Ashnott Lead Mine

Overview

A limestone knoll in the Hodder valley pockmarked by four centuries of lead mining: a licence to dig for lead was granted here in 1538, the hand-shafts and opencuts on top are mostly 17th- and 18th-century, and the more orderly levels below, with their wooden rails ironed on the running surface, were driven in the 1820s before the lead slump closed the mine.

History

The earliest record is a lease in the National Archives, dated 1538, giving Thomas Proctor licence to dig, take and mine lead. From the early 16th century, if not before, miners chased the erratic lead deposits through the Ashnott limestone knoll, beginning with open-cuts and shafts and ending with levels driven into the hillside to reach deeper ground and to carry ore and water out. The ramified upper workings, with their small hand-shafts and opencuts, are principally of 17th- and 18th-century date; the lower levels, more ordered in their haulage and layout, probably date from the 1820s, as does the adit driven from the stream side in Ashnott Wood. A collapse in the price of lead, perhaps together with the marginal nature of the mine itself, appears to have ended the working in the 1830s. A report of 1835 says of the manor that 'there is a lead mine within the manor, from which a considerable quantity of ore has been obtained, but it is not now wrought, in consequence of the depreciation in the value of lead', and adds that there was a smelt mill near the mine, with an overshot waterwheel and the apparatus for smelting, belonging to the lord of the manor — at that time Edward Peregrine Towneley, whose family had bought the lordship from the Duchess of Buccleuch. The first edition Ordnance Survey, surveyed in 1847, still marks Ashnott as 'Lead Mines', which suggests a brief revival. Members of the Northern Cavern and Mine Research Group explored the workings in 1961 and published a sketch survey in 1966, and in 2014 the surface was recorded by Historic England's research team using Structure from Motion, which builds a detailed three-dimensional model from aerial photographs refined by observation on the ground.

Geology

The mine is in a limestone reef knoll which forms the core of a complex anticline surrounded by members of the Worston Shale group. The mineralisation was in the form of irregular strings rather than a single strong vein, which is why the workings that followed it through the upper two horizons are so intricate for their small extent.

Workings

Surface workings cover about 2.8 hectares of the knoll: infilled or roughly capped shafts, open-cuts, adits, spoil heaps and dressing floors. The main entrance is a level on the western side of the knoll about 160 m south-west of Ashnott Farm, and several adits are driven into the western face, two of them blocked and visible as shallow depressions with spoil; a large depression east of these has adits in its own east face and appears to be linked by a tunnel to one of the western adits. The main dressing area lies on the east, a large bank of limestone debris with smaller discard mounds and a shallow depression flanked by waste and served by leats, fed by two dams. Underground the workings are on four horizons: the upper two were reached by shafts from the surface, while in the lower two underground shafts drop from one level to the next. The lowest level still held, in 1961, the remains of a tramway of wooden rails with iron strips fixed to their running surfaces; several of those rails are now kept at the mining museum in Earby. A single-pot lime kiln of 18th- or early 19th-century type, built into the slope east of the farm buildings, was probably sited to use waste from the mine.

Closure

The major collapse in the price of lead, perhaps with the difficulty of working such erratic deposits, ended mining in the 1830s. The 1847 Ordnance Survey still marked the site as lead mines, which points to a short revival, but nothing is recorded of it.

What remains

The earthworks and buried remains of the mine, with the lime kiln, are a scheduled monument in two areas. The surface pattern of shafts, open-cuts, adits, spoil heaps and dressing floors survives across the knoll under pasture, along with the leats, the banks of two dams and a third dam recorded in 1847; the lime kiln stands with its west-facing draw hole and a slumped charge hole above.

Shafts and bell-pits with and without upcast, open-cuts, blocked and open adits, waste terraces below the limestone scarp, dressing floors, leats and dam banks, and the single-pot lime kiln.

Redevelopment

None. The knoll is farmland around Ashnott Farm.

Nearby mines

• Rimington Lead Mines — 12.5 km E

Straight-line distance, within 15 km. Show on the map.

Recorded claims

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

• A lease in the National Archives dated 1538 gave Thomas Proctor licence to dig, take and mine lead at Ashnott. ^1,2
• The ramified upper workings of small hand-shafts and opencuts are principally of 17th- and 18th-century date, while the more ordered lower levels probably date from the 1820s. ^1,2
• The lowest level retained, when explored in 1961, a tramway of wooden rails with iron strips fixed to their running surfaces; several are now kept at the mining museum in Earby. ^1,2
• A report of 1835 records that the mine was not then being worked because of the depreciation in the value of lead, and that a smelt mill with an overshot waterwheel stood near it. ²
• The mine lies in a limestone reef knoll forming the core of a complex anticline surrounded by the Worston Shale group, the mineralisation occurring as irregular strings. ²

Photographs & further reading

Sources

1. (primary) Ashnott lead mine and lime kiln, Newton (List entry 1016550) — Historic England
2. (secondary) Ashnott Mine — Northern Mine Research Society

Record created: 22 September 2026 · Last researched: 22 September 2026