Blaydon Main Colliery

Overview

A colliery at Low Shibdon, Blaydon, on the south bank of the Tyne, first worked in the early eighteenth century and reopened by the Ramsays in 1828. Its Content, Hazard, Milner and other pits raised coking and gas coal for Derwenthaugh and Tyne Dock, employing over 700 in 1894, until it closed in 1921.

History

Blaydon Main, also called Shibdon Colliery, lay at Low Shibdon on the south bank of the Tyne at Blaydon, in the township of Winlaton. It was opened in the early eighteenth century and worked by Alderman White, the Blacketts and their agent, and later leased to the Simpsons; the Blaydon Way, a wagonway to Blaydon Main staiths, was opened in the 1740s. The colliery closed in 1798. It reopened in 1828, when the Hazard and Speculation pits were sunk, and on 11 September 1837 coal 3 ft 8 in thick was won at G. H. Ramsay's colliery amid great rejoicing. The Ramsays, as Ramsay and Co. and George H. Ramsay and Son, worked it for most of the century from pits named Content, Garden, Hazard, Milner and Speculation; the Content Pit reached the Brockwell at about 288 feet. The wagonway to the staiths was relaid with iron rails in 1853. On 21 March 1860 a boiler at the Shildon Pit exploded at the change of shift, killing the brakesman William Holmes, a fireman, Daniel Johnson, and two men crushed under the rubble (see Disasters, below), and on 4 May 1865 three men died when one of them carried a naked light into a stopped-off passage in the Five Quarter.

By the 1890s the Stella Coal Company worked the colliery, the Brockwell at 46 fathoms and the Hodge or cannel seam at the Milner Pit at 14 fathoms, with coke ovens at Derwenthaugh; it employed 720 in 1894 and about 400 men and boys at Blaydon Burn, with an output of some 100,000 tons a year shipped at Tyne Dock. Priestman Collieries took it over in May 1909, and employment reached 685 in 1910. The colliery closed in 1921, its Brockwell and Three Quarter workings abandoned on 1 June that year.

Geology

Durham coalfield: the Brockwell, Three Quarter, Five Quarter, Stone Coal, Towneley and Hodge (cannel) seams.

Workings

The Content, Garden, Hazard, Milner, Shildon and Speculation pits; the Blaydon Way to Blaydon Main staiths; coke ovens at Derwenthaugh.

Closure

Closed in 1921; its last Brockwell and Three Quarter workings were abandoned on 1 June 1921. An earlier colliery on the site, opened in the early eighteenth century, closed in 1798.

What remains

Unknown.

Redevelopment

Unknown.

Related mines

• Axwell Park Colliery — Both were taken over by Priestman Collieries Ltd.
• Blaydon Burn Colliery — Both were taken over by Priestman Collieries Ltd.
• Clara Vale Colliery — Both were worked by the Stella Coal Company.
• Emma Colliery — Both were worked by the Stella Coal Company.
• Stargate Colliery — Both were worked by the Stella Coal Company.
• Waldridge Colliery — Both were taken over by Priestman Collieries Ltd.
• Watergate Colliery — Both were taken over by Priestman Collieries Ltd.

Disasters & major incidents

• Blaydon Main Colliery boiler explosion, 1860
  21 or 27 March 1860 · Machinery · 4 fatalities
  In March 1860 a boiler at the Shildon Pit of Blaydon Main Colliery burst at the change of shift, moments after the brakesman had found its valves in order, killing him, a fireman and two men buried under the rubble.

Recorded claims

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

• Blaydon Main, also known as Shibdon Colliery, opened in the early eighteenth century, worked by Alderman White and the Blacketts and later leased to the Simpsons; it closed in 1798 and reopened in 1828, when the Hazard and Speculation pits were sunk. ¹
• On 11 September 1837 coal 3 ft 8 in thick was won at G. H. Ramsay's Blaydon Main, amid great rejoicing. ^2,3
• In the 1890s the Stella Coal Company worked the Brockwell at 46 fathoms and the Hodge or cannel seam at 14 fathoms, employing about 400 at Blaydon Burn, with coke ovens at Derwenthaugh and an output of about 100,000 tons a year. ^3,1
• On 21 March 1860 a boiler explosion at the Shildon Pit, Blaydon Main, killed four men. ^2,4
• The Blaydon Way from the colliery to Blaydon Main staiths opened in the 1740s, was relaid with iron rails in 1853 and closed in the 1920s. ⁵
• Blaydon Main's Brockwell, Three Quarter and Five Quarter workings were abandoned in 1921. ^3,6,7

Photographs & further reading

Sources

1. (secondary) Blaydon Main Colliery (Low Shibdon) (HER 3457) — Tyne and Wear HER (Sitelines)
2. (primary) Local Records; or, Historical Register of Remarkable Events, vol. 3 (T. Fordyce, 1867) — Internet Archive
3. (primary) Blaydon Main Colliery — Durham Mining Museum
4. (primary) Colliery Accident 1860: Blaydon Main, Shildon Pit, 27 March 1860 — Durham Mining Museum
5. (secondary) Blaydon Way (or Shibdon) (HER 3459) — Tyne and Wear HER (Sitelines)
6. (primary) Blaydon Main Colliery: catalogue of plans of abandoned mines — Durham Mining Museum
7. (primary) BGS mine plan: Blaydon Main, Brockwell, abandoned 1921 — BGS / Mining Remediation Authority mine plans

Record created: 5 October 2026 · Last researched: 5 October 2026