Silverwood Colliery
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Silverwood Colliery was a
colliery Coal mining is the process of extracting coal from the ground. Coal is valued for its energy content and since the 1880s has been widely used to generate electricity. Steel and cement industries use coal as a fuel for extraction of iron from ...
situated between
Thrybergh Thrybergh is a village and civil parish in the Metropolitan Borough of Rotherham in South Yorkshire, England, from Rotherham. It had a population of 4,327 in 2001, reducing to 4,058 at the 2011 Census. History Thrybergh – which is mentione ...
and
Ravenfield Ravenfield is a small village and civil parish in South Yorkshire, England. It is located in the Metropolitan Borough of Rotherham, east of the town of Rotherham. The older part is a former farming village and over recent years has become a ...
in
Yorkshire Yorkshire ( ; abbreviated Yorks), formally known as the County of York, is a Historic counties of England, historic county in northern England and by far the largest in the United Kingdom. Because of its large area in comparison with other Eng ...
,
England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...
. Originally called Dalton Main, it was renamed after a local woodland. It was owned by Dalton Main Collieries Ltd.


History

Dalton Main Collieries Limited became a
public company A public company is a company whose ownership is organized via shares of stock which are intended to be freely traded on a stock exchange or in over-the-counter markets. A public (publicly traded) company can be listed on a stock exchange (l ...
which was floated on the
London Stock Exchange London Stock Exchange (LSE) is a stock exchange in the City of London, England, United Kingdom. , the total market value of all companies trading on LSE was £3.9 trillion. Its current premises are situated in Paternoster Square close to St Pau ...
in December 1899. The purpose of the company was to buy out the business of
Roundwood Colliery Roundwood Colliery was a coal mine situated in the Don Valley, about 2 miles north of Rotherham, South Yorkshire, England on the borders of Rotherham and Rawmarsh. History Coal gathering in the Aldwarke area, lands of the old manor which s ...
, purchase land at Silverwood, between Thrybergh and Ravenfield, and sink a new deep colliery there. These installations were to be connected to a boat staithe on the River Don by a railway. The first shaft commenced sinking in 1900 and coal was being worked by 1904. The railway, with its own
platform Platform may refer to: Technology * Computing platform, a framework on which applications may be run * Platform game, a genre of video games * Car platform, a set of components shared by several vehicle models * Weapons platform, a system or ...
, which from Roundwood Colliery, became known as
John Brown's Private Railway John Brown's railway was a line constructed in the Rotherham area of South Yorkshire, England, in order to link Silverwood Colliery to staithes situated alongside the River Don, South Yorkshire, River Don. The line, along with the collieries, bec ...
after the company which became sole owners of the Dalton Main Collieries from 1909. There was also a line which ran from Silverwood, past Ravenfield, and down to join the existing line just north of
Anston Anston is a civil parish in South Yorkshire, England, formally known as North and South Anston. The parish of Anston consists of the settlements of North Anston and South Anston, divided by the Anston Brook. History Anston, first recorded as ...
. Royalty visited the mine twice;
King George V George V (George Frederick Ernest Albert; 3 June 1865 – 20 January 1936) was King of the United Kingdom and the British Dominions, and Emperor of India, from 6 May 1910 until his death in 1936. Born during the reign of his grandmother Que ...
and Queen Mary paid a visit in July 1912, but left early to drive to Cadeby Colliery after learning of the disaster that had befallen that pit on the very same day.
Queen Elizabeth II Elizabeth II (Elizabeth Alexandra Mary; 21 April 1926 – 8 September 2022) was Queen of the United Kingdom and other Commonwealth realms from 6 February 1952 until Death and state funeral of Elizabeth II, her death in 2022. She was queen ...
visited the mine in July 1975 and mined a lump of coal herself.


Paddy mail crash

Shortly after 8 a.m. on 3 February 1966, miners starting their shift went down the pit to board the "
Paddy mail Paddy mails, generally considered as being workmen's trains, were operated by, or for many companies to transport their workers to their place of work or between their sites of work. Originally they were operated by railway contractors, on temp ...
". It was normal practice for the ‘man-rider’ to be followed by a second train which carried equipment. On this day the second train suddenly ran out of control and caught up with the ‘man-riding’ train, hitting it hard in the rear. Ten men lost their lives and a further 29 miners were injured. The accident featured in the local and national press, much of the coverage giving prominence to Sister Adsetts, a member of the Silverwood medical team who, working with members of the Rotherham Mines Rescue team, tended the injured as they were brought from the wreckage. The unusual feature of a woman coming out from the pit led to headlines such as "The Angel with the dirty face". The accident happened some one and a half miles from the pit bottom in the Braithwell return roadway. When the locomotives and the vehicles were removed to the underground workshops for testing, the brakes proved to be in full working order. In the report on the accident by the Mines Inspectorate, the main recommendation was that a train carrying materials must not follow a man-riding train. The rules on underground train operation were re-written.


Closure and redevelopment

The colliery closed in 1994, with remaining reserves being worked from nearby
Maltby Main Colliery The Maltby Main Colliery was a coal mine located east of Rotherham on the eastern edge of Maltby, South Yorkshire, England. The mine was closed in 2013. History The first shafts at Maltby Main Colliery were sunk in 1910, and the first coal pro ...
. A large coal washing and reclamation project continued. During closure the pit was used as the location for the mine accident scene in the film ''
When Saturday Comes ''When Saturday Comes'' (''WSC'') is a monthly magazine about football, first published in London in 1986. "It aims to provide a voice for intelligent football supporters, offering both a serious and humorous view of the sport, covering all the ...
''. The area around Woodlaithes Farm, on the edge of the colliery tip, has since been developed as an up-market housing estate known as Woodlaithes Village which has its own "village pond". Reclamation work finished in 2006, with the
Forestry Commission The Forestry Commission is a non-ministerial government department responsible for the management of publicly owned forests and the regulation of both public and private forestry in England. The Forestry Commission was previously also respon ...
planting tree saplings in 2007. The coal tip has been grassed completely and the once dangerous slurry lake turned into a freshwater nature reserve.


Sport

The colliery had its own football team –
Silverwood Colliery F.C. Silverwood Colliery F.C. was an English association football club based in Rotherham, South Yorkshire. History They competed in the Midland Football League (1889), Midland Football League in 1919–20, and in the FA Cup on numerous occasions. L ...
– which competed in the FA Cup on numerous occasions.


References


External links


Old Ravenfield village historical pictures
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