New Haden Colliery

Overview

A colliery of the small Cheadle coalfield in north Staffordshire, sunk at Draycott Cross and nicknamed the Klondyke for the thickness of the Woodhead coal it worked. It was one of the first mines in Staffordshire to be electrified underground and had a brickworks alongside it. The Cheadle branch railway was built past its shafts and opened in 1901. It was closed in 1943 when the Ministry of Fuel and Power moved its 500 miners to more efficient pits for the war effort.

History

The Cheadle coalfield is a small and awkward one, and New Haden was its principal twentieth-century pit. The colliery was opened at Draycott, and the section of the Cheadle branch line from Totmonslow to Cheadle opened on 1 January 1901, passing the Draycott Cross shafts; the pit was latterly known as Draycott Colliery. Its nickname, the Klondyke, came from the thickness of the Woodhead coal it worked, and it was among the first Staffordshire mines to have electricity underground. A brickworks stood with it. The railway that served it was a liability from the start. The line had to pass through a ridge of high sandstone in a tunnel that gave trouble almost as soon as it was finished, several sections needing patching over the years, and a partial collapse in November 1918 closed the line for nearly a month. In 1930 the company decided to abandon the tunnel altogether and build a deviation half a mile to the east; the tunnel was closed and blocked in 1933. That same year the colliery was in Parliament. On 21 February 1933 Sir Joseph Lamb asked the Secretary for Mines about the discharge of 200 men from New Haden on the ground that its quota was insufficient, arguing that the quota allowed the men only a day and a half a week at the rate they had been producing. The reply was that the owners were beginning to draw coal again from their Berry Hill colliery and it was to be hoped one would offset the other. The pit closed in 1943, when the Ministry of Fuel and Power decided to move its 500 miners to more efficient pits in aid of the war effort; its traffic of 3,000 tons a week was lost with it.

Geology

The Cheadle coalfield, a small detached field in north Staffordshire. The seam that mattered here was the Woodhead coal, thick enough to earn the pit its Klondyke nickname. The ground above gave as much trouble as the ground below: the ridge of high sandstone the Cheadle branch had to tunnel through to reach the colliery was unstable enough to close the line for a month in 1918 and to be abandoned outright in 1930.

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

Workings

Shafts at Draycott Cross, with a brickworks on the surface alongside the colliery. New Haden was one of the first mines in Staffordshire to be electrified underground. Its output moved by rail on the Cheadle branch, which opened past the shafts on 1 January 1901 and carried about 3,000 tons a week from the pit.

Closure

The colliery was not worked out. It closed in 1943 by decision of the Ministry of Fuel and Power, which moved its 500 miners to more efficient pits as a war measure. The quota disputes of the early 1930s, when 200 men were discharged and the remaining workforce could be employed only a day and a half a week, show a pit already struggling against the industry's output controls a decade before.

What remains

The colliery is gone and the Cheadle branch with it. The tunnel that served it was blocked off in 1933 after the line was diverted around it, and the deviation has since closed too.

Nearby mines

• Foxfield Colliery — 5.3 km SW
• Parkhall Colliery — 9.0 km W
• Florence Colliery — 9.2 km W
• Caldon Low Quarry — 9.6 km NE
• Brown End Quarry — 10.5 km NE

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 colliery was nicknamed the Klondyke for the thickness of the Woodhead coal it worked, and was one of the first mines in Staffordshire to be electrified underground. ¹
• On 21 February 1933 the Commons was told that 200 men had been discharged from New Haden on the ground of an insufficient quota, which the member for the area said would allow the remainder only a day and a half's work a week; the Secretary for Mines replied that the owners were reopening their Berry Hill colliery. ²
• The colliery closed in 1943 after the Ministry of Fuel and Power decided to move its 500 miners to more efficient pits for the war effort, losing traffic of 3,000 tons a week. ¹
• The Cheadle branch reached the colliery through a tunnel in a sandstone ridge that gave trouble from completion, partially collapsed in November 1918 and closed the line for nearly a month, and was abandoned in 1930 for a deviation half a mile east, being blocked off in 1933. ^1,3

Photographs & further reading

Sources

1. (secondary) Cheadle Coalfield — Wikipedia
2. (primary) New Haden Collieries, Cheadle — House of Commons debate, 21 February 1933 — Hansard
3. (secondary) Draycott Cross Colliery — Subterranea Britannica

Record created: 9 September 2026 · Last researched: 9 September 2026