Houldsworth Colliery

Overview

A major Doon Valley colliery sunk in 1900 by the Dalmellington Iron Company at a cost of £250,000 to work the Patna coalfield, named for the Manchester family behind the company, and worked for 65 years until nationalisation and eventual closure in 1965.

History

Houldsworth Colliery was sunk in 1900 by the Dalmellington Iron Company at a cost of £250,000, one of a group of pits worked around Patna in the Doon Valley -- an area whose iron and coal industry had been built up since Henry Houldsworth, of the Manchester cotton-manufacturing family, founded the company at Dunaskin in 1848. The colliery working the Patna and Patna Thick coal seams employed 48 workers in 1900, growing quickly to over 380 by 1910, and continued in production through the First World War and after; by the 1930s employment had settled at around 250-300, working the Diamond and Patna seams, and output was recorded at 81,000 tons in 1947, the year the colliery passed to the National Coal Board on nationalisation. Ownership had earlier passed from the Dalmellington Iron Co. Ltd to Bairds & Dalmellington Ltd around 1930-35. The colliery's worst recorded accident came on 2 September 1906, when thirteen men were being lowered together in the cage and the winding engineman lost control; the valve gearing reversed, and the cage, on landing at the pit bottom, was immediately raised again some thirteen feet, crushing two of the men -- James McDermont, a 62-year-old miner, and John Scott, a 22-year-old drawer -- against a beam at the doorheads. The oversman travelling with them was also injured. Houldsworth remained in production under the National Coal Board until its closure in December 1965, after 65 years of working.

Geology

Coal of the Ayrshire field in the Doon valley: the Patna and Patna Thick seams.

Workings

Worked the Patna, Patna Thick, Diamond and (from the 1950s) related coal seams via a conventional shaft-and-cage colliery, employing over 380 workers underground and at the surface at its peak around 1910.

Closure

Closed in December 1965 under National Coal Board ownership, after 65 years of continuous working.

What remains

Unknown.

Disasters & major incidents

• Houldsworth Colliery Cage Accident (1906)
  2 September 1906 · Winding / Shaft Accident · 2 fatalities
  The winding engineman lost control while lowering thirteen men in the cage at Houldsworth Colliery, Patna; the cage was violently re-raised on landing, crushing two men to death.

Recorded claims

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

• Houldsworth Colliery was sunk in 1900 at a cost of £250,000 to the Dalmellington Iron Company, and was named for the Houldsworth family of Manchester, the driving force behind the Doon Valley iron industry since the company's 1848 founding. ¹
• Employment grew from 48 workers in 1900 to over 380 by 1910; output was recorded at 81,000 tons in 1947, the year the colliery passed to the National Coal Board. ²
• On 2 September 1906, while thirteen men were being lowered together in the cage, the winding engineman lost control and the reversed valve gearing caused the cage to be immediately re-raised some thirteen feet on landing, crushing James McDermont (62, miner) and John Scott (22, drawer) against a beam at the doorheads; the oversman travelling with them was also injured. The Durham Mining Museum catalogues this as a two-fatality colliery disaster. ^2,3
• Houldsworth Colliery closed in December 1965 after 65 years of continuous working. ¹
• Grace's Guide records that John Houldsworth, his brothers and family friends established the Coltness and Dalmellington ironworks in Lanarkshire and Ayrshire about 1835; that by 1860 the proprietors had fourteen blast furnaces between the two sites, capable of some 120,000 tons of pig iron a year; that the Dalmellington Iron Co was registered on 28 May 1885; and that in 1931 its Ayrshire interests were combined with William Baird and Co's to form Bairds and Dalmellington Ltd, 75 per cent Baird-owned and controlling 70 per cent of the Ayrshire coalfields. ⁴

Sources

1. (secondary) Dalmellington Area — Northern Mine Research Society
2. (primary) Houldsworth Colliery [AYR] — Durham Mining Museum (drawing on Mines Inspectors' Reports and List of Mines government returns)
3. (primary) Disasters - Names: Houldsworth, 2 September 1906 — Durham Mining Museum
4. (secondary) Dalmellington Iron Co — Graces Guide
5. (secondary) Dalmellington Iron Company — RAILSCOT

Record created: 30 August 2026 · Last researched: 30 August 2026