Allanshaw Colliery

Overview

A Hamilton colliery sunk in the 1870s by Sneddon and Co. and worked by the Allanshaw Coal Company, served by Peacock Cross station on the North British line. In 1904 an explosion of unexplained cause killed a miner and his son though their safety lamps were found locked. Its last seams were abandoned in 1942.

History

Allanshaw Colliery lay at Hamilton, by Peacock Cross station on the North British Railway's Glasgow, Bothwell, Hamilton and Coatbridge line. The station, open from 1878 to 1917, served Allanshaw alone of the collieries around it, and an Allanshaw signal box stood to the east.

Messrs Sneddon and Co. were sinking the colliery in 1876. That March four men were sinking a new shaft at 70 fathoms when the spring dog that held the kettle to the winding rope snapped, and the kettle, filled with stones and weighing nearly three quarters of a ton, fell from near the top onto them; James Paterson was killed and the others hurt. In July the foreman sinker, unscrewing the pipes in No. 1 pit as the water fell, slipped from a plank near the mouth and fell 60 fathoms into seven feet of water.

By 1890 it belonged to the Allanshaw Coal Company. In June 1904 an explosion of undisclosed cause in No. 1 pit killed a miner and his son (see Disasters, below). Its Ell and Main workings were abandoned in 1898 and 1900, the Ell in 1912, and the Main, Pyotshaw and Humph, Ell, and Splint and Blackband in 1942.

Geology

The Ell, Main, Pyotshaw, Humph and Splint coals and the Blackband ironstone.

Workings

No. 1 pit, 60 fathoms by 1876, and a second shaft being sunk that year; safety lamps in use by 1904.

Closure

Its last workings, in the Main, Pyotshaw, Humph, Ell, Splint and Blackband, were abandoned in 1942.

What remains

Unknown.

Redevelopment

Unknown.

Disasters & major incidents

• Allanshaw Colliery explosion, 1904
  13 June 1904 · Explosion · 2 fatalities
  Early on the morning of 13 June 1904 a man at the pit bottom of No. 1 pit, Allanshaw Colliery, Hamilton, heard a dull noise. A search found the miner Patrick Harrison unconscious and badly burned and his son dead. There were signs of an explosion, yet the workings were undamaged and both men's safety lamps were locked. Patrick Harrison died in Glasgow Royal Infirmary two days later.

Recorded claims

Individual factual claims, each attached to the source(s) that support it below. Where sources disagree, both are kept.

• Peacock Cross station (1878-1917) served Allanshaw colliery, and an Allanshaw signal box stood to its east. ¹
• In March 1876 the kettle fell on four men sinking a new shaft at 70 fathoms at Allanshaw, killing one. ²
• The Allanshaw Coal Company owned the colliery from at least 1890 to 1911. ^2,3,4
• Its Splint and Blackband workings were abandoned in 1942. ⁵

Photographs & further reading

Sources

1. (secondary) Wikipedia: Peacock Cross railway station — Wikipedia
2. (secondary) Accidents 1876-1899 — Scottish Mining Website — Scottish Mining Website
3. (primary) NMRS Coal Mining Accidents and Deaths: Allanshaw, No.1, 1904 (Patrick Harrison) — Northern Mine Research Society
4. (primary) NMRS Coal Mining Accidents and Deaths: Allanshaw, 1911 — Northern Mine Research Society
5. (primary) BGS / Mining Remediation Authority mine plan: Allanshaw, Splint and Blackband, abandoned 1942 — British Geological Survey
6. (primary) BGS / Mining Remediation Authority mine plan: Allanshaw, Ell and Main, abandoned 1898 — British Geological Survey
7. (primary) NMRS Coal Mining Accidents and Deaths: Allanshaw, No.1, 1904 (Edward Harrison) — Northern Mine Research Society
8. (secondary) Hamilton Parish Accidents 1900-1914 — Scottish Mining Website

Record created: 16 October 2026 · Last researched: 16 October 2026