Bishop Middleham Colliery

Overview

A small south Durham colliery in the fields south-east of Bishop Middleham village, near Ferryhill, won in 1845 and sunk from March 1846. It was never a large or continuous concern: the official lists show it standing idle through the early 1880s, and its last working life, under Dorman, Long and Company from 1923, was as a small satellite of the neighbouring Mainsforth Colliery, with fewer than forty men in 1929 and seven the following year. It closed in 1936.

History

Bishop Middleham Colliery was won in 1845 and the pit sunk from 25 March 1846, on the magnesian-limestone-covered eastern edge of the Durham coalfield between Ferryhill and Sedgefield. By 1873 it belonged to the Weardale Iron and Coal Company of Tudhoe and Tow Law, one of the larger ironmaster-owners in the county, which listed it among a dozen collieries stretching from Guisborough to Weardale; in the same company's returns for 1882 and 1883 it appears as 'standing', and the Durham Mining Museum records no workforce at all for 1880 to 1883. The Five Quarter and Main Coal seams had already been abandoned in 1876. In the 1880s ownership passed to the Middlesbrough ironmasters Bolckow, Vaughan and Company, which by then held the surrounding Ferryhill and Chilton royalties. The coal under Bishop Middleham and Nunstainton remained in the hands of the Weardale Steel, Coal and Coke Company (the Weardale Iron and Coal Company's successor) as lessor: a 1910 sublease to the Carlton Iron Company recites the company's own lease of 28 February 1908, and in March 1918 its agent at Mainsforth, Charles Howson, was corresponding about four drifts being driven through the Ecclesiastical Commissioners' barrier in the Busty seam of the Bishop Middleham royalty. Dorman, Long and Company, which absorbed Bolckow, Vaughan, took the colliery in April 1923 and worked it as an outlier of Mainsforth: Howson remained agent for both, and in the winter of 1927-28 land at Bishop Middleham was surveyed for a new engine house and electric substation. The 1929 list shows 31 men (18 below ground, 13 on the surface) working the Busty and Harvey seams under manager F. Widdas; in 1930 only seven. A firedamp explosion late on 2 March 1930 fatally injured a 24-year-old miner, Joseph Spence, who died four days later, and a stoneman, Martin Livett, had been killed by a fall of stone the previous November. Dorman, Long's output book for the pit runs from May 1930 to 29 August 1936, and the colliery closed in 1936.

Geology

The colliery lay on the concealed part of the Durham coalfield, where the Coal Measures pass eastward beneath the Permian magnesian limestone that gives Bishop Middleham its quarries. The seams named in the records are the Five Quarter and Main Coal (abandoned 1876) and the Busty and Harvey seams worked in 1929-30, all Middle Coal Measures seams of the south Durham succession.

Geological setting: Sedimentary Beds and Seams (historical documentary reference)

Workings

A single sunk pit of 1846, working the Five Quarter and Main Coal seams until their abandonment in 1876 and, in its final phase, the Busty and Harvey seams. The 1918 correspondence describes four drifts being driven through the Ecclesiastical Commissioners' barrier in the Busty seam, and by 1930 the workings were being driven from an old shaft towards Mainsforth Colliery, whose agent ran both pits. No reliable depth figure has yet been located.

Closure

Closed in 1936 after a final decade as a small Dorman, Long satellite of Mainsforth; the company's output book for the pit ends on 29 August 1936. The pit had already stood idle for long spells, including the whole of 1880-83.

What remains

The site lies in farmland south-east of the village. No documented surface remains of the colliery have been located in the sources checked; the parish record notes only the remains of a wagonway. The disused Bishop Middleham Quarry nearby, now a nature reserve, is a separate limestone working and should not be confused with the colliery.

Recorded claims

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

• The colliery was won in 1845 and Bishop Middleham Pit was sunk from 25 March 1846; it closed in 1936. ¹
• Owned by the Weardale Iron and Coal Company in 1873-75 and listed as standing under it in 1882-83; by the 1880s owned by Bolckow, Vaughan and Company, and from April 1923 by Dorman, Long and Company. ^1,2
• The Five Quarter and Main Coal seams were abandoned in 1876; the Busty and Harvey seams were being worked in 1929 and 1930. ¹
• The pit recorded no employees in 1880, 1882 and 1883 (standing); 31 in 1929 (18 underground, 13 surface) and 7 in 1930. ¹
• Durham Record Office holds correspondence of 9-12 March 1918 on four drifts being driven through the Ecclesiastical Commissioners' barrier in the Busty seam of the Bishop Middleham royalty, and of December 1927 to February 1928 on surveying land at the colliery for a new engine house and electric substation; the company's output book for the pit covers 19 May 1930 to 29 August 1936. ³
• A firedamp explosion at about 11.35 pm on 2 March 1930 fatally injured Joseph Spence, aged 24, who died on 6 March; Martin Livett, a 45-year-old stoneman, had been killed by a fall of stone on 25 November 1929. ¹
• The village supported itself mainly by farming with some coal mining; the remains of a wagonway have been recorded in the parish. ⁴

Photographs & further reading

Sources

1. (secondary) Bishop Middleham Colliery — Durham Mining Museum
2. (secondary) Weardale Iron and Coal Co., Ltd. — collieries owned 1873-1883 — Durham Mining Museum
3. (primary) National Coal Board: colliery company records (NCB 13) — Weardale Steel, Coal and Coke Company and Dorman, Long papers — Durham Record Office
4. (secondary) Bishop Middleham — Wikipedia

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