Ripley Colliery

Overview

The Butterley Company's colliery in its home town, sunk in 1846 by the museum's dating or 1854 to 1863 by others, working the Deep Hard, Deep Soft, Tupton and Silkstone from two pits and grown under the National Coal Board to over a thousand people and half a million tons before it closed in October 1949 and merged with Denby Hall. A gas explosion in October 1857 killed six and put the under-viewer and deputy before the magistrates.

History

The Butterley Company, founded by Outram and Beresford in 1790 with Jessop and Wright as partners, owned the mineral ground around Ripley and worked a string of pits there: Ripley itself, Britain, Ormonde, Upper and Lower Hartshay, Whiteley, Waingroves, Bailey Brook, Exhibition, Loscoe, New Langley and Denby Hall. The Durham Mining Museum dates Ripley Colliery from 1846; Wikishire has it worked from 1863 to 1948, and a Derbyshire history gives 1854. In the 1890s it had two pits, No. 1 on the Deep Soft and Deep Hard and No. 2 on the Tupton, with 336 people at No. 1 in 1894 and 299 across both in 1896; No. 1 was abandoned in 1905 and the colliery fell to 128 people before the Silkstone was added by 1910. Employment was 198 in 1910, 266 in 1923, 397 in 1933, 518 in 1940 and 1,042 at nationalisation in 1947, when the pit raised 500,000 tons of coking, gas, household and industrial coal. The museum records closure in October 1949, after which the workings were merged with Denby Hall.

Twenty-six deaths are named between 1857 and 1937. The worst was the gas explosion of October 1857 in a rise heading whose ventilation had been broken by a hole knocked through the brattice without a door (see Disasters, below). Two loaders were killed on 20 March 1880 when a heavy weight came suddenly on their stall (see Disasters, below). The Pit Top, a grassed open space with a white arch sculpture, is the site of the original colliery.

Geology

Erewash valley Coal Measures: the Deep Hard, Deep Soft, Tupton and Silkstone seams.

Geological setting: Sedimentary Beds and Seams (historical documentary reference)

Workings

Two pits, No. 1 abandoned in 1905; bratticed rise headings in 1857, stall working with holing, and rail sidings on the pit bank.

Closure

Closed in October 1949, after which Wikishire records it merged with Denby Hall; 1,042 people had been employed two years earlier.

What remains

The Pit Top, a grassed open area with seating and a white arch sculpture, occupies the site of the original colliery.

None standing; the Pit Top open space and its arch.

Related mines

• Britain Colliery — Butterley Company neighbour, joined to Britain by the colliery railway over the iron bridge at Steam Mill Lane.

Disasters & major incidents

• Ripley Colliery explosion, 1857
  5 and 10 October 1857 · Explosion · 6 fatalities
  A nine-foot heading driven 160 yards to the rise at Ripley Colliery was ventilated by a brick-and-lime brattice up its middle. The under-viewer had a hole broken through the brattice a hundred yards from the face and never saw that a door was fixed in it, so the hundred yards of heading beyond filled with gas. It exploded twice in October 1857 and killed six men, four of them on the 10th with George Gyte dying of the first explosion on the 5th. The inspector, John Hedley, prosecuted the under-viewer and the deputy and the magistrates convicted both.
• Ripley Colliery roof fall, 1880
  20 March 1880 · Collapse / Roof Fall · 2 fatalities

  On 20 March 1880 two loaders were killed by a fall of roof at Ripley Colliery, in County Durham, when a heavy weight came suddenly onto the stall.

  William Brindley, aged 21, and Charles Stanley, aged 20, loaders, were killed by the fall.

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 museum dates the colliery 1846 to October 1949; Wikishire has it worked 1863–1948 and merged with Denby Hall in 1949. (disputed) ^1,2
• The Mining Remediation Authority catalogue holds abandonment plans titled 'Ripley' (catalogue 4856, Deep Hard and Deep Soft seams, 1905; others for the Blackshale in 1908 and the Ell in 1891 and 1912); none is dated to the colliery's 1949 closure, and the catalogue gives no location, so they may include other Ripley pits. (uncertain) ⁴

Recorded claims

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

• The museum dates the colliery 1846 to October 1949; Wikishire has it worked 1863–1948 and merged with Denby Hall in 1949. (disputed) ^1,2
• 336 at No. 1 in 1894, 299 in 1896, 128 in 1905 after No. 1 was abandoned, 198 in 1910, 397 in 1933, 518 in 1940 and 1,042 in 1947 with 500,000 tons. ¹
• Twenty-six named deaths 1857–1937, including six in the gas explosion of October 1857 and two loaders killed by one fall on 20 March 1880. ¹
• The Pit Top, a grassed open area with a white arch sculpture, is the site of the original Ripley Colliery. ^2,3
• The Mining Remediation Authority catalogue holds abandonment plans titled 'Ripley' (catalogue 4856, Deep Hard and Deep Soft seams, 1905; others for the Blackshale in 1908 and the Ell in 1891 and 1912); none is dated to the colliery's 1949 closure, and the catalogue gives no location, so they may include other Ripley pits. (uncertain) ⁴

Photographs & further reading

Sources

1. (primary) Ripley Colliery — Durham Mining Museum — Durham Mining Museum
2. (secondary) Ripley, Derbyshire — Wikishire — Wikishire
3. (observational) Ripley Pit Top (Geograph photo 6461305) — Geograph
4. (primary) BGS / Mining Remediation Authority mine plans: RIPLEY — British Geological Survey / Mining Remediation Authority
5. (secondary) Butterley Company — Wikipedia — Wikipedia

Record created: 12 September 2026 · Last researched: 12 September 2026