British Rhondda Colliery

Overview

The older of the two drift complexes on the mountain between Glyn Neath and Rhigos at the head of the Vale of Neath, opened in 1890 by Davis' British Rhondda Steam Coal Company and worked by the New British Rhondda Colliery Company to 1935 on the Four Feet, Six Feet and Nine Feet with up to six hundred people. Its name outlived it: the neighbouring Rhigos drifts were still 'British Rhonda' to local men in the 1930s.

History

The Durham Mining Museum dates British Rhondda from 1890, when Davis' British Rhondda Steam Coal Company began working the steam-coal seams at Glyn Neath from levels on the Blaengwrach mountain. It was small at first, 90 people in 1894, 116 in 1900 and 193 in 1905 on the Four Feet and Nine Feet, and fell back to 84 in 1910 when the Lower Four Feet and Six Feet were also worked; then it grew, under the New British Rhondda Colliery Company Ltd, to 494 in 1915, 600 in 1923 and 573 in 1933, the year a second entry returns eleven. The museum records closure in 1935. The Welsh Coal Mines fatality lists place its men at Glynneath, at Rhigos and once at Glyncorrwg, and record twelve deaths between 1891 and 1927: colliers under falls of coal and roof in the nine-foot seam, a rider crushed when the engineman drew his journey into the terminal sheave in 1911, a collier of 51 run over by runaway trams on the surface incline in 1914 a week after another death, a sixteen-year-old helper six weeks into the job the same year, and a haulier crushed by his horse in 1927. The archive's Rhigos Colliery record describes the ground the two complexes shared: about a square mile at the head of the valley, with a very large number of openings made across it over time, the Rhigos drifts beginning in 1919 as Peacock beside 'the older and separate British Rhondda complex'. Welsh Coal Mines notes that Rhigos was known locally as British Rhonda and later as The Pandy, the name having passed from one to the other.

Geology

Anthracite and dry steam coal of the north crop of the South Wales Coalfield: the Four Feet, Lower Four Feet, Six Feet and Nine Feet seams.

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

Workings

Levels driven into the mountainside with a surface incline and rope-hauled journeys of drams; naked lights were in use in the nine-foot seam in 1908.

Closure

Recorded as closed in 1935 by the Durham Mining Museum, with 573 employed at the 1933 return; the reason is not stated in the sources read. Rhigos continued on the adjoining ground until 1965.

What remains

Not established from the sources read; the ground is the same mountainside as the Rhigos workings. No photograph of the colliery was found.

Not established from the sources read.

Related mines

• Rhigos Colliery — The two drift complexes shared about a square mile of the mountain at the head of the Vale of Neath; the archive's Rhigos record names British Rhondda as the older and separate complex on that ground, and Rhigos carried the British Rhonda name locally.

Nearby mines

• Rhigos Colliery — 2.1 km NW
• Cwmgwrach Colliery — 2.5 km SW
• Glenrhondda Colliery — 3.7 km S, Rhondda Cynon Taf
• Dunraven Colliery — 3.9 km S, Rhondda Cynon Taf
• Glyncorrwg Colliery — 5.0 km S

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.

• Worked 1890–1935 under Davis' British Rhondda Steam Coal Co. and the New British Rhondda Colliery Co. Ltd; 90 employed in 1894, 193 in 1905, 84 in 1910, 494 in 1915, 600 in 1923 and 573 in 1933, steam coal from the Four Feet, Six Feet and Nine Feet. ¹
• The neighbouring Rhigos drifts, opened in the 1920s, were known locally as British Rhonda and later as The Pandy. ²
• Twelve named deaths 1891–1927, all single; two in one week in January 1914, and a sixteen-year-old collier's helper six weeks into the job in April 1914. ^1,3,4

Photographs & further reading

Sources

1. (secondary) British Rhondda Colliery — Durham Mining Museum — Durham Mining Museum
2. (secondary) Rhigos Colliery — Welsh Coal Mines
3. (secondary) Fatalities 1914 — Welsh Coal Mines — Welsh Coal Mines
4. (secondary) Fatalities 1927 — Welsh Coal Mines — Welsh Coal Mines

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