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MSF Quick Links

North West England

Nenthead Mill

Midlands

Little Eaton and Denby Gangway Coal Tramway

Pentrich and Oakerthorpe Coal Tramway

Loscoe and Erewash Coal Tramway

North Wales

Ffestiniog Railway

Mid Wales

Talyllyn Railway

Corris Slate Railway

Major Surface Features

The history and heritage of the UK mining industry is not limited to just underground mine workings and open quarries. By definition it includes the railways, tramways, mills, ports and factories that served the mines and quarries.

This page lists Major Surface Features, that is locations classfied as mining related and that served (or still serve) more than one mine or quarry.

Railways, Tramways, Mills, Ports & Factories

Click on the Major Surface Feature to view the home page for that location.

North West England

Nenthead Mill

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Nenthead Mines History and Surface Features

The earliest mining around what is know as the village of Nenthead was probably via surface workings and shallow pits, and would have dated to well before the 1700's. Nenthead at this time did not exist, and the area of the village to be, consisted of a hand full of dwellings.

It was the formation of the Quaker owned London Lead Company in 1692 and the subsequent merging with the Ryton Company in 1705, which was involved in smelting lead ore, which brought change to the mining that was being carried out in the area. After the merger, the London Lead Company (LLC) started to acquire mines of its own. During this period they applied for leases for the mines at Nenthead from the Greenwich Hospital who were the owners of the Alston Moor Estate, but failed to obtain them. However, Colonel George Liddle was granted leases, and he was responsible for building the first smelt mill at Nenthead in 1736. Liddle's operations proved to be unprofitable and the leases for the mines where transferred to the LLC by 1750.

With so many mines under the operation of the LLC they soon realised that an infrastructure was needed to support the expanding mining activities, and they expanded the site from the smelt mill to what became the village of Nenthead. With the LLC mostly being owned by Quakers, they felt a strong sense of social responsibility towards the miners. As a result, the company built miners cottages, shops, schools, a clock tower, a post office, a market hall and chapels for the miners and their families, along with the introduction of 'Mine Shops'. These were a sort of lodging house right at the portal of a mine so that miners did not have to travel distances during the working week and short harsh winter days.

The LLC was responsible for one of the largest mining developments in the area, and they were keen to use the latest developments to increase productivity. They employed mining engineers and chemists and subsequently were able to improve smelting and metal recovery operations. Joseph Dickinson Stagg's fume condenser was used for the improved recovery of lead from the smelt mills fumes, and Hugh Lee Pattinson's new process for the separation of lead and silver improved the yield of silver from poorer lead ores, as well as saving fuel. The LLC smelt mill continued to be used until it was closed at the beginning of the 1900's.

The LLC operated at Nenthead until 1882, when the leases were sold to the Nenthead and Tynedale Lead and Zinc Company. This company only operated at Nenthead for a relatively short number of years, and its decline was due to the falling price of lead. In 1896 the leases were sold to the Vielle Montagne Zinc Company of Belgium, which heralded yet another new era for the Nenthead mines.

The Vielle Montagne Zinc Company (VMZC) introduced modern technology and ideas to the mines at Nenthead. A system of air compressors driven by water via pelton wheel turbines was built, which powered new rock drills and winches. Traction engines and locomotives for haulage replaced horses, and acetylene lamps replaced candles. The VMZC reworked the old LLC workings for zinc and drove extensive new levels in the mines, which commanded new ore shoots. They still extracted lead, but this was not the main ore.

In 1905 the old LLC dressing mill was rebuilt when the VMZC commissioned a new plant on the site. The new mill was built by the Krupp's Company from Germany and came online at the end of the 1900's. It was a gravity separation plant and was said to be the most modern in the world. The treated ore from the mill was transported to Alston and then taken by rail to Tyne Dock where it was shipped to Belgium for smelting. VMZC operated at Nenthead to around the end of the 1930's.

During the Second World War the Ministry of Supply reworked the dumps for the production of zinc and lead for the war effort. In this period a floatation plant was erected within the older mill buildings. At the end of the 1940's the Anglo Austral Mine Ltd took over the leases from VMZC and the mill at Nenthead was refitted with a floatation plant to treat fluorspar, mainly from the Cambokeels mine in Weardale. Towards the end of operations in 1960, part of the dumps from the Rampgill Firestone Level were treated at the mill, but this proved to be unsuccessful. The plant was then sold to the Rampgill Mill Company for lead and zinc recovery from the dumps around Nenthead. The enterprise was short lived and closed down in 1963. In the same year the lease for Smallcleugh Mine was taken up by local miners, but little large scale mining took place. In 1970 the British Steel Corporation took up a lease for the whole of Alston Moor to explore for fluorspar, but nothing ever became of this at the Nenthead site.

Nenthead serviced a large amount of mines in the Nent Valley and ones from further a field. This left many surface remains around Nenthead itself. There are remains of a smelt mill, a gravity separation plant mill, powder houses, mine shops, reservoirs, leats, hydraulic installations, compressed air installations, aerial rope ways, fume flues, a chimney and old tramways to name a few.

Today Nenthead is a mecca for mine explorers and home to the North Pennines Heritage Trust, which has since 1996 been restoring the Nent Valley mine site. Now you could easily drive through this quiet village without realising the importance of its historical heritage.

Midlands

Little Eaton and Denby Gangway Coal Tramway

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THE LITTLE EATON GANGWAY

Origins
In 1792 Benjamin Outram prepared plans for a broad canal from Swarkestone to Smithy Houses, near Denby, with a branch at Derby to the Erewash Canal at Sandiacre, which he estimated would cost £60,000. The use of a tramway as an alternative was first proposed by William Jessop on 3 November 1792. The Derby Canal Act of 1793 authorized a rail connection between the Derby Canal at Little Eaton and the collieries to the north. The purpose of this 5-mile long tramway was to carry coal from Kilburn and Denby down to the canal at Little Eaton and general goods including stone, pottery and "clogs of wood".

Construction & Operation
Outram's original plan was for a conventional waggonway with wooden sleepers and oak rails reinforced with cast iron plates. Accordingly, an advertisement appeared in the Lincoln & Stamford Mercury for 16 August 1793 for oak sleepers 4 feet 6 inches long squared at each end for a length of 9 inches.
However by the time the railway was approved, Outram had decided to use the flanged ‘L’ section rails (plates) with which his name has become associated. In this he may have been influenced by Jessop, also by Joseph Butler of Wingerworth near Chesterfield, who had constructed a similar line in 1788. Butler is believed to have been the first to do so, and supplied the rails, rather than Outram's own works. Outram preferred stone blocks to sleepers and used them in this case (Dimns approx 1.75ft x 1.5ft x 1ft deep with 2.5inch hole 4 to 6 inches deep). The gritstone blocks were drilled with a hole into which an oak plug was fitted. The rails where 3ft long x 4 inch wide with a flange of 4 inches in the centre tapering down to 2 inches at the ends. They were attached by means of spikes driven into a countersunk semi circular cast hole at the end of the plates. The problem with the original plates was that the plates could move as the holes wore or were incorrectly spiked, this lead to derailments so to remedy this holes were incorporated 2 inches in from the ends of newer/replacement plates and the additional holes drilled in the blocks (3 hole blocks have been found as have blocks were the impression of the rail end has worn into it due to movement). The line is said by some to have been originally 3 ft 6 in gauge, being increased later to 4 ft 6 in at an unknown date, but evidence suggests the line was almost certainly 4 ft 6 in from new.
The wagons were built at Outram's Butterley works consisted of containers (aka body, box) mounted loosely onto a tram (aka chassis, undercarriage) with four cast iron wheels which floated on the axle. The trams were of timber construction with 2 ft 4 in wheels in diameter, 1.5 in wide. The coal containers were approx 5ft 9 in x 3 ft 7.5 in x 2 ft deep, they often had further raised boarding around the top adding another 1 ft 5 in. Capacity was over 46-48cwt of coal per container. Other containers were used of similar construction dependent on the goods being carried.
The typical working over the line was 4 horses pulling 8 wagons lead by a ‘carter’ or ‘gangleader’.
The tramway ran four miles from the canal wharf to Smithy Houses climbing approx 100ft, and another mile further to Denby Hall Colliery. Further short branches served Salterwood North and Henmoor Collieries, Belper Potteries (via incline to Openwoodgate) as well as the Denby Pottery.
Containers would be lifted off at Little Eaton and loaded complete into narrowboats by fixed cranes using 4 point chain slings or transferred to two-wheeled carts for carriage by road. The canal from Little Eaton led to Gandy's Wharf in Derby for onward distribution through the canal network or by road. This is probably the first instance of containerisation in the world.
The gangway and the canal opened in 1795, the first load of coal from Denby being distributed to the poor of Derby. The type of coal being carried was large lumps not the nutty slack we think of today which was just thrown away as waste in the 18th and early 19th century as it could not be easily transhipped by hand.

Closure and Remains
When the Midland Railway built its branch line to Ripley in 1856 the gangway lost most of its trade, finally closing in 1908.
The trackbed was used as the base of the new A61, which bypassed the old road through Coxbench.
The only remaining traces are the Clock house wharf building at Little Eaton (SK362410) and the route parallel to the railway through the village, the easternmost arch of Jack O' Darley bridge in the village (SK364420), and another two arch bridge over the Bottle Brook (SK363413) and some in situ stone blocks and route of the incline up to Openwood gate at Belper just below the A38 over bridge (SK377473). The Henmoor colliery route (branch) can also be traced at (SK376476) as far as the A38 where it is cut. A few of the stone blocks can be found in some walls near to the route of the line.
A wagon from the gangway survives in the National Mining Museum at Lound Hall.

GRID REF QUOTED IS FOR SMITHY HOUSE END OF GANGWAY, LITTLE EATON END IS AT SK362410

Pentrich and Oakerthorpe Coal Tramway

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Pentrich and Oakerthorpe Tramway (Gangway)

This tramway was opened in 1817 and ran from the Cromford Canal at Hartshay Hill to Pits around Pentrich (such as Waterloo Colliery), a distance of approx 1.25 miles to Broadoaks being recorded. A branch was added to Oakerthorpe (Longcroft) Colliery a further 1.25 miles away to the North.
A good deal of the route north beyond the road from Pentrich to Swanwick can be traced. On this section can be found a nice embankment made of colliery waste some 20ft high and just after a nice curved alignment following the edge of the woods. Passed Longcroft farm the route is ploughed under but maps point to it following a hedge line north down to the site of Oakerthorpe (Longcroft) Colliery. It had to cross a 20ft deep narrow valley which it appears to have done on another earth embankment built above a brick lined Culvert to direct the stream. 2 possible boundary posts sit in the woods close by. To the east of this location lie the remains of a small brick works inc kiln in the woods.
It is assumed to have been a gangway of the Outram type but that cannot be given as a definate and in recent walks no stone blocks could be found built into walls etc as with other gangways.

Grid given is for the centre section of traceable route towards Longcroft.
The southern Hartshay end of the route (at the Cromford) canal was destroyed/buried by the A610 upgrade SK388515, the far end is at SK397548.

I have put on a google map illustrating the route at
[link]

Loscoe and Erewash Coal Tramway

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This tramway was originally built in the late 18th Century to serve the collieries around Loscoe and along the approx South Easterly route of Bailey Brook down to Loscoe Wharf on the erewash Canal at Langley Mill.
The route is part traceable at Langley Mill to the right ofBailey Brook and Left of the Horse and Jockey pub. Most of the NE end of route was probably used as the later railway to Bailey Brook, Ormonde and Loscoe collieries.
The route seems to have served Loscoe Colliery and in the Red River adjacent to the former colliery site West of the main road at the grid ref given are stone sleeper blocks, recent measurements show the plates may have been only 3.5 inches wide compared to the usual 4 inches of the Outram type, One sleeper block had a spike in the head of which was the same profile as those on the Little Eaton and Denby.

North Wales

Ffestiniog Railway

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A short history of the Ffestiniog Railway should appear here.

Mid Wales

Talyllyn Railway

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Talyllyn Railway opened in 1865 to carry slates and passengers along the Fathew valley serving Bryn Eglwys Slate Quarry and the village of Abergynolwyn.

Corris Slate Railway

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Disclaimer: Mine exploring can be quite dangerous, but then again it can be alright, it all depends on the weather. Please read the proper disclaimer.