This post is part of a series called Somerset Coal Miners
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- High Littleton
- Paulton
- Midsomer Norton – High Street
- Midsomer Norton
- Midsomer Norton Station
- Haydon
- Radstock
- Chilcompton
- Westfield
- Camerton
- Clandown
- Coleford – Coal Barton
- Coleford – Mackintosh
- Holcombe
- Old Mills
- Writhlington
- Timsbury
- Somerset Coal Mining – History!
- Paulton Basin
- Farrington Gurney
- Tunley
- Westfield Old Pit Road
- Newton St Loe
- Clandown
- Brandy Bottom
About This Location:
- There were two winding shafts, one square with wooden guides the other round with a 10ft diameter and wire guide ropes.
- The second may have been sunk when cages were introduced in the 1860s.
- A third shaft for ventilation and a fourth for pumping out water from the mine.
- The coal mining shafts were wound by steam engines as were many of the underground inclines, a new one delivered in 1861 for £254.
- Output during 1846 was 11,900 tons which in 1889 increased to 60,000 tons.
- By the late nineteenth century Greyfield was one of the most important collieries in Somerset.
- Owing to a lack of any road access to the pit head a double track tram road incline with probably a haulage engine at its head was built from the colliery to a coal depot on the Bath to High Littleton road.
- In 1873 narrow gauge rail lines were laid, the sidings being the responsibility of the GWR.
- Horses worked the sidings to start with, the first steam locomotive arrived in 1885.
- 1909 water broke into the mine from old workings, there was no loss of life, all water was pumped out by later that year.
- On May 28th 1911, 152 men and boys were made redundant by the closure of the pit.
- There were at least 4 other small pits in the High Littleton area- Mooresland, Woody Heighgrove, Mearns and Amesbury being the main ones.
About Somerset Coal:
We believe that Somerset coal was first discovered by the Romans. They were in the West Country 43AD, and there are references to it being used at the Temple of Minerva in Aqua Sulis (Bath). The coal used was probably found in coal outcrops around Stratton-on-the-Fosse, and transported along the Roman road – the Fosseway – for use in Bath.
Early coal workings, from coal outcrops, were largely in the Nettlebridge Valley, around Stratton-on-the-Fosse and Coleford, and to the North of the Coalfield, around High Littleton. It is estimated that output in 1500 was estimated about 10,000 tons a year, and that this had increased 10-fold by the late 1600s…
For even more information and history of Somerset Coal, Click Here.
High Littleton Figure:
