Mines

Recently added
Recently updated

The 100 mines most recently added, of 2555, newest first.

MineRegionWorkedCommodities
Grimebridge Colliery
A hard-coal Rossendale pit of 1851, reopened by its own colliers and worked until 1996.
Lancashire 1851–November 1963 Coal
Gomersal Colliery
A hand-got Yorkshire pit closed for fear of flooding after Lofthouse, now part of Oakwell Hall's park.
West Yorkshire 1916–June 1973 Coal
Swadlincote Colliery
A Swadlincote pit of 1852 that set a national productivity record three years before it closed.
Derbyshire 1852–February 1965 Coal
Nantewlaeth Colliery
A deep upper Afan valley pit with its own miners' halt, closed within two years of nationalisation.
Neath Port Talbot 1915–November 1948 Coal
Hawkins Colliery
A family pit at Cheslyn Hay for nearly a century, where a 1900 cage accident sent its winder to trial.
Staffordshire c. 1840–April 1960 Coal, Ironstone
Bretby Colliery
The Earl of Carnarvon's colliery at Newhall Park, worked for 86 years until 1962.
Derbyshire 1872–May 1962 Coal, Fireclay
Newmillerdam Colliery
A small Wakefield drift mine whose men were promised jobs at a new drift when it closed in 1981.
West Yorkshire 1929–1981 Coal
New Monckton Colliery
A six-shaft Royston giant with its own coke works, closed on economic grounds in 1966.
West Yorkshire 1874–3 December 1966 Coal
Ramcroft Colliery
A wartime pit mothballed for ten years, reopened for the next war, and struck in 1957 over the canteen tea.
Derbyshire 1916 (reopened 1939)–October 1966 Coal
Shirland Colliery
A Derbyshire pit the South Yorkshire miners' union bought in 1875, worked for a century until 1965.
Derbyshire 1864–May 1965 Coal
Arnghyll Colliery
A Durham coking-coal drift that opened and shut repeatedly over forty years.
County Durham By 1915–5 May 1951 Coal
Stagshaw Bank Colliery
A tiny Tynedale landsale pit in the limestone coal that only became a Coal Board mine in 1953.
Northumberland By 1882–4 October 1958 Coal
Barmoor Colliery
A Morpeth landsale pit that changed hands five times and still outlasted most of its neighbours.
Northumberland By 1882–26 October 1962 Coal, Fireclay
Nettlesworth Colliery
A Victorian pit that became a pumping station, then lent its name to a drift that worked into the 1970s.
County Durham 1861–27 September 1974 Coal
Crookhall Colliery
The pit that made Crookhall village, later a coking-coal mine for the Consett ironworks.
County Durham 1839–9 November 1963 Coal, Fireclay
Lambley Colliery
A small pit in a remote Northumberland coalfield that the Coal Board grew to nearly two hundred men.
Northumberland By 1850–16 August 1958 Coal
Tirherbert Colliery
A Hirwaun level west of Tower whose fan-house ruin was recorded on Hirwaun Common in 2009.
Rhondda Cynon Taf 1914–24 December 1958 Coal
Islwyn Level
A sixty-year family level in the Sirhowy valley that grew from seven men to seventy.
Caerphilly 1888–December 1948 Coal
Rockwood Colliery
A Taffs Well drift reopened on the eve of the war and worked by tunnels and diesel trains into the 1960s.
Rhondda Cynon Taf c. 1905 (reopened 1937)–May 1963 Coal
Glyntillery Colliery
The first South Wales colliery to run electric locomotives underground.
Torfaen c. 1913–January 1976 Coal
Thinacres Mine
A small Overwood company drift on ground first mined in the 1870s, worked into the 1960s.
South Lanarkshire 1938 (some accounts 1939)–May 1963 Coal
Newfield Colliery
A wartime Kenneth family pit that the Coal Board turned into a surface mine.
South Ayrshire 1940 (reopened 1948)–August 1956 Coal
Hindsward Colliery
A Cumnock pit opened three times in a century, last by a private firm that kept it going into the 1980s.
East Ayrshire 1880–1988 Coal
Overtown Colliery
A Coltness pit closed so the Coal Board could sink its shafts another 125 metres for coking coal.
North Lanarkshire 1931 (earlier pits by 1862)–January 1968 Coal
Cronberry Moor Colliery
A Cronberry pit with a washer that cleaned its neighbours' coal and a morphia scheme for its injured.
East Ayrshire c. 1920–March 1957 Coal
Coatspark Colliery
A 1930s 'ingoing eye' that revived the oldest way of winning coal at Cambuslang.
South Lanarkshire By 1933–May 1958 Coal
Woodside Colliery
A small Dalserf pit that lasted more than a century, from 1848 into the Coal Board years.
South Lanarkshire 1848–July 1955 Coal
Lochend Colliery
A Lanarkshire pit whose cone-topped bing, 'The Mexican's Hat', is a landmark and a scheduled monument.
North Lanarkshire c. 1880–December 1948 Coal
Forthbank Colliery
A Coal Board mine planned to last 24 years that grew to nearly a thousand men and closed after nine.
Clackmannanshire 1892 (reopened 1947)–January 1958 Coal
Melloch Colliery
A wartime reopening of an old Ochils working, run as an outpost of Tillicoultry mine.
Clackmannanshire c. 1850 (reopened 1939)–1948 Coal
Avonbraes Colliery
A tiny post-war drift whose coal crossed the Avon Water by bridge and climbed out of the gorge by incline.
South Lanarkshire 1949 (production 1952)–May 1965 Coal
Enterkine Colliery
Annbank's big pit, where seven men and boys died in a firedamp explosion in 1898.
South Ayrshire 1878–November 1959 (abandoned 1960) Coal, Fireclay
Lugar Mine
A wartime drift mine opened by the Bairds combine at the old ironworks village of Lugar.
East Ayrshire 1942–December 1953 (abandoned 1954) Coal
Bourtreehill Colliery
An Ayrshire colliery that was as much a pottery, famous for its white enamelled sinks.
North Ayrshire By 1872–1924 Coal, Fireclay
Meadowmill Mine
A short-lived Coal Board drift on an old washer site, now a dry ski slope.
East Lothian 1952 (production 1953)–June 1960 (abandoned December 1962) Coal
Isle of Canty Colliery
The Alloa Coal Company's last new mine, and the first pit the National Coal Board ever closed.
Fife 1939–1948 (abandoned 1949) Coal
Bellyford Mine
An old Ormiston pit brought back by the Coal Board, which took in the men of its neighbour Limeylands.
East Lothian 1866 (reopened 1949)–November 1961 (abandoned December 1962) Coal
Torry Mine
A Coal Board drift built to leave no mark on the countryside, its coal sent through tunnels to Valleyfield.
Fife 1951 (production 1953)–June 1965 Coal
Sorn Mine
A post-war Coal Board drift that was meant to last 25 years and worked for thirty.
East Ayrshire 1952 (production 1953)–April 1983 Coal
Dollar Mine
A small Clackmannanshire mine that set a national record for a single coalface in 1962.
Clackmannanshire 1943–May 1973 Coal
Callendar Colliery
An estate colliery that was half a brickworks, digging fireclay and blaes alongside its coal for a century.
Falkirk By 1855 (estate workings from 1830)–November 1959 (Policy Pit) Coal, Fireclay, Ironstone
Warrix Colliery
Sunk in the middle of a strike, its first coal carted off and sold while pickets tried to stop the work.
North Ayrshire 1894–November 1950 Coal, Fireclay
Oxenford Colliery
One of the last Ormiston pits, given a new shaft by the Coal Board in 1949 and worked for another decade.
East Lothian 1854–January 1959 (some accounts 1962) Coal
Hillhouserigg Colliery
A Shotts Iron Company pit worked for a century, from the ironworks' early years to the first years of the Coal Board.
North Lanarkshire 1850–April 1949 Coal, Ironstone
Rankinston Colliery
An ironmasters' pit sunk two hundred metres to a two-foot band of ironstone, whose bing still stands over Rankinston.
East Ayrshire By 1880–1913 (ironstone workings abandoned) Coal, Ironstone
Barbauchlaw Colliery
An Armadale mine that raised steam coal and fireclay, with a brickworks alongside.
West Lothian 1900 (earlier pits by 1856)–February 1952 (abandoned 1953) Coal, Fireclay
Wellsgreen Colliery
A Fife Coal Company pit in the Dysart Main, the thickest seam in Fife, now under a golf driving range.
Fife 1884-1890 (sinking)–April 1959 Coal
Ferniegair Colliery
A Hamilton pit where an electric coal-cutter's cable fired gas in 1909 and the widows took the owners to court.
South Lanarkshire c. 1850–February 1947 Coal
Canderrigg Colliery
Stonehouse's biggest employer after the looms fell silent, cutting coal by machine in seams eighteen inches high.
South Lanarkshire By 1905–January 1954 (some accounts 1958) Coal
Thankerton Colliery
Holytown's big pit, worked for over a century and employing more than 700 when it was nationalised.
North Lanarkshire 1850–December 1953 (abandoned 1954) Coal
Southfield Colliery
The Shotts Iron Company's big inter-war colliery at Shotts, with over 500 men at nationalisation.
North Lanarkshire 1920 (sinking)–May 1959 Coal
Dullatur Colliery
A 1930s anthracite drift mine near Cumbernauld whose brick pithead buildings still stand.
North Lanarkshire 1935 (earlier workings by 1899)–May 1964 Coal
Coalburn Colliery, New Cumnock
A New Cumnock pit first leased by the manager of the Marquis of Bute's pottery, worked on a small scale for over a century.
East Ayrshire 1854 (present mine 1924)–February 1962 Coal
Broomside Colliery
A shallow Motherwell pit where waste was being stowed hydraulically as early as 1911.
North Lanarkshire 1869–October 1948 (abandoned 1950) Coal
Ardenrigg Colliery
An anthracite pit on the moor above Plains whose coal rode an aerial ropeway down to the brickworks at Stepends.
North Lanarkshire 1908–June 1963 Coal
Hassockrigg Colliery
A Coltness Iron Company pit between Shotts and Harthill, worked from the 1870s until 1962.
North Lanarkshire By 1876–1962 Coal
Pirnhall Colliery
A Carron Company drift mine on the edge of Stirling, worked in tandem with Bannockburn Colliery.
Stirling 1933 (earlier workings by 1867)–1963 Coal
Shieldmains Colliery
An Ayrshire colliery of fourteen numbered pits and mines, the last of them worked until 1950.
East Ayrshire By 1900–March 1950 Coal
Craigrie Colliery
A Clackmannan pit sketched by Lord Eldin about 1770, still winding coal for the Alloa Coal Company in 1952.
Clackmannanshire 1852 (reopened 1942)–August 1952 (abandoned 1957) Coal
Littlemill Colliery
Rankinston's pit, rebuilt in the 1950s with a 325-metre shaft, whose closure in 1974 emptied the village.
East Ayrshire 1860 (some accounts 1905)–June 1974 Coal
Fortissat Colliery
A Shotts moorland pit worked for coal and ironstone, remembered now by the remains of Scobie's Bing.
North Lanarkshire By 1875–1949 Coal
Tillicoultry Colliery
The Clackmannanshire drift mine that gave television its first live broadcast from underground, in 1952.
Clackmannanshire 1866 (first listed)–18 January 1957 (abandoned 1959) Coal
Woodmuir Colliery
West Lothian's 'Blinky', whose tall brick washery still stands among the fields at Breich.
West Lothian By 1859–1963 Coal
Carriden Colliery
A Bo'ness colliery sunk at the start of the First World War in a parish mined since the thirteenth century.
Falkirk By 1905–January 1953 (abandoned 1954) Coal
Polquhairn Colliery
An Ayrshire house-coal pit that found a second life beyond a whin dyke and lasted until 1962.
East Ayrshire 1895–August 1962 Coal
Capledrae Colliery
A Fife cannel-coal colliery deliberately drowned with a diverted burn to put out a fire in 1888.
Fife By 1837–1889 Coal
Muirbeath Colliery
The last pits sunk in Dunfermline's own burgh coalfield at Highholm, worked for twenty years.
Fife 1894 (sinking from 1892)–1914 Coal
Preston Island Colliery
A baronet's island colliery in the Firth of Forth, built to fire salt pans and ended by an explosion within a decade.
Fife By 1807 (sinking from c. 1800)–1811 Coal
Little Raith Colliery
A Cowdenbeath colliery that probably lent its name to an early Raith Rovers, a forerunner of Cowdenbeath F.C.
Fife By 1852–1959 Coal
Grangemouth Colliery
A Forth-side colliery whose clay won honours at the Great Exhibition and whose subsidence made rare saline lagoons.
Falkirk 1839–1911–1912 Coal
Lanemark Colliery
The New Cumnock colliery that housed its miners in the South Boig rows and lent its name to a football club.
East Ayrshire 1865–1908 Coal
Gilbertfield Colliery
Cambuslang's 'slaughter house' pit, whose miners pulled their way to a national tug-of-war title.
South Lanarkshire 1880 (sinking)–1919 Coal
Banknock Colliery
A Stirlingshire colliery whose spoil heaps outlived it by fifty years as a brickworks' raw material.
Falkirk By 1869–c. 1931 Coal
Gilmerton Colliery
Three centuries of edge-coal mining on Edinburgh's doorstep, ended by a fire that sealed the pit for good.
Midlothian 1627 (first record)–1961 (abandoned 1963) Coal
Arniston Colliery
Gorebridge's colliery, whose Emily shaft was said to be the deepest in Scotland when it was sunk.
Midlothian 1858 (some accounts 1860s)–April 1962 Coal
Clara Vale Colliery
A pit village named after the coal owner's wife, built with the colliery in 1893 and still standing apart.
Tyne and Wear 1893 (sinking from 1891)–1966 Coal
Randolph Colliery, Evenwood
Evenwood's big pit, whose coke and gas works outlived it by twenty-two years.
County Durham 1893–1962 Coal
Midgeholme Colliery
A Pennine-edge coalfield worked for over three hundred years, whose coal once rode behind Stephenson's Rocket.
Cumbria 1628 (first record)–1954 Coal
Howden Colliery
A North Bitchburn company pit that worked every one of its parent colliery's seams except the Brockwell.
County Durham 1860s (first record)–1907 Coal
East Walbottle Colliery
A small Edwardian pit that lasted into the 1960s and kept its pithead baths.
Tyne and Wear 1908–1966 Coal
East Howle Colliery
A colliery lit, signalled and pumped by electricity in 1894 that worked out its coal within thirty-three years.
County Durham 1872–1905 Coal
Hutton Henry Colliery
A twenty-one-year colliery that took a village from 156 people to over 3,000 and then stopped paying.
County Durham 1876–1897 Coal
Shincliffe Colliery
A colliery won amid celebration in 1839 whose village, emptied by its closure, lost even its name.
County Durham 1839 (sinking from 1837)–1875 (abandoned 1886) Coal
Spital Tongues Colliery
The colliery that tunnelled under a city to reach its river, then failed within twenty years.
Tyne and Wear 1835 (sinking from 1833)–1858 (some accounts 1860) Coal
Prestwick Colliery
A Ponteland pit worked on and off from 1771 to 1966 that never employed two hundred men.
Northumberland 1771–1966 Coal
Brusselton Colliery
A small south-west Durham pit that the Coal Board tripled in size in the 1950s.
County Durham 1834–1968 Coal
Dunston Colliery
A Bowes pit that worked for a year, lay idle for fifteen, then ran for over half a century.
Tyne and Wear 1875 (first sunk 1873)–1947 Coal
Rough Lea Colliery
The largest of Hunwick's pits, whose fireclay pipe works outlived it by forty years.
County Durham 1858–1931 Coal
North Bitchburn Colliery
A Stobart colliery with its own pipe works that employed nearly a thousand in 1902 and is now a wood.
County Durham 1845–1966 Coal
Woodhouse Close Colliery
A colliery won in 1837 that ended as a 28-foot drift, its pit heaps levelled for a post-war housing estate.
County Durham 1835–1934 Coal
Sunniside Colliery
A hilltop Pease pit whose village of 1,500 emptied towards the coast after 1925.
County Durham 1867–1925 (reopened 1937-1965) Coal
West Sleekburn Colliery
A modest Bedlington pit that employed nearly a thousand in the 1920s, now marked only by a vent pipe.
Northumberland 1859–1962 Coal
Delves Colliery
A Consett Iron Company pit first worked by Mormons, which named it the Latter Day Saints pit.
County Durham 1847–1963 (Saints Pit closed 1913) Coal
Tyne Main Colliery
Its Friar's Goose engine house, the last pumping station built to keep the Tyne out of the lower river's collieries, still stands.
Tyne and Wear 1798–1926 Coal
Stobswood Colliery
A Northumberland pit that stayed small for forty years, then quadrupled and broke production records in the 1940s.
Northumberland 1875–1965 Coal
Toronto Colliery
A Wear-side colliery named after Toronto, whose village kept the Canadian name.
County Durham 1859 (sinking from 1857)–1967 (last plans 1976) Coal
Eldon Colliery
A Pease colliery of 1829 that employed nearly 2,000 at its 1921 peak and was pulled down within two years of closing.
County Durham 1829–1932 Coal
Byers Green Colliery
A Bolckow, Vaughan coking colliery that passed through six owners in ninety years.
County Durham 1841 (sinking from 1840)–1931 Coal
Croxdale Colliery
A Weardale company colliery whose village streets still carry the names of the men who paid for its houses.
County Durham 1875 (Thornton Pit sunk 1876)–1934 Coal
Aberfoyle Slate Quarries
Scotland's 'tartan slate' quarries, which outlasted most of the country's slate industry and reopened after the Second World War.
Stirling 1625 (first record)–1954 (some accounts 1958) Slate

Accessibility options

Saved in this browser and applied on every page. Colour is never the only cue on MineArchive; if links are hard to pick out, underline them or raise the contrast. For larger text, use your browser's zoom.

Contrast
Link visibility
Motion
Reading width