Clackmannan Colliery

Overview

A coal and ironstone colliery in Clackmannan parish whose 1842 evidence to the Children's Employment Commission recorded 226 people underground, a third of them women and girls, and which was still at work under the Clackmannan Coal Company in 1900.

History

In 1842 the Clackmannan Colliery Company's managing partner, James R. Wilson, told the Children's Employment Commission that 226 males and females worked below ground, about a third of them female and a ninth children under thirteen. Children pushed the corves on rails with loads of four to seven hundredweight, and worked the ten to twelve hours their parents did. The colliery had a sick fund and a school, whose fees were stopped from wages at the count-table. The children's own evidence was stark: Joseph Patterson, eleven, said the work was very sore; Janet Mitchell, fourteen, had been wheeling coal below ground for three years; and James Wilson, ten, who wheeled ironstone carts of seven or eight hundredweight in the ironstone pit, had lost two fingers. The oversman, Francis Wilson, had been at the colliery since 1832.

Later in the century the colliery was owned by Mitchell and Mowbray and then by the Clackmannan Coal Company, raising household, manufacturing and steam coal. It employed 315 people in 1894, falling to 175 by 1900. Deaths recorded there between 1853 and 1899 include two men killed in May 1899 when a pony-drawn rake of hutches brought down a fall of roof.

Geology

Coal seams worked with ironstone.

Workings

Coal pits and an ironstone pit; in 1842 coal and ironstone were moved in corves on rails, with an incline from the ironstone ends.

Closure

Unknown.

What remains

Unknown.

Redevelopment

Unknown.

Recorded claims

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

• In 1842 the Clackmannan Colliery Company employed 226 males and females below ground, about a third of them female and a ninth children under 13. ¹
• In 1842 the colliery had a sick fund and a school, whose fees were stopped from wages at the count-table. ¹
• The oversman Francis Wilson had been connected with the colliery since 1832. ¹
• The colliery was owned by Mitchell and Mowbray and later by the Clackmannan Coal Co. ²
• Clackmannan Colliery employed 315 people in 1894, 212 in 1896, 186 in 1899 and 175 in 1900. ²
• On 22 May 1899 James Russell, 14, and John White, 21, were killed by a fall of roof brought down by a pony-drawn rake of hutches. ²

Sources

1. (primary) Clackmannan 1 (1842 Children's Employment Commission evidence) — Scottish Mining Website
2. (primary) Durham Mining Museum: Clackmannan Colliery — Durham Mining Museum

Record created: 19 October 2026 · Last researched: 19 October 2026