Bearpark Colliery

Overview

A County Durham colliery two miles west of Durham City, opened in 1872 and worked for over a century until April 1984. It was a coking-coal pit almost throughout, raising fireclay alongside the coal into the 1920s, and reached 350,000 tons in the year of nationalisation. Unusually for a Durham colliery of its size, no disaster of five or more deaths is recorded there.

History

The colliery opened in 1872 under the Bearpark Coal Company, and its 16 Feet Pit is the shaft named in the records. Ownership passed to the Bearpark-Brancepeth Coal & Coke Company in the 1880s and to the Bearpark Coal & Coke Company in the 1890s — the successive names tracking what the colliery was actually for. Its returns from 1894 onward are almost monotonously consistent: coking and manufacturing coal, with fireclay, year after year to 1921, and coking coal alone through the 1920s and 1930s. The National Coal Board took the colliery over in 1947, when it raised 350,000 tons of bunker, coking, manufacturing and steam coal. It reverted to coking coal for most of the Coal Board years, with household and steam coal added between 1965 and 1975, and was still returning coking coal in 1985. It closed on 6 April 1984.

Geology

The colliery worked the Coal Measures of the west Durham coalfield, where the coals are of coking quality — the reason the colliery's owners twice renamed themselves for coke and why the pit fed the coke and iron trades rather than the household market. Seatearth fireclay beneath the coals was raised as a saleable product until the 1920s.

Workings

The 16 Feet Pit is the shaft named in the colliery records. The output returns are unusually consistent — coking and manufacturing coal with fireclay from 1894 to 1921, coking coal alone through the 1920s and 1930s, and coking coal again for most of the National Coal Board years, with household and steam coal added between 1965 and 1975.

Closure

Closed on 6 April 1984, having worked for 112 years.

What remains

The colliery has been cleared, but the village keeps its memory. Bearpark Community Centre — a red brick building put up in 1921 as the miners' welfare hall — is at the hub of the village, and an old pit wheel stands in front of it as a memorial to Bearpark's mining history. Bearpark Colliery Road still carries the pit's name.

The former miners' welfare hall of 1921, now the community centre, with a pit wheel in front of it.

Nearby mines

• Sacriston Colliery — 4.5 km N
• Beamish Colliery — 10.7 km N
• West Stanley Colliery — 11.1 km NW
• Dean and Chapter Colliery — 11.5 km S
• Harraton Colliery — 11.5 km NE, Tyne and Wear

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 colliery opened in 1872 and closed on 6 April 1984. (high) ¹
• It was held by the Bearpark Coal Company from 1872, the Bearpark-Brancepeth Coal & Coke Company in the 1880s, the Bearpark Coal & Coke Company from the 1890s, and the National Coal Board from 1947. (high) ¹
• The returns record coking and manufacturing coal with fireclay from 1894 to 1921 and coking coal alone through the 1920s and 1930s; in 1947 the colliery raised 350,000 tons of bunker, coking, manufacturing and steam coal. (high) ¹
• The Durham Mining Museum records no disaster of five or more killed at Bearpark, though it lists 90 named fatalities across the colliery's working life. (high) ¹
• Theodore Fry was involved in founding the Bearpark Coal and Coke Company in 1872, which established the coal mine at Bearpark. (medium) ²
• Bearpark Community Centre, a red brick building originally put up in 1921 as a miners' welfare hall, stands at the hub of the village with an old pit wheel in front of it as a memorial to Bearpark's mining history. (medium) ²

Photographs & further reading

Sources

1. (secondary) Durham Mining Museum: Bearpark Colliery — Durham Mining Museum
2. (secondary) Bearpark — Wikipedia

Record created: 3 September 2026 · Last researched: 3 September 2026