Research Projects

by Frank Williamson

With their large housing estates and proximity to the centre of Durham City, few people would readily associate Gilesgate Moor, Belmont and Carrville with a history of coal mining, but in the land that lies between Sunderland Road and the river Wear there were at various times in the 1800s and early 1900s five operational coal mines.

The Coal Mines.

The five mines were Kepier Colliery, Grange Colliery, two named Kepier Grange Colliery, (the similarity and interlinking of the names leading to some confusion in the unravelling of their history) and Florence Pit which was linked with Kepier Colliery.

1. Kepier Colliery

Kepier Colliery was the earliest of the five, it being recorded in the Victoria History of Durham (1) that in 1818 “a boring was put down below the Hutton seam at Kepier Colliery, nothing was found”.There is no record of when before 1818 the pit was opened, but it is shown as an operational colliery on the 1st series Ordnance Survey (O.S.) Map published in 1861-62. Kepier Colliery was situated in Gilesgate Moor a few yards to the north of Sunderland Road in an area now containing the recently built Mackintosh Court. The date that the colliery closed is unknown but the site is shown as disused on the 2nd series O.S. Map which was published in 1898.

2. Grange Colliery

Grange Colliery was also recorded in the Victoria History of Durham (1) as having been opened in 1843 following boring operations the previous year. It is shown as being operational on the 1st series O.S. Map published in 1861-62 and was sited on land which is now occupied by a caravan park close to the A1M junction. The colliery’s closure date is the subject of some debate. Records held by the Durham Mining Museum (2) and published in "Durham Collieries - a listing" (3), show closing dates variously between 1934 and 1948, but F. Whellan (4) records in 1894 that “on the site of the old Grange Colliery, the Grange Iron Company's Works were established in 1867 and that “ most of the villages mentioned have fallen into decay owing to the collieries on the Low Grange and High Grange estates ceasing to work and many of the houses are falling down”. The Grange Iron Works closed in 1926 and a 1948 closure date is thrown into further doubt by an eye witness report that the derelict site, including the old mine shaft was bombed in a German air raid in 1941.

3. Kepier Grange Colliery (1st)

This colliery was sited in the north east corner of what is now Belmont Industrial Estate, about 200 yards from the side of the A1M. It was shown as operational on the 1st series of O.S.Map published in 1861-62 and the Victoria History of Durham (1) records that “in 1844 Kepier Grange pit was sunk from the surface to the Brockwell seam”. Both the Durham Mining Museum (2) and the "Durham Collieries - a listing" (3) record the date of closure of this earlier Kepier Grange Colliery as 1924, but the 2nd series O.S.Map shows the site as disused in 1898.

4. Kepier Grange Colliery (2nd)

It is more likely that the 1924 closure date refers to this colliery which was situated where the junction now links Belmont Road and the A690 dual carriageway. No specific written records have come to light to date the opening of this pit. However it was not shown on the 2nd series O.S. Map published in 1898 but was shown as operational on the 3rd series O.S.Map, published 1921-24 which narrows down the opening date to some extent.

5. Florence Pit.

The Victoria History of Durham (1) states that “in 1872 No2. Shaft, Florence Pit, Kepier Colliery was sunk from the surface to the Busty seam”. Here again by the time of the publication of the 2nd series O.S.Map (published 1898) the site was shown as disused. The site of the Florence Pit was halfway down a steep incline towards the river and next to a footpath which now leads from Kepier Woods to Kepier Hospital. Neither the O.S.Map nor evidence from the site itself gives any clue to the practical means that were employed to transport the coal mined from the pit

Coal Transportation.

Apart from the Florence Pit, all the collieries were linked by rail to a spur line running from Belmont Junction to Gilesgate Station which according to Maitland (5) was opened primarily for passenger traffic on 13th June 1844. Kepier Colliery, which predated the spur line, had a rail link to the spur which was about a half a mile long, while the other collieries were, probably by design located very close to the spur line. Prior to 1844, Kepier Colliery had a long rail link running through Dragonville to the Houghall-Pittington line, the scant evidence for this being shown on a map of the local railway system contained in the Londonderry papers (6).

References

(1) Page. W ed. The Victoria History of the Counties of England. A History of Durham Volume II, Archibald Constable + Co.Ltd, 1907

(2) Durham Mining Museum Website - Mining – Collieries (May 2003)

(3) Durham County Record Office Durham Collieries – a listing, Durham County Record Office 2001

(4) Whellan, F & Co. History, Topography and Directory of the County Palatine of Durham 2nd Edition 1894, Ballantyne, Hanson & Co 1894

(5) Maitland, A. Durham City and the Railway Age, University of Durham 1994

(6) History of Belmont (Maps), Londonderry Papers – Map of Railways 1843

Digitised by C. Wild

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