Cross Knave Colliery

Overview

Three small pits at Five Acres near Coleford, shown on Sopwith’s map of the Forest of Dean in 1835 and worked under a gale granted in 1841 to three free miners in equal thirds. They took the Coleford High Delf from shafts thirty yards deep, wound by one horse whim, and sold their coal locally: eight tons a day, a quarter of it lime coal, worth ninepence a ton including royalty. Benjamin Davies acquired sole interest from his father in 1866, and in May 1873 was committed for manslaughter after fifteen-year-old George Nelmes was killed falling down the shaft when the winding rope broke. Output was 769 tons in 1880 and the colliery still employed eight people in 1908; how much longer it worked is not known.

History

Three Cross Knave pits, also known as Five Acres, appear on Sopwith’s map of 1835. The gale was granted on 1 March 1841 to John Nelmes of Berry Hill, John Davis of Five Acres and Richard Elly of Berry Hill, as Free Miners in equal undivided third parts, to work coal in the Coleford High Delf. The return made that year gives the whole operation in a few lines: coal raised by one horse whim, pits thirty yards deep, disposed of by country sale, eight tons a day of which a quarter was lime coal, 2,400 tons over 300 working days, ninepence a ton including royalty, £90 a year. Output stayed at that scale — 140 tons in 1841, 244 in 1842, 250 in 1843, 612 in 1845, 194 in 1846. The gale passed to Mary Nelmes and others in October 1862, and on 1 June 1866 Benjamin Davies acquired sole interest from his father; one of the pits stood in a garden close to Fiveacres Farm. On 16 May 1873 George Nelmes, aged fifteen, was killed at the pit. The inquest at the Globe Inn, Five Acres, heard how the colliery was worked. The banksman, John Harris, had gone off hauling coal to Coleford with the horse normally used at the gib, leaving word with a man working in a quarry fifty yards away to pull the men up. The custom was that anyone who heard the signal would wind when no horse was there; nobody was regularly appointed. There were no guides in the shaft and no signal times, and the signal itself was a knock on the side of the pit cart. Asked by a juryman, Harris said the owner was not aware that passers-by pulled the men out of the pit. H.M. Inspector of Mines Mr Brough attended for the Crown and Mr Mountjoy for the dead youth’s friends and the Association of Miners. The jury returned a verdict of manslaughter against Benjamin Davis, there having been no proper arrangement for working the gib at the pit top, and he was committed for trial. The colliery went on. Output was 769 tons in 1880, when the official list of collieries at work returns it as "Cross Knave, Five Acres, Coleford, Benjamin Davis", and there were eight employees, five of them below ground, in 1908. About that time the owner was in dispute with the landowner over proposals to erect a steam engine and open a level. The gale had been divided in 1903 and different parts passed through many hands; the colliery was sold to Alfred J. Smith in 1910. It is not known for how long it continued to operate.

Geology

The Coleford High Delf Seam of the Pennant Group, the coal that underlies the western side of the Forest of Dean basin and outcrops around Coleford and Berry Hill. At Cross Knave it was within thirty yards of the surface, which is why three men with a horse could work it at all — and why the whole enterprise never rose above a few hundred tons a year.

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

Workings

Three shallow shafts, thirty yards deep in 1841, wound by a single horse whim at the gib. The inquest of 1873 describes the arrangement plainly and is the fullest account of how such a pit actually operated: no guides in the shaft, no fixed signal times, a knock on the side of the pit cart for a signal, and no one regularly appointed to wind — whoever happened to be about when the horse was away. A proposal to put up a steam engine and drive a level came only about 1908, and foundered in a dispute with the landowner. The site is now a stone-lined shaft about six feet square.

Closure

The gale was divided in 1903 and its parts passed through many hands; the colliery was sold to Alfred J. Smith in 1910, and it is not known for how long it went on working after that. Coal mining on this scale in the Forest of Dean was already being squeezed out by the larger collieries and by the cost of the steam plant a pit needed to go any deeper — a step Cross Knave proposed around 1908 and never took.

What remains

The site of the colliery is a stone-lined shaft about six feet square, photographed by the Forest of Dean Local History Society in March 2004. Nothing else survives above ground; the ground around it is now the built-up edge of Five Acres.

A stone-lined shaft approximately six feet square.

Nearby mines

• Gentlemen Colliers — 1.1 km S
• Cannop Colliery — 2.6 km E
• Hopewell Colliery — 2.6 km SE
• Whitecliff Ironworks — 2.6 km SW
• Dark Hill Colliery — 2.7 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.

• The official list of collieries at work in 1880 returns the pit as "Cross Knave, Five Acres, Coleford, Benjamin Davis". ¹
• Three Cross Knave pits, also known as Five Acres, are shown on Sopwith’s map of 1835; the gale was granted on 1 March 1841 to John Nelmes of Berry Hill, John Davis of Five Acres and Richard Elly of Berry Hill as Free Miners in equal undivided third parts, to work coal in the Coleford High Delf. ^2,3
• The 1841 return records the coal raised by one horse whim from pits thirty yards deep, disposed of by country sale at eight tons a day — a quarter of it lime coal — amounting to 2,400 tons over 300 working days at ninepence a ton including royalty, or £90 a year. ³
• Recorded outputs are 140 tons in 1841, 244 in 1842, 250 in 1843, 612 in 1845, 194 in 1846 and 769 in 1880; there were eight employees, five below ground, in 1908. ^2,3
• George Nelmes, aged fifteen, was killed on 16 May 1873 when the winding rope broke as he was ascending the shaft. At the inquest at the Globe Inn, Five Acres, the jury returned a verdict of manslaughter against the owner Benjamin Davis, there having been no proper arrangement for working the gib at the pit top, and he was committed for trial. ^2,3
• Evidence at the inquest established that there were no guides in the shaft and no signal times; the signal was a knock on the side of the pit cart, and when the horse normally used at the gib was away hauling coal to Coleford, anyone within earshot would wind the men up, no person being regularly appointed. The banksman said the owner was not aware that passers-by pulled the men out of the pit. ³
• Benjamin Davies acquired sole interest from his father on 1 June 1866; the gale was divided in 1903 and different parts passed through many hands, and the colliery was sold to Alfred J. Smith in 1910. It is not known for how long it continued to operate. ^2,3

Photographs & further reading

Sources

1. (secondary) List of coal mines UK 1880 — Coalmining History Resource Centre
2. (primary) Miners Memorial Project: Fatalities in Coal Mines — Forest of Dean Local History Society
3. (secondary) Cross Knave — Forest of Dean Coal Mining — Lightmoor Press
4. (secondary) A History of the County of Gloucester: Volume 5, Bledisloe Hundred, St Briavels Hundred, the Forest of Dean — Industry — Victoria County History / British History Online

Record created: 6 September 2026 · Last researched: 6 September 2026