 40001 Kiveton Park Colliery | |
| Location | |
|---|---|
  Kiveton Park Colliery | |
| Country | England |
| Coordinates | 53°20′21″N1°15′48″W / 53.33917°N 1.26333°W |
| Production | |
| Products | Coal Coke [1] |
| History | |
| Opened | 1866 [2] |
| Closed | 1994 |
Kiveton Park Colliery was a coal mine in the village of Kiveton Park, near Rotherham, South Yorkshire, England.
Until 1845, Kiveton was a rural village, where the main work was in agriculture. In that year, a railway line was built through the district, which connected Sheffield with Worksop, Retford, and Grimsby.
This line became part of the Manchester, Sheffield and Lincolnshire Railway. It provided a significant freight transport connection. Within 20 years of the railway's opening, coal was being mined at many locations along the line and transported and sold to merchants in the Manchester area and in the port of Grimsby.
In 1864, Carrington and Company leased rights to mine coal in the area around Kiveton. Sinking began on 6 June 1866 and the Barnsley seam was reached on 5 December 1867, just over 400 yards (370 m) below the surface.
In 1873, the Kiveton Park Colliery Company was founded, replacing the prior trading name and operation. Initially, gas was obtained from the Beighton Gas Company, but in the 1870s the company began to make their own. This lasted until 1956, when it started to draw a supply from the grid.
A new mining shaft was sunk in 1886, to reach the Thorncliffe seam. It reached its target at a depth of almost 700 yards (640 m). This coal was used for coking purposes and coke ovens were built adjacent to the colliery. The seam, because of a band of dirt at its centre, was an uneconomic proposition and abandoned after 10 years.
Another shaft was sunk adjacent to that serving the Barnsley seam and connected to it. For ventilation purposes this shaft was taken down to the Silkstone seam at over 700 yards (640 m). Passing through the High Hazels seam at just over 300 yards (270 m) this was opened up in 1900 because of its very good quality house coal. The small coal mined was used for manufacturing purposes. Until 1929, all coal was mined by hand, but in the years to 1940, the mining was mechanised.
In 1928, an amalgamation took place between Kiveton Park and Sherwood Collieries and in 1944 they were taken over by the United Steel Companies. The mining industry was nationalised in 1947.
The Barnsley seam was worked out in 1970, after just over 100 years of providing coal from its reserves. The colliery was closed in 1994. [3]
Both the colliery offices and the pithead baths were grade II listed in October 1986. The offices date from 1875 and their listing makes note of their unusual survival in the South Yorkshire Coalfield. [4] [5] The pithead baths, despite being a listed structure, was demolished in late 2013. [6] Much of the former site to the south of the colliery offices was remediated and landscaped before opening as the Kiveton Community Woodland. [7] [8]
In November 1882, an underground explosion killed four men. [9]
In June 1941, an explosion at the mine killed at least two miners. A fracture in a lamp was believed to have ignited a pocket of gas and caused the explosion in the Barnsley Seam. Five men were burned, two of whom died at the scene. [10]
John Dennis, great-grandfather of comedian Hugh Dennis, was a miner at Kiveton Park Colliery. [11] [12]
Walter Cecil Castledine, father of theatre director Annie Castledine and grandfather of writer and academic Helen Morales, was an electrical engineer at Kiveton Park Colliery.
Kiveton Park is a village within the Metropolitan Borough of Rotherham, in South Yorkshire, England. Historically a part of the West Riding of Yorkshire, from the Norman conquest to 1868, Kiveton was a hamlet of the parish of Harthill-with-Woodall. It subsequently transferred to the civil parish of Wales which takes its name from the neighbouring village.
Caphouse Colliery, originally known as Overton Colliery, was a coal mine in Overton, near Wakefield, West Yorkshire, England. It was situated on the Denby Grange estate owned by the Lister Kaye family, and was worked from the 18th century until 1985. It reopened as the Yorkshire Mining Museum in 1988, and is now the National Coal Mining Museum for England.
The Oaks explosion, which happened at a coal mine in West Riding of Yorkshire on 12 December 1866, remains the worst mining disaster in England. A series of explosions caused by firedamp ripped through the underground workings at the Oaks Colliery at Hoyle Mill near Stairfoot in Barnsley killing 361 miners and rescuers. It was the worst mining disaster in the United Kingdom until the 1913 Senghenydd explosion in Wales.
Cortonwood was a colliery near Rotherham, South Yorkshire, England. The colliery's proposed closure was a tipping point in the 1984-85 miners' strike. The site is now a shopping and leisure centre.
The Maltby Main Colliery was a coal mine located 7 miles (11 km) east of Rotherham on the eastern edge of Maltby, South Yorkshire, England. The mine was closed in 2013.
Shireoaks Colliery was a coal mine situated on the edge of the village of Shireoaks, near Worksop in North Nottinghamshire, close by the Yorkshire border.
The South Yorkshire Coalfield is so named from its position within Yorkshire. It covers most of South Yorkshire, West Yorkshire and a small part of North Yorkshire. The exposed coalfield outcrops in the Pennine foothills and dips under Permian rocks in the east. Its most famous coal seam is the Barnsley Bed. Coal has been mined from shallow seams and outcrops since medieval times and possibly earlier.
Steetley Colliery is a former colliery on the Derbyshire/Nottinghamshire border.
Harworth Colliery was a colliery near the town of Harworth Bircotes in Bassetlaw, Nottinghamshire, England.
Langold is a village in the civil parish of Hodsock, in the Bassetlaw district, north Nottinghamshire, England. At the 2011 census it was defined as a ward of Bassetlaw Council with a population of 2,472. It was built to provide housing for the miners of Firbeck Colliery between 1923 and 1927. Langold Lakes Country Park is situated on the south-western edge of the village.
Chatterley Whitfield Colliery is a disused coal mine on the outskirts of Chell, Staffordshire in Stoke on Trent, England. It was the largest mine working the North Staffordshire Coalfield and was the first colliery in the UK to produce one million tons of saleable coal in a year.
Frickley & South Elmsall Colliery was opened by the Carlton Main Colliery Company Ltd in 1903 in South Elmsall, in Yorkshire, England.
Wharncliffe Woodmoor 1, 2 and 3 colliery was a coal mine that was located at the junction of Laithes Lane and Carlton Road, about 2 miles (3.2 km) north-east of Barnsley, South Yorkshire and a quarter mile east of Staincross and Mapplewell railway station, on the Great Central Railway. The branch line junction was about 200 feet (61 m) from Staincross that connected it to the colliery via a private line. The line finished up between the three main shafts and the coking ovens.
Gibfield Colliery was a coal mine owned by Fletcher, Burrows and Company in Atherton, then in the historic county of Lancashire, England.
Bersham Colliery was a large coal mine located near Rhostyllen in Wrexham County Borough, Wales. The mine accessed seams found in the Denbighshire Coalfield.
Wheldale Colliery was a coal mine located in Castleford, Yorkshire, England which produced coal for 117 years. It was accessed from Wheldon Road.
Towneley Colliery or Towneley Desmesne was a coal mine on the Burnley Coalfield in Burnley, Lancashire, England. Sunk in the late 1860s, it was linked to the Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway's Burnley to Todmorden line which became known as the Copy Pit route and, by tramway, to the Leeds and Liverpool Canal.
Barrow Colliery was a coal mine in Worsborough, South Yorkshire, England. It was first dug in 1873, with the first coal being brought to the surface in January 1876. It was the scene of a major incident in 1907 when seven miners died. After 109 years of coaling operations, the mine was closed in May 1985.
Bentley Colliery was a coal mine in Bentley, near Doncaster in South Yorkshire, England, that operated between 1906 and 1993. In common with many other mines, it suffered disasters and accidents. The worst Bentley disaster was in 1931 when 45 miners were killed after a gas explosion. The site of the mine has been converted into a woodland.
Upton Colliery was a coal mine near to the village of Upton in the West Riding of Yorkshire, England. The site was 8.5 miles (13.7 km) north west of Doncaster and 10 miles (16 km) north east of Barnsley. Coal was transhipped from the colliery by the former Hull and Barnsley Railway line.
East of Sheffield by Roger Milnes. "Forward" - The journal of the Great Central Railway Society, No.16, July 1984. ISSN 0141-4488 (This article also uses unpublished material researched for "East of Sheffield" from various sources including members of the Kiveton and Wales Local History Group).
Official Company Handbook of the United Steel Companies.