Hollinswood Colliery

Overview

A North Staffordshire pit at Talke, near Kidsgrove, at work in the 1870s under Kinnersley and Company and connected by tramroad to Birchenwood. Enoch Edwards — later secretary of the North Staffordshire Miners' Association, president of the Miners' Federation of Great Britain and Member of Parliament for Hanley — went down it at nine years old for sixpence a day.

History

The colliery stands in the Mould's Pits gazetteer of the North Staffordshire coalfield as Hollinswood, numbers 13 and 15, with the farm of that name at grid reference SJ 833 535, shafts at SJ 833 536 and SJ 836 535 and dirt tips at SJ 832 536. It was connected by a tramroad to Birchenwood, the large Kidsgrove colliery and coking works a mile to the north-east.

The official return of collieries at work in 1880 carries it as 'Holin Wood, Newcastle, Kinnersley and Co.' — Newcastle here being Newcastle-under-Lyme, the inspection district, not the Tyne. A later directory entry transcribed by the gazetteer gives the pit under Bidder and Elliot of the Harecastle and Woodshutts collieries, Stoke-on-Trent, with two people below ground and two at the surface and the return marked standing — a working reduced to a care-and-maintenance handful.

What the pit is chiefly remembered for is a child. Enoch Edwards was born at Talk-o'-the-Hill in April 1852, the son of a pitman, and the gazetteer records that he started work aged nine, in 1861, at Hollinswood colliery for sixpence a day. He became treasurer of the North Staffordshire Miners' Association in 1870 and its secretary in 1877, president of the Midland Miners' Association in 1880 and of the Miners' Federation of Great Britain in 1904, mayor of Burslem, and from 1906 until his death in 1912 Member of Parliament for Hanley.

Geology

The pit worked the Coal Measures of the North Staffordshire coalfield around Talke and Kidsgrove. The gazetteer names the seams taken in the district's workings of this date as the Birchenwood, the Yard and the Four Foot, worked around 1851 to 1853, and then the Stony Eight Foot, the Rough Seven Foot, the Ten Foot and the Four Foot — the thick, closely stacked seams that made this corner of the coalfield worth the number of small pits sunk into it.

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

Workings

At least two shafts, at SJ 833 536 and SJ 836 535, with the dirt tips a few hundred yards west at SJ 832 536. A tramroad ran from the colliery to Birchenwood. By the date of the directory entry the whole establishment was four people, two of them underground.

Closure

The closure date is not known. The colliery was at work in the 1880 return and the directory entry transcribed by the gazetteer has it standing with four people employed; nothing on record gives the year it stopped.

What remains

Nothing is recorded of the site as it stands. The ground north-east towards Birchenwood was reclaimed in the 1970s for the Parkhouse industrial estate; whether that took in this colliery's own site is not established.

Redevelopment

None recorded for this site specifically.

Related mines

• Birchenwood Colliery — A tramroad connected Hollinswood colliery at Talke to Birchenwood, which took its coal for coking.

What's uncertain

Points where sources disagree or the record could not be settled; both accounts are kept. All open questions in the archive.

• The gazetteer gives Edwards's dates as 1853 to 1912; Wikipedia, following the Encyclopaedia Britannica, gives his birth as 10 April 1852 at Talk-o'-the-Hill. A birth in April 1852 fits the gazetteer's 'aged 9 in 1861'; a birth in 1853 does not. (disputed) ^2,3
• The BGS mine-plans catalogue holds a Mining Remediation Authority abandonment plan titled 'Hollinswood' (catalogue 12169, Four Feet, dated 1937); the catalogue gives no location and the plan's details do not clearly tie it to this working, so it may belong to another of the same name. (uncertain) ⁴

Recorded claims

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

• The official return of collieries at work in 1880 gives 'Holin Wood, Newcastle, Kinnersley and Co.' ¹
• The Mould's Pits gazetteer places Hollinswood colliery, numbers 13 and 15, with its farm at SJ 833 535, shafts at SJ 833 536 and SJ 836 535 and dirt tips at SJ 832 536, connected by a tramroad to Birchenwood. ²
• The gazetteer records that Enoch Edwards, later a trade union official and Member of Parliament, was born at Talke-o'-th'-Hill and started work aged nine in 1861 at Hollinswood colliery for sixpence a day. ²
• The gazetteer gives Edwards's dates as 1853 to 1912; Wikipedia, following the Encyclopaedia Britannica, gives his birth as 10 April 1852 at Talk-o'-the-Hill. A birth in April 1852 fits the gazetteer's 'aged 9 in 1861'; a birth in 1853 does not. (disputed) ^2,3
• The BGS mine-plans catalogue holds a Mining Remediation Authority abandonment plan titled 'Hollinswood' (catalogue 12169, Four Feet, dated 1937); the catalogue gives no location and the plan's details do not clearly tie it to this working, so it may belong to another of the same name. (uncertain) ⁴

Photographs & further reading

Sources

1. (secondary) List of coal mines UK 1880 — Coalmining History Resource Centre
2. (secondary) Mould's Pits: Collieries of the North Staffordshire Coalfield (H) — North Staffordshire Miners' Group / Apedale Heritage Centre
3. (secondary) Enoch Edwards (trade unionist) — Wikipedia
4. (primary) BGS / Mining Remediation Authority mine plans: HOLLINSWOOD — British Geological Survey / Mining Remediation Authority

Record created: 6 September 2026 · Last researched: 8 September 2026