Chatterley Whitfield

[me]

Just by chance, managed to catch the first tour of the year. Excellently presented by volunteers, lots of artifacts, and given a walk round the large site. The volunteers have a passion for the site and are working hard to digitise documentation, very large maps & technical drawings. They have created a number of monuments to miners in a remembrance garden.
What a terrible shame that this wonderful piece of our industrial heritage has been allowed by the council to fall into such a state of disrepair and then make it exceedingly difficult for the volunteers to actually try & preserve what remain of it.
I encourage you to take the opportunity to visit this site and support the great efforts being made by the Friends of Chatterley Whitfield.

 

[tomferry]

I have done a tour around there myself it’s very interesting, they are doing extremely good work I hope they get further support they deserve it.

 

[Pitlamp]

"I encourage you to take the opportunity to visit this site and support the great efforts being made by the Friends of Chatterley Whitfield."

Thanks for posting this information - and for the images. I'd be interested in doing just that but many forum members probably haven't even heard of the place and don't know where it is. So it might be worth giving us basic details?

(Yes I realise we could probably Google it but will people?)

 

[tomferry]

Here is a link to there history website and other articles they have done .

Home - Chatterley Whitfield - Former Mine and Museum

Welcome Chatterley Whitfield Friends - CIO. (Registered Charity 1183093) Chatterley Whitfield is an industrial time capsule and is widely acknowledged to be the most comprehensive surviving example of a deep mine site in England. Here at Britain's biggest remaining colliery site, which has been...

chatterleywhitfieldfriends.org.uk

My personal photo collection link below incase anyone wants to see more of the tour. I only use a phone so no amazing quality

Chattery Whitfield

Explore this photo album by Tom Ferry on Flickr!

flickr.com

 

[Pitlamp]

Ta!

 

[wellyjen]

Went there in about 1980/81 with my Dad on a day trip with the Workers Education Association. The mine was still being pumped via one of the neighbouring working collieries that pre-strike existed in the area, so there was an underground trip too. A shame the site was left to rot for so long, but good that something is now happening. I ended up living not far from there for a good few years.

 

[shotlighter]

A great place & a great tragedy that it was closed. The original underground trip that Jen did was down 700 feet to the Holly Lane seam. Not long before that was closed, I went down with my grandfather & came out with a small lump of Holly Lane coal, which is still on my bookshelf. Holly Lane was considered to be one of the finest house coals in England (it outcrops about a mile from where I live btw).

The original underground section was closed when pumping ceased from Wolstanton in about 86/87. However a shallow and very convincing new underground trip was built to replace it. The shaft "experience" was constructed by Wolstantons shaft team & was supurb & even I was impressed, even though I knew what they'd done. (Shaft team foreman was a neighbour).

One of the sites greatest treasures is the Hesketh winding engine, a huge Worsley Mesnes steam winder. It was always kept in pristine condition but the last time I saw it, it was covered in rust, dirt & bird crap.

 

[Cantclimbtom]

I have a fragment of a memory from being a young child. I was taken to a mining museum, I think coal (this must narrow it down!) and given a hard hat with cap lamp and lead acid battery which was a struggle for me over my shoulder on a strap. The guide milked the joke way too long that I had to hand over my matches and cigarettes, cigars etc or digital watch as it was a potential source of ignition. We went into a lift cage and descended very slowly a fairly short distance and had a very short tour. The only other thing I remember was at the back of the lift was a conveyor belt contraption which moved fast as we descended slowly to try to give the impression we were descending a great distance at speed.

From these sparse details do you think I might have been to Chatterley Whitfield? (The belt at back if lift to a fake-deep coal mine tour). My dad did things like take me to Gloddfa Ganol, Llechwedd, Ironbridge, Black Country Living Museum and so forth. So it's plausible... Does that lift sound familiar to there? Could it be anywhere else in maybe 1979/1980 or so?

 

[shotlighter]

I have a fragment of a memory from being a young child. I was taken to a mining museum, I think coal (this must narrow it down!) and given a hard hat with cap lamp and lead acid battery which was a struggle for me over my shoulder on a strap. The guide milked the joke way too long that I had to hand over my matches and cigarettes, cigars etc or digital watch as it was a potential source of ignition. We went into a lift cage and descended very slowly a fairly short distance and had a very short tour. The only other thing I remember was at the back of the lift was a conveyor belt contraption which moved fast as we descended slowly to try to give the impression we were descending a great distance at speed.

From these sparse details do you think I might have been to Chatterley Whitfield? (The belt at back if lift to a fake-deep coal mine tour). My dad did things like take me to Gloddfa Ganol, Llechwedd, Ironbridge, Black Country Living Museum and so forth. So it's plausible... Does that lift sound familiar to there? Could it be anywhere else in maybe 1979/1980 or so?

79/80 would be far too early for the shallow "replacment" trip to be in operation (by about 6-7 years).
Whitfield closed in about 1975 as an operational pit. Incidentally, DCRO has one of the last batch of flame safety lamps from Whitfield, stamped "75" on the glass ring.

 

[me]

I have been trying to get more information on this chimney as the guide said they didn't know what it was for. A couple of people suggested a Shot Tower but there appears to be only 3 known ones in the UK & this isn't one of them.

I have looked at maps & found something next to the railway lines on a 1920 - 1940 map (it has created a long shadow on the right hand map. Just south of the solar farm) so asked a railway enthusiast friend who suggested "It's far too tall for a tunnel ventilation shaft, canal or railway - it would need to be shorter & broader. More likely for coal fired steam engine"

Anyone other suggestions?

 

[shotlighter]

I have been trying to get more information on this chimney as the guide said they didn't know what it was for. A couple of people suggested a Shot Tower but there appears to be only 3 known ones in the UK & this isn't one of them.
View attachment 15315

I have looked at maps & found something next to the railway lines on a 1920 - 1940 map (it has created a long shadow on the right hand map. Just south of the solar farm) so asked a railway enthusiast friend who suggested "It's far too tall for a tunnel ventilation shaft, canal or railway - it would need to be shorter & broader. More likely for coal fired steam engine"

Anyone other suggestions?

It looks like a lot of brick and tile works chimneys, once
common in the area. Other than that?

 

[tomferry]

I second the above brick works or similar

 

[wellyjen]

Often found in close proximity to coal mines. Easy access to fuel for firing the bricks/tiles and can be a source of suitable clay too.

 

[Roger the Cat]

Hoffman kilns usually have a tall, central chimney. You would expect to find the remains of said kiln over a wide area.

 

[shotlighter]

Hoffman kilns usually have a tall, central chimney. You would expect to find the remains of said kiln over a wide area.

The ovens that those little chimneys served were groups of little beehive ovens. They were very common round here at one time , Parkhouse had a group of them & so did others. Apart from the Hoffmann coke ovens (Birchenwood & Shelton steel works), I don't know of any colliery brickworks that had Hoffmann's. Sneyd probably used a Hoffmann, as they were very forward looking. Unfortunately all the folk I know & could ask are dead now.

 

[Lizzie84]

I did the 'fake' tour when I was a child in the very limited time they had it...before beginning the long fight to preserve the site. It pretty much started my love with the industrial past and mines in general. I remember that they also had the 'last' pit pony there at the time.
I keep meaning to get on a nowadays tour. Such an incredible site and sadly one which the Chatterly ex workers and friends seem to have been fighting for far too long instead of being able to enjoy sharing.