Inset

The place part-way down a shaft where a seam or level is entered and the cage stops to be loaded: the shaft's landing at that horizon.

Historical usage

Gresley's coal-mining glossary of 1883 explains the inset as the entrance to a mine at the bottom or part way down a shaft where the cages are loaded, and that is the sense in every colliery record since. The word had an older life in the Leeds district, where the Farnley pit accounts of 1690 to 1754 use inset for a place cut into a bank for coal, but that use did not spread. The 1849 glossary of the Northumberland and Durham coal trade has the men without the word: the hangers-on who put the full tubs into the cage and took the empties out at the shaft bottom, or at any other landing or stopping place. The Cannock Chase accident of 1868 turned on one. The pit had no depth indicator, and the engineman knew the skip had reached the headway or inset where it had to stop by a wrapping of hemp on the rope, which in time broke the rope.

How it worked

A shaft that serves more than one seam has an inset at each: a widening of the shaft walls where the roadways of that seam meet it, with keps or a landing for the cage to rest on, signals to the engineman, and an onsetter in charge. Below the lowest inset the shaft runs on to the shaft bottom and the sump that collects the mine's water. In modern shaft sinking the stations are cut by the sinkers on the way down, each with a short stub of roadway leading off it, and the lowest is usually where the mineral is loaded into the shaft, with a pocket cut beside it for the loading plant.

Why it was used

One shaft can serve every seam it passes through, and the inset is what makes that possible: it is the door from the shaft into each level, and the point where the winding of the whole pit is organised. Without it every seam would need a shaft of its own.

Risks & limitations

A cage must stop exactly at the inset, and the men at it stand at the edge of a shaft. Before indicators and reliable signalling the engineman judged the position by rope marks, which at Cannock Chase destroyed the rope; a cage jerking at a bad joint in the guides threw a man out at Glenclelland in 1917. An inset is also an opening in the shaft lining, and the point where the ventilation of a seam can short-circuit into the shaft unless it is doored.

Regional variation

Inset in the coalfields, shaft station in the metal mines and in modern practice, landing or stopping place in the older North East glossaries. The archive's earlier scan for 'plat' as a Cornish word for the same thing found no glossary that defines it so and no record that uses it; the Cornish plats on record are the cylinder plat and the whim plat, which are platforms at surface.

Related terminology

Cage, Keps, Level, Onsetter, Shaft, Shaft Sinking, Sump, Winding Rope

Mines associated with this term

5 examples chosen from 16 linked records — the term page is not an index.

• Abernant Colliery — Neath Port Talbot (well documented example)
  Named in this record’s workings: “…North (upcast, 836-837 yards) and South (downcast, 987 yards), with insets at 692 and 792 yards, electrically wound by 1,500 hp and 2,000 hp…”
• Thorne Colliery — South Yorkshire (well documented example)
  Named twice in this record, first in the geology: “…to final abandonment. The No. 2 shaft reached 964 yards, with an inset at 863 yards at the Kent's Thick or High Hazel seam where it…”
• Wheldale Colliery — West Yorkshire (well documented example)
  Named twice in this record, first in the history: “…the longest single conveyor belt in the world at the time. Six seam insets eventually served the shafts, from the Warren House at 600 feet down…”
• William Pit — Cumbria (well documented example)
  Named in this record’s workings: “…was abandoned in later years and winding was carried on from an inset thirty feet below the Main Band Seam, which the shafts cut at 624…”
• Cannock Chase No. 4 Pit — Staffordshire (well documented example)
  Named twice in this record, first in the history: “…months as a 'token' to show the engineman when the skip reached an inset, because the engine had no indicator. Hardened into a bolster, it…”

Disasters associated with this term

5 examples chosen from 8 linked records, most direct relationship first.

• Aldwarke Main Colliery shaft accident, 1904 (contextual relationship)
  Named in this record’s narrative: “…Parkgate shaft was used only for men going to and from the Parkgate inset, 406 yards down. It was an upcast, and also carried the exhaust…”
• Bersham Colliery explosion (contextual relationship)
  Named in this record’s rescue and recovery: “…hooker-on's body was found under the guide rods blown into the south inset, and John Jones, Edward Owen and Robert Lloyd were found as the…”
• Bickershaw Colliery shaft accident, 1932 (contextual relationship)
  Named twice in this record, first in the narrative: “…after, an overwind occurred, the cage plunging past the landing inset and through wooden support timbers before crashing into water in the…”
• Cannock Chase Colliery shaft accident, 1868 (contextual relationship)
  Named in this record’s narrative: “…as a 'token' to show the engineman when the skip was level with an inset where it had to stop. There was no indicator on the engine to do…”
• Ingham Colliery explosion, 1947 (contextual relationship)
  Named in this record’s narrative: “…Act 1911. Two shafts went to the Black Bed at 277 yards, with an inset at 188 yards in the Beeston. The Wheatley Lime, where the explosion…”

Sources

1. (primary) Mining Terms (S): glossary of the Northumberland and Durham coal trade, 1849 — Durham Mining Museum
2. (secondary) Cannock Chase Colliery Shaft Accident - Cannock - 1868 — Northern Mine Research Society
3. (secondary) Inset (Yorkshire Historical Dictionary) — University of York, Borthwick Institute
4. (secondary) Pit Terminology — Healey Hero
5. (secondary) Shaft sinking — Wikipedia

Record created: 16 October 2026 · Last researched: 16 October 2026