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Littleton Colliery was a deep coal mine situated two miles north of Cannock on the A34 in the village of Huntington. The colliery closed on 3 December 1993 and was the last working coal mine on the Cannock Chase Coalfield.
The mine was named after Baron Hatherton, who had assumed the surname Littleton in 1812. The first workings at the mine, however, were conducted by the Cannock and Huntingdon Colliery Company in 1877. Upon sinking the first "No. 1" shaft, they encountered water at a depth of 438 ft (133 metres) and the shaft became flooded. [1] Lord Hatherton, who owned the land on which the colliery was constructed, sunk the "No. 2" shaft in 1899 which was completed to a depth of 1,622 ft (494 metres).
In the 1960s, the colliery was modernised and equipped with skip winding. After this, the production regularly surpassed 1,000,000 tons in a year.
The colliery closed in 1993 following the overturning of a reprieve granted a year earlier. The colliery has now been completely demolished and the old site is shared between Littleton Green Community School and a housing development. [2] The former spoil tip has been redeveloped into what is now known as Littleton Leisure Park and is an area for both walkers and wildlife.
One of the surviving steam locomotives that worked at the colliery, Littleton No. 5, is currently stored at Avon Valley Railway undergoing overhaul.
The Wyrley and Essington Canal, known locally as "the Curly Wyrley", is a canal in the English Midlands. As built it ran from Wolverhampton to Huddlesford Junction near Lichfield, with a number of branches: some parts are currently derelict. Pending planned restoration to Huddlesford, the navigable mainline now terminates at Ogley Junction near Brownhills. In 2008 it was designated a Local Nature Reserve.
The Astley Green Colliery Museum is a museum run by the Red Rose Steam Society in Astley near Tyldesley in Greater Manchester, England. Before becoming a museum, the site was a working colliery that produced coal from 1912 to 1970; it is now protected as a Scheduled Monument. The museum occupies a 15-acre (6 ha) site by the Bridgewater Canal which has the only surviving pit headgear and engine house on the Lancashire Coalfield.
The Hatherton Canal is a derelict branch of the Staffordshire and Worcestershire Canal in south Staffordshire, England. It was constructed in two phases, the first section opening in 1841 and connecting the main line to Churchbridge, from where a tramway connected to the Great Wyrley coal mines. The second section was a joint venture with the Birmingham Canal Navigations, and linked Churchbridge to the Cannock Extension Canal by a flight of 13 locks, which were opened with the Extension Canal in 1863. The coal traffic was very profitable, and the canal remained in use until 1949. It was formally abandoned in 1955, after which the Churchbridge flight and much of the Extension Canal were destroyed by open cast mining.
Edward John Littleton, 1st Baron Hatherton PC, FRS, was a British politician from the extended Littleton/Lyttelton family, of first the Canningite Tories and later the Whigs. He had a long political career, active in each of the Houses of Parliament in turn over a period of forty years. He was closely involved in a number of major reforms, particularly Catholic Emancipation, the Truck Act 1831, the Parliamentary Boundaries Act 1832 and the Municipal Corporations Act 1835. Throughout his career he was actively concerned with the Irish question and he was Chief Secretary for Ireland between 1833 and 1834.
Huntington is a civil parish and former mining village in Staffordshire, on the outskirts of Cannock Chase. It lies on the A34 road just north of Cannock and is surrounded by woodland. The village had an estimated population of 3,720 in 2004, increasing to 4,536 at the 2011 Census. The population in Huntington on the 2021 census was 4,715, a 3.94% increase from the decade before.
Tower Colliery was the oldest continuously working deep-coal mine in the United Kingdom, and possibly the world, until its closure in 2008. It was the last mine of its kind to remain in the South Wales Valleys. It was located near the villages of Hirwaun and Rhigos, north of the town of Aberdare in the Cynon Valley of South Wales.
Agecroft Colliery was a coal mine on the Manchester Coalfield that opened in 1844 in the Agecroft district of Pendlebury, Lancashire, England. It exploited the coal seams of the Middle Coal Measures of the Lancashire Coalfield. The colliery had two spells of use; the first between 1844 and 1932, when the most accessible coal seams were exploited, and a second lease of life after extensive development in the late 1950s to access the deepest seams.
The Somerset Coalfield in northern Somerset, England is an area where coal was mined from the 15th century until 1973. It is part of a larger coalfield which stretched into southern Gloucestershire. The Somerset coalfield stretched from Cromhall in the north to the Mendip Hills in the south, and from Bath in the east to Nailsea in the west, a total area of about 240 square miles (622 km2). Most of the pits on the coalfield were concentrated in the Cam Brook, Wellow Brook and Nettlebridge Valleys and around Radstock and Farrington Gurney. The pits were grouped geographically, with clusters of pits close together working the same coal seams often under the same ownership. Many pits shared the trackways and tramways which connected them to the Somerset Coal Canal or railways for distribution.
Baggeridge Colliery was a colliery located in Sedgley, West Midlands England.
The current Cannock Extension Canal is a 1.8-mile (2.9 km) canal in England. It runs from Pelsall Junction on the Wyrley and Essington Canal, north to Norton Canes Docks and forms part of the Birmingham Canal Navigations. Historically, it ran to Hednesford, and served a number of collieries, which provided the main traffic. It opened in 1863, and the northern section closed in 1963, as a result of mining subsidence.
The Elsecar Collieries were the coal mines sunk in and around Elsecar, a small village to the south of Barnsley in what is now South Yorkshire, but was traditionally in the West Riding of Yorkshire.
Rumer Hill Junction was a canal junction on the Cannock Extension Canal where the Churchbridge Branch left to join the Hatherton Canal. The junction, along with the northern section of the canal was abandoned in 1963. The Churchbridge Branch and Rumer Hill Junction were subsequently obliterated by opencast mining.
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.
The Tarenni Colliery and its associated workings, are a series of coal mines and pits located between the villages of Godre'r Graig and Cilybebyll located in the valley of the River Tawe, in Neath Port Talbot county borough, South Wales.
Whitburn Colliery was a coal mine located about three miles south of South Shields, North East England, located on the North Sea coast.
Cannock Chase Coalfield is a coalfield in Staffordshire, England, lying directly under Cannock Chase. It forms a rough triangle between Brereton, Essington and Pelsall.
The Burnley Coalfield is the most northerly portion of the Lancashire Coalfield. Surrounding Burnley, Nelson, Blackburn and Accrington, it is separated from the larger southern part by an area of Millstone Grit that forms the Rossendale anticline. Occupying a syncline, it stretches from Blackburn past Colne to the Yorkshire border where its eastern flank is the Pennine anticline.
Bank Hall Colliery was a coal mine on the Burnley Coalfield in Burnley, Lancashire near the Leeds and Liverpool Canal. Sunk in the late 1860s, it was the town's largest and deepest pit and had a life of more than 100 years.
Hapton Valley Colliery was a coal mine on the edge of Hapton near Burnley in Lancashire, England. Its first shafts were sunk in the early 1850s and it had a life of almost 130 years, surviving to be the last deep mine operating on the Burnley Coalfield.
Ellesmere Colliery was a coal mine in Walkden, Manchester, England. The pit was located on Manchester Road, a short distance south of Walkden town centre.
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