Snibston Colliery

Overview

A Leicestershire colliery sunk by the celebrated railway engineers George and Robert Stephenson, whose name gave rise to the town of Coalville and whose colliery railway was one of the earliest built anywhere in Britain.

History

Snibston was one of three collieries sunk in the 1820s and 1830s that between them created the town of Coalville in north-west Leicestershire, taking its own name directly from the mine. The colliery was sunk by the celebrated railway engineers George and Robert Stephenson, and produced coal continuously from 1833 to 1983 — exactly 150 years. Robert Stephenson also built the colliery's own railway, constructed between 1833 and 1836 to connect Snibston to the Leicester and Swannington Railway, making it one of the earliest railways built anywhere in Britain. The colliery finally closed in 1983 (some sources give 1985 for final abandonment of the wider site). Leicestershire County Council bought the site to preserve its most important buildings, and in 1992 opened Snibston Discovery Museum, a major interactive museum of science and working life built around the preserved colliery structures. The museum closed and was largely demolished in 2015 following council funding cuts; the colliery's listed headstocks and three other listed buildings survive, and volunteer-led colliery tours with former miners and re-enactors continue on part of the site.

Geology

Snibston worked coal seams of the Leicestershire coalfield around Coalville.

Workings

Coal was raised via shafts sunk by George and Robert Stephenson, connected to the wider rail network by one of Britain's earliest railways, built by Robert Stephenson between 1833 and 1836.

Closure

The colliery ceased coal production in 1983, ending exactly 150 years of continuous working.

What remains

The colliery's listed headstocks and three other listed buildings survive on part of the former Snibston Discovery Museum site, which closed and was largely demolished in 2015; volunteer-led tours continue.

The protected historic headstocks and three further listed buildings from the colliery survive, along with the route of Robert Stephenson's early colliery railway.

Abandoned workings can be dangerous — unstable ground, uncapped shafts, flooding and bad air are common even where a site looks safe from the surface. This entry describes history and general location only; it is not an access guide.

Recorded claims

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

• Snibston Colliery was sunk by George and Robert Stephenson and produced coal continuously from 1833 to 1983. ^1,2
• Robert Stephenson built Snibston's own colliery railway between 1833 and 1836 to connect it to the Leicester and Swannington Railway, one of the earliest railways built anywhere in Britain. ¹
• Leicestershire County Council bought the site on closure and opened Snibston Discovery Museum in 1992 around the preserved colliery buildings; the museum closed and was largely demolished in 2015 following council funding cuts, though the listed headstocks and three other buildings survive. ²

Images

Sources

1. (secondary) A brief history lesson on Snibston Colliery — Wildgoose Education
2. (secondary) Snibston — Wikishire

Record created: 21 August 2026 · Last researched: 21 August 2026