coal seams and came upon the Brick Clay seams which were still dipping down, they realised that the ,'Deep Coal', they were after lay aprox 330 yards below the Brick Clays, therefore the,'Deep Coal', must have been at a depth of 1,100 Yards below the surface. They were at that time 770 Yards below the surface. They encountered small quantities of salt water and although it never exceeded 6,000 gallons per day, it was not only salt but corrosive and poisonous. It was proving impossible to keep going in the broken ground and it was decided to abandon the project. The Coal Industry was nationalised in 1938 BROWNHILLS AREA
Brownhills would not have grew and developed into the town it is today if it had not been for the Black Gold just below the surface (COAL). The coal deposits had been there since the ice age and lay there all those years until a time came when it was needed and accessible. Running through the strata under Brownhills and so its coal seams are faults in the earth’s crust. The faults or cracks comprise of a main double fault and a series of small faults. The main fault or crack is known as the Eastern Boundary fault, which runs from Birmingham, in the south, to Rugely in the north . This Eastern Boundary fault divides into two near Aldridge. The right branch runs from Aldridge, through the Eastern side of Walsall Wood, under Brownhills High St and carries on Northwards to a point just north of the Watling St. This Eastern fault was to become known as the Vigo Fault. The left branch of the fault runs from Aldridge through the West of Walsall Wood, through Clayhanger and rejoins the Vigo fault at the point just north of the Watling St. This branch of the fault became known as the Clayhanger Fault. The layers in the strata to the East of the Vigo Fault, i.e. the Shireoaks, Stonall area are nearly a quarter of a mile lower down than those to the West of the fault. This meant that to the East of the Vigo fault the red clay marls were over 1,000 feet thicker, and the Coal 1,000 feet deeper down at aprox 2, 500 feet under the surface. But to the West of the fault the clay was thinner and the yard and deep coal seams were closer to the surface and so more easily extracted. On the western side of the main fault, where the Vigo and Clayhanger faults rejoin, the coal seams are cut, or separated by 3 cross faults, (cracks). One which is known as the Hammerwich Fault crossed about 150 yards south of Chasewater reservoir. The second and third faults ran parallel with each other, one either side of the Watling Street, this became known as the, 'Rising Sun Trough'. Now to the coalfields of Brownhills. Due to the fact that the coal seams between all the faults or cracks could not be reached from one mine shaft numerous shafts were sunk around the Brownhills area to get to all the coal seams. Starting in the north part of Brownhills coalfields The mine that opened just to the south of the Hammerwich fault very near to the Wilkin Inn, was known as the 'Coppice pit No 8', or,'The Corner Pit'. The shaft was sunk around the area where the Wilkin road joins the Hednesford road. The two entrepreneurs who were responsible for developing the coal fields around Brownhills and Chasetown were, Mr Harrison and the excellent engineer Mr. J.R.McClean. To gain access to the coal in the Rising Sun Trough, Mr Harrison sank the, 'Cathedral Pit', as part of his Brownhills Colliery Co. This pit was to become the main pumping pit to remove water from the pits to the north and south of the Trough. The shafts were connected by tunnels to allow the water to drain from each pit into the Cathedral pit and so be pumped out. The Cathedral Pit was in an area known as, 'The Wyrley Common', which was just south of the Watling Street and West of Brownhills. Many pits were opened on Wyrley common by William Harrison including, the Grove, Norton and Wyrley pits Mr Harrisons pits employed over 1,000 men in the late 1800's. Many other pits were opened at this time on the Wyrley Common. A little further west along the Watling St the, 'Conduit Colliery', was opened by the Conduit Colliery Company with the shafts, No's 1, 2 and 3 being sunk. Conduit No 1 was a small pit employing 120 underground and 44 surface workers.Conduit No 3 was the largest and in 1896 employed 836 underground and 264 surface workers, the pits were managed by Mr W. H. Whitehouse. These shafts were sunk in the area now occupied by Leeways Ltd.Also the ,'SunPit', 'Hart Pit', and the 3 shafts belonging to the Wyrley Common Colliery, which were to become known as the,'Red, White and Blue'.
South of the Rising Sun Trough on Brownhills Common, the coal was reached by the mines
belonging to the, 'Coppice Colliery Company'. Numerous shafts were sunk,
No 1 pit was half way between the Rising Sun and the Hussey Arms, just off the Chester
road. No 2 colliery was 150 yards further south The No 3 shaft was just south of the
Rising Sun in an area known as, 'Engine Meadow'. The No5 pit which was also a brickwork's,
was 100 yards north of Engine Lane , midway between, what was , The London and
North-western Railway and the tracks of The Midland Railway. The Brickworks was one of the
few on the common and the people who worked the Kiln were paid in kind at the, "Tommy
Shop", which was at, Coppice Farm, which backed onto the Brickworks, William Marklew
was the tenant farmer who also ran the Tommy Shop, which was reputed to be the last Tommy
Shop in the UK. The area around Coppice farm sank due to subsidence and a large hole filled with water
which has now become a fishing pond, known locally as,'Marklew's Pond'. The pond was
originaly known as the'Brick-Hole'.
(1) COPPICE COLLIERY PIT No 6 Mining for coal has always had its inherent dangers and has so been a high risk occupation. In 1843 The Midland Mining Commission found that 610 miners from the region had been killed in the pits since 1837, an average of over 100 per year, or 2 per week. During the 1860’s local mines accident funds were established to help families who had suffered through mining accidents. The Mining Regulations Act of 1872 tried to address the problem of accidents by directing that all Mines which employed more than 30 people should be controlled by a fully qualified and trained Mining Engineer. In 1878 an agreement was reached which stated that all widows and orphans would be paid an amount from a permanent fund. The payments were £4 for a widow and 10 shillings for each child under the age of 13 years old.
The most well known accident to have happened locally was an explosion which occurred at , ‘The Grove Colliery’, on Wyrley Common, Brownhills. It happened in the underground workings on 1st October 1930 and took the life of 14 miners. Ten of the Miners lived in Brownhills. They were all buried with honour together in a collective grave at St James’ Church Cemetery in Brownhills. The accident happened at the same time as the airship R101 was destroyed by fire and on which 46 people were killed and therefore the pit disaster hardly got a mention in the National News Papers of the time. The 14 men who were killed in the explosion were, Alfred Boden aged
49, John Brownridge 34, Ben Corbett 52, John Hackett 33, Alfred Heath 27, Jack Holland 41,
Richard Howdle 30, Alex Martin 32, James Malley 33, William Robbins 45, John Scoffam 50,
Harry Smith 38, John Whittaker 44, and William Whittaker 62.  The memorial stone to all those killed in the Grove pit disaster. Other accidents which were reported to H.M. Inspector of Mines were subject to investigation and reports were made, some of which are detailed below: 1855 - The Railway Colliery - A young boy killed when he fell down the shaft. 1859 - Pelsall Wood Colliery - The engine of the winding gear went out of gear and caused a death in the shaft. 1871 - Highbridge Colliery - Sand and Gravel broke into the under ground workings and filled the pit shaft burying 3 men. When the bodies were recovered they were stained red from the sand and were taken to the Jolly Collier Public House on the Pelsall road by Birch Coppice, the bodies were placed in cotton wool lined coffins. 1872 - Pelsall Hall Colliery - This was a disaster which took the lives of 22 men and boys. The Pit was by Knights Hill near Pelsall Hall. The miners struck into an unrecorded old working which was flooded with water. The water rushed into the Colliery and cut off the miners, when the bodies were recovered, 19 of the men and boys had died from inhaling Carbonic Acid Gas and 2 had drowned , this was 21 souls, the 22nd miner was never recovered. Legend has it that the miners have been seen walking down knights hill on the anniversary of the disaster at the time their shift would have ended. 1876 - Leighswood Colliery, Aldridge - Shaft sinkers were killed when the platform they were working on collapsed and fell 900 feet to the bottom of the shaft. 1880 - Aldridge Colliery - Known as Dry Bread pit, reputably because the wages were so poor , all the miners could afford to take for their lunches was Dry Bread. A Stallman called T. Chatwood aged 40, was killed by a fall of rock while he was ripping the roadway. 1883 - Coppice Colliery, Brownhills - John Jones an overman aged 47 years was killed by a fall of coal when a spragg was removed from the side of the road. 1883 - Walsall Wood Colliery - A Loader named Jas Harris aged 27 years was killed by a roof fall between timber and the face. 1883 - Aldridge Colliery - Richard Evans, a Loader aged 19 was killed when a fall of roof and rock fatally injured him. 1885 - Coppy Hall Colliery, Aldridge - A young boy aged 15, named Henry Bates who was employed as a horse driver, was found dead under a tub. It was reported he was probably riding the chain between the pony and the tub. 1855 - Aldridge Colliery - Henry Grice , also a horse driver, was killed when the tubs he was pulling came off the rails and knocked out a timber roof support in the gate road, causing the roof to fall. 1888 - Aldridge Colliery - A horse driver was also killed on this occasion. He was found dead under a full tub of coal. He was a Silas Hammond aged 16 years. 1888 - Aldridge Colliery - A lamp cleaner at the Colliery named Daniel Male, aged 15, was killed while on his way home from work. He climbed up a brick wall by the Colliery Branch Railway, to look at a birds nest in a crevice. A railway wagon was being shunted by a horse and the driver did not see the boy who was knocked off the wall and crushed by the wagon. 1889 - Walsall Wood Colliery - C. Talliis, aged 40, a holer, died when coal from the face fell and crushed him against a tub. 1889 - Coppy Hall Colliery - A Stallsman named Thomas Hall, aged 56, injured himself internally so severely while lifting a heavy piece of rock, he died one month later from the injury. 1889 - Aldridge Colliery - Thomas Hawley, a loader aged 28 was killed when the roof collapsed in a shallow face which broke down the timber. 1900 - Aldridge Colliery - A 42 year old Stallman, named Joseph Bowers, was severely injured by a roof fall. He lingered until the later half of 1901. As his death did not occur within one year and one day, the accident was not included as a fatality. 1901 - Aldridge Colliery - A Timberer aged 36, named Edward Carroll, was repairing a roadway when a piece of rock fell on him, severely injuring him. He died from his injuries on 7th October 1901. Six weeks after his accident. 1901 - Walsall Wood - Joseph Witton, aged 57, a holer drawed the back timber in a waste with a hammer instead of a ringer and chain. The roof collapsed on him and he died from a broken back. These are just some of the fatal accidents recorded at local pits. There were thousands of other non fatal accidents, showing what a dangerous occupation it was to be a coal miner in the 19th century HOME PAGE <<<<<GOTO MY HOME PAGE INDEX PAGE GOTO THE INDEX PAGE WHICH LISTS ALL THE PAGES ON MY SITE If you are interested in mining history try this great site. |
Marklews Pond, previosly
the 'Brick-Hole'.
