Kelty Colliery

Overview

The Fife Coal Company's colliery at Kelty, which grew from 521 people in 1894 to over twelve hundred by 1900. Two of its shafts, Nos. 4 and 5, were renamed the Lindsay after the company's first chairman, and it was there that nine men died in 1957.

History

Coal at Kelty was the Earl of Moray's in the 1850s and the Beath and Blairadam Coal Company's in the 1860s. The Fife Coal Company was formed in 1872 to take over and develop that company's pits, and Kelty became one of its own. The Lists of Mines show it growing fast: 521 employed in 1894, 685 in 1896 and 1,208 in 1900 — a thousand of them below ground — on household, manufacturing and steam coal. The colliery's shafts were numbered, and Nos. 4 and 5, which began sinking in 1873 in the south-east corner of Kelty about two miles north of Cowdenbeath, took the name of the Lindsay Pit after the Fife Coal Company's first chairman. On 14 December 1957 an underground explosion at the Lindsay killed nine local miners and injured others; Kelty Community Council held a memorial service for the sixtieth anniversary at the community centre in December 2017.

Geology

The colliery worked the Coal Measures of the Fife coalfield at Kelty. Neither source read names the seams, which is a gap.

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

Workings

A numbered group of shafts. Nos. 4 and 5 began sinking in 1873 in the south-east corner of the village, about two miles north of Cowdenbeath, and were afterwards known as the Lindsay Pit.

Closure

No closure date has been established for Kelty Colliery as such. The Lindsay, its Nos. 4 and 5 shafts, is recorded as producing until 1965 and abandoned two years later.

What remains

No account of the site as it is now was found in the sources read.

No account of surviving remains was found in the sources read.

Redevelopment

Not established.

Related mines

• Dunnikier Colliery — Both passed to the Fife Coal Company, which by its height ran fourteen collieries in the county and is the operator this archive holds them both under.

Recorded claims

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

• The colliery was the Earl of Moray's in the 1850s and the Beath and Blairadam Coal Company's in the 1860s before passing to the Fife Coal Company Limited. The Lists of Mines give 521 employed in 1894, 685 in 1896 and 1,208 in 1900, producing household, manufacturing and steam coal. ¹
• The Lindsay Pit, whose shafts were originally Kelty Nos. 4 and 5, took its name from the Fife Coal Company's first chairman; it began sinking in 1873, stood in the south-east corner of Kelty about two miles north of Cowdenbeath, employed an average of 820 men and produced until 1965, being abandoned two years later. ²
• Nine local miners lost their lives and others were injured in an underground explosion at the Lindsay Colliery on 14 December 1957; Kelty Community Council held a memorial service for the sixtieth anniversary at the Kelty Community Centre on 15 December 2017. ²

Photographs & further reading

Sources

1. (secondary) Kelty Colliery — Durham Mining Museum
2. (secondary) Lindsay Pits, Kelty — Fife Pits

Record created: 10 September 2026 · Last researched: 10 September 2026