Birchenwood Colliery

Overview

A Kidsgrove colliery of about 1891 whose coal went almost entirely to coke and by-products. Seven men died in an explosion at its No. 18 pit in December 1925. The pits closed about 1932 but the coke ovens ran on for another forty years on coal brought in from Biddulph, making the last coke in May 1973.

History

Birchenwood was sunk on ground already worked over: the North Staffordshire gazetteer lists a scatter of older collieries on the site — the Valentine Pit on the original Brieryfield pits, the Nelson Colliery, the Kidsgrove Pit, Head o' th' Lane, Speedwell and several unnamed workings, some of them already abandoned by the Ordnance Survey of 1873-5. The colliery proper dates from about 1891. It was never really a coal-selling pit. Almost all the coal from the group went to coke and other by-products, and the works became a key supplier of coke to the ironworks in the Biddulph valley as well as producing chemical by-products. A tramroad connected Hollinswood colliery at Talke to Birchenwood, and by the 1925 explosion there were five shafts and a footrail in use for pumping, winding and ventilation — two upcast, two downcast with the footrail — the main shaft being No. 18, the only one winding coal, at five or six thousand tons a week. The Birchenwood Colliery Company Limited worked it for thirty years until June 1925, when Kidsgrove Collieries Limited took over; six months later came the explosion that killed seven (see Disasters, below). The pits closed about 1932, but that was not the end of the site. The company went on making coke and by-products from Biddulph coal, and by the 1950s the works was a gas plant supplying the local gas board with some six million cubic feet of coal gas a year with coke as the by-product. North Sea gas removed the market, and despite modern ovens the works closed in July 1973, the last coke made that May.

Geology

The colliery worked the Coal Measures of the North Staffordshire coalfield at Kidsgrove, on the northern edge of the field near Talke. The coals here are gassy and the 1925 explosion was of methane; the gazetteer records the seams taken in the district's workings as the Birchenwood, Yard, Four Foot, Stony Eight Foot, Rough Seven Foot and Ten Foot.

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

Workings

Five shafts and a footrail were in use at the time of the 1925 explosion, for pumping, winding and ventilation: two upcast, and two shafts and the footrail downcast. No. 18 was the main shaft and the only one used to wind coal, at about five to six thousand tons a week. The site also carried the coke ovens and by-product plant that were the colliery's real business, and a tramroad ran in from Hollinswood colliery at Talke.

Closure

The pits closed about 1932. Coke and by-product manufacture continued on coal from the Biddulph collieries; by the 1950s the works supplied the gas board with about six million cubic feet of coal gas a year. North Sea gas ended that market and the works closed in July 1973, the last coke having been made in May.

What remains

The colliery and coke works are gone. The ground is now Birchenwood Country Park, and the route of the Birchenwood gas and coke railway through it has been walked and photographed by industrial archaeologists.

None identified in the sources consulted.

Redevelopment

The site is now Birchenwood Country Park.

Related mines

• Hollinswood Colliery — A tramroad connected Hollinswood colliery at Talke to Birchenwood, which took its coal for coking.

Nearby mines

• Hollinswood Colliery — 1.6 km SW
• Bunker's Hill Colliery — 2.3 km W
• Chatterley Whitfield Colliery — 3.8 km E
• Diglake Colliery — 4.8 km SW
• Sneyd Colliery — 5.3 km SE

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

Disasters & major incidents

• Birchenwood Colliery Explosion, 1925
  18 December 1925 · Explosion · 7 fatalities
  An explosion at the No. 18 pit of Birchenwood Colliery, Kidsgrove, on 18 December 1925 killed seven men and seriously injured fourteen others. The colliery had changed hands six months earlier, passing from the Birchenwood Colliery Company to Kidsgrove Collieries Limited.

Recorded claims

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

• Almost all the coal from this group of pits was used for coke and other by-products; the pits closed about 1932 but the company continued to produce coke and by-products with coal from the Biddulph collieries, and the last coke was made in May 1973. ¹
• The North Staffordshire gazetteer lists several older collieries on the Birchenwood ground, including the Valentine Pit on the original Brieryfield pits, the Nelson Colliery, the Kidsgrove Pit, Head o' th' Lane and Speedwell, some already abandoned by the Ordnance Survey of 1873-5. ²
• Staffordshire Past Track gives the colliery as about 1891 to 1932. ¹

Photographs & further reading

Sources

1. (secondary) Birchenwood Colliery — Staffordshire Past Track
2. (secondary) Mould's Pits: Collieries of the North Staffordshire Coalfield (B) — North Staffordshire Miners' Group / Apedale Heritage Centre

Record created: 9 September 2026 · Last researched: 9 September 2026