Auchinreoch Colliery

Overview

A William Baird colliery at Auchinreoch near Kilsyth, sunk about 1900 and working coking coal through the first quarter of the 20th century with something over 350 men at its height. By 1937 it was down to ten men and standing idle. Five deaths there are named, among them a girl of nineteen picking stone at the surface.

History

Auchinreoch appears in the Lists of Mines from 1900, when 35 people were employed and the entry is marked as sinking, under William Baird and Co. Ltd. Baird had come into this district about 1860 and built much of its mining community, and the industry the firm began here lasted rather more than a century. The colliery grew quickly: 253 employed by 1905, 359 by 1910, and after a dip to 286 in 1915 it was back to 342 in 1920 and 352 in 1923, the great majority underground. It raised coking coal from the Coking and Haughrig seams, with the Wee seam added by 1920. Then it stopped: the 1937 return shows ten people, five below and five at the surface, and the colliery noted as presently idle. Five deaths at the colliery are named in the Durham Mining Museum's list, and four of the five involve haulage. Jeannie McGhee, nineteen, a stone picker, went over a fence for some reason nobody established and was caught by the blades of a dross conveyor on 28 December 1905. Charles Wilson, a drawer of twenty-three, was run into by a runaway hutch in 1906 after another drawer lost control of it when a snibble came out. Samuel Jackson, a miner of fifty, was caught in 1909 by a stationary race of hutches that started as he passed it. James Shaw, a brakesman of sixty-four, signalled in January 1913 for the rake to be run without the empty hutches attached, so that the full ones ran away; his bruises were thought slight and he died of lung complications eight days later. William Stevenson, a miner of thirty, was overtaken and run over by a rope-drawn rake in December 1913 while walking out at the end of his shift, having run in front of it past a manhole he could easily have reached — the inspector noted that the manholes were of good size but had not been whitewashed.

Geology

The colliery worked Coal Measures seams of the Central Scottish coalfield: the Coking and Haughrig seams from the start, with the Wee seam added by 1920. The names are local, and the coking quality is what the Lists of Mines record it selling.

Geological setting: Sedimentary Beds and Seams (well documented example)

Workings

Sinking was under way in 1900 with 35 people employed. Underground haulage was by rope-drawn rakes of hutches on inclines the returns call dooks, with manholes cut in the sides of the roadways for men to stand in as a rake passed — the arrangement that four of the colliery's five recorded deaths turned on.

Closure

No closure date has been located. The colliery was still returning 352 people in 1923 but appears in the 1937 list with ten and the note 'presently idle', so it had effectively stopped by the middle 1930s.

What remains

Nothing of the colliery's present state was established from the sources read for this pass.

Nearby mines

• Gartshore Colliery — 0.8 km SW
• Meiklehill Colliery — 2.3 km S
• Woodilee Colliery — 3.7 km S
• Auchengeich Colliery — 5.2 km S, North Lanarkshire
• Bedlay Colliery — 7.0 km SE, North Lanarkshire

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.

• The Lists of Mines record 35 employed in 1900 while sinking, 253 in 1905, 359 in 1910, 286 in 1915, 342 in 1920 and 352 in 1923, working the Coking and Haughrig seams and, by 1920, the Wee seam; the 1937 return shows ten people and the colliery presently idle. ¹
• Five deaths are named: Jeannie McGhee, 19, a stone picker caught by a dross conveyor in 1905; Charles Wilson, 23, run into by a runaway hutch in 1906; Samuel Jackson, 50, caught by a race of hutches in 1909; James Shaw, 64, a brakesman who died of lung complications after a runaway in January 1913; and William Stevenson, 30, run over by a rope-drawn rake in December 1913. ¹
• William Baird & Co. came into the Twechar and Kilsyth district about 1860 and the mining community it created lasted for rather more than a century, the last colliery in the area closing in 1968. ²
• Auchinreoch is a small hamlet formerly in Stirlingshire and now in East Dunbartonshire, near Kilsyth and Kirkintilloch. ³

Photographs & further reading

Sources

1. (secondary) Auchinreoch Colliery — Durham Mining Museum
2. (secondary) Twechar — Wikipedia
3. (secondary) Auchenreoch — Wikipedia

Record created: 11 September 2026 · Last researched: 12 September 2026