Jamage Colliery

Overview

Jamage at Audley was one of the three pits of the Bignall Hill group, working the Bullhurst, Seven Feet and Eight Feet seams under the Wedgwood family and then the Bignall Hill Colliery Company. The Bullhurst here ran twenty feet thick at one in five and was known through north Staffordshire as peculiarly liable to gob fires. Sealing one off killed six men in 1911.

History

The colliery is returned to the Mines Inspectors from 1894 under the representatives of the late John Wedgwood of Bignall Hill, Audley, and later under the Bignall Hill Colliery Co. Ltd. It was one of a group of three pits — the Jamage Main, the Jamage and the Rookery — working the Seven Feet, Eight Feet and Bullhurst seams for coking, gas, household and steam coal, with a Bottom Two Row seam appearing in the 1905 return.

It is unusual among the pits in this archive for how much of its workforce stood on the surface: 301 people in 1894, of whom 117 were above ground, and 710 in 1910 with 280 above. Employment peaked there and fell away afterwards — 526 in 1915, 438 in 1923 with a further 309 at the Main, 229 in 1933 and 140 by 1937.

Two explosions clear this archive's bar. Five men were killed on 5 January 1876 when a shot fired gas in the Seven Feet Banbury seam (see Disasters, below). Six more died on 25 November 1911 (see Disasters, below) when a gob fire the management was in the middle of sealing off exploded behind the stoppings.

Geology

Jamage worked the north Staffordshire coalfield at Audley. The seams returned are the Seven Feet, the Eight Feet, the Bullhurst and a Bottom Two Row. The Bullhurst is of a very undulating nature, varying widely in both thickness and inclination; at the point where the 1911 explosion happened it was about twenty feet thick and lay at about one in five. It yields gas freely and was well known in the district as peculiarly liable to gob fires — a thick, dry, dusty and gassy seam prone to spontaneous combustion.

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

Workings

One of a group of three pits, the Jamage Main, the Jamage and the Rookery, held by the Bignall Hill Colliery Company. The 1923 returns list the Main separately from the rest. Shaft depths are not recorded.

Closure

The closure date is not known. The colliery was still returning 140 people in 1937.

Related mines

• Rookery Colliery — The other Bignall Hill colliery; its boilers supplied the Rookery's steam and it closed in 1941, six years before the Rookery.

Disasters & major incidents

• Bignall Hill Colliery explosion, 1874
  24 December 1874 · Explosion · 17 fatalities
  On Christmas Eve 1874 firedamp exploded in the Bullhurst seam of the Bignall Hill Colliery at Audley, north Staffordshire, the property of the representatives of Josiah Wedgwood. Of twenty-two people known to be in the pit, seventeen were killed. The inquest blamed naked lights in a seam where gas had been found that morning and urged locked lamps throughout the district's Bullhurst and Banbury seams.
• Jamage Colliery explosion, 1876
  5 January 1876 · Explosion · 5 fatalities
  At about half past four on the afternoon of 5 January 1876 an explosion tore through the Seven Feet Banbury seam of the Jammage pits at Talke, killing all five men working there and blowing the cage at the pit head into the headgear. A stopping had been opened to let material down, cutting off the air, and gas that had gathered for hours was fired by a shot in Daniel Darlington's place. The jury called the pit's discipline very lax and asked for gunpowder to be banned where safety lamps were used.
• Jamage Pit explosion
  25 November 1911 · Explosion · 6 fatalities
  Coal in a pillar being worked out at Jamage was found slightly warm two days before. The management decided to build the district off and withdrew everyone except the men putting up the stoppings. The stoppings were practically finished when, at about half past nine on the morning of Saturday 25 November 1911, the enclosed area exploded and partially blew them out. Thirty-one people were in the pit. Six died of afterdamp and fourteen were injured.

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 BGS mine-plans catalogue holds a Mining Remediation Authority abandonment plan titled 'Jamage' (catalogue 17315, Spoil Tip (Ref.Nos. 15/28/1 & 15/28/2), undated in the catalogue); 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) ²

Recorded claims

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

• The Bullhurst is very undulating and varies widely in thickness and inclination. At the scene of the 1911 accident it was about twenty feet thick and lay at about one in five. It yields gas freely and was well known in the district as peculiarly liable to gob fires. ¹
• The BGS mine-plans catalogue holds a Mining Remediation Authority abandonment plan titled 'Jamage' (catalogue 17315, Spoil Tip (Ref.Nos. 15/28/1 & 15/28/2), undated in the catalogue); 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) ²
• Five men were killed at the Jammage Pits on 5 January 1876 by an explosion of firedamp caused by gunpowder, the pits then held by the representatives of the late J. Wedgwood. ³
• At 9.50 a.m. on Saturday 25 November 1911 an explosion in the Bullhurst Seam workings, while stoppings were being built to seal a heating, killed six men and injured fourteen of the 31 underground; R. A. S. Redmayne held the inquiry (Cd 6152). ¹

Photographs & further reading

Sources

1. (secondary) Jamage Pit Explosion, 25 November 1911 — Healey Hero
2. (primary) BGS / Mining Remediation Authority mine plans: JAMAGE — British Geological Survey / Mining Remediation Authority
3. (primary) Jammage Pits, 5 January 1876 — Durham Mining Museum
4. (primary) Jamage Colliery — Durham Mining Museum

Record created: 11 September 2026 · Last researched: 11 September 2026