The 1841 Awards of Coal stated that
Moses Teague, ëdid after 9th April 1832 and before the passing of the Act
make application in writing for a gale of coal in extension of Meerbrook
Level (but which application was not granted) and that Moses Teague, together
with William Crawshay erected works and proceeded as if it had beení.
The Awards then confirmed the interests of Teague and Crawshay with Crawshay
having a three-quarters share.
William Crawshay of Cyfarthfa Castle,
Merthyr Tydfil, Glamorgan was a South Wales iron master born in 1788 and
owner of the great Cyfarthfa Ironworks. His interest in the Forest
came through Cinderford Ironworks in which he took a three-twentieth share
in 1835 together with Teague. Meerbrook Level, and other coal concerns
around Cinderford were aquired to provide a supply of coal to the works.
The expansion of the Meerbrook Level
is believed to have begun in 1832 on the site of Lightmoor Colliery and
Sopwithís plan of 1835 shows two shafts in existance, one what was to become
the pumping shaft, or deep pit, and the other a winding shaft, later to
become the smoke pit. A survey of the Forests collieries published
in March 1841 revealed that there was an 18 inch high pressure pumping
engine and a 15 inch high pressure winding engine, both of double power
and each with their own engine house. The pits had been sunk down
220 yards but they still had another 20 yards to go and the coal output
was nil. Possibly a small amount of coal was being won and used in
the engine boilers. According to an article on developments at the
colliery, published in the Dean Forest Mercury in 1899, coal was first
struck in 1846 the colliery being under the management of ëGafferí Davies,
whilst the business interests of William Crawshay were being looked after
by George Morgan, whose family were to retain connections to the end of
the collieryís life.
Initially communication between
the colliery and the ironworks was by tramroad, a line being laid due east
from Lightmoor to the Forest of Dean tramroad where it made a junction
close to Ruspidge Mill. Upon the conversion of the Forest of Dean
line to a broad gauge railway by the South Wales Railway in 1854 Crawshayís
built their own private branch from the colliery. Plans for this
line had been produced as early as May 1853 and in January 1854 it was
described thus;
ëBroad gauge Branch Railway commencing
at Light Moor deep pit and extending eastwards and northwards through open
Forest to the fence of Light Moor Enclosure and thence in a northern direction
through Light Moor Enclosure to the southern side of the Turn Pike road
leading from Coleford to Cinderford Bridge and from the north side of the
same road, through a portion of open Forest called Crab Tree Hill to a
point about six chains northward of the Old Northern fence of Crab Tree
Hill Enclosure and adjoining the west side of land in the occupation of
the South Wales Railway Co. and again commencing at a place opposite the
last described point on the east Side of the land in occupation of the
South Wales Railway Co. and continuing in a Southwards and Eastwards direction
through open Forest, and through Freehold Land belonging to the Cinderford
Iron Co. to a point nesr the Weighing Machine of the said Co.í
The line was worked by Crawshayís
own locomotives with at least one being supplied by the Neath Abbey Iron
Co.
In 1854 William Crawshay conveyed
his interests in the concerns to his son Henry who it seems had been managing
his fathers interests in the Forest for some time.
With regards to the colliery itself
four shafts had now been sunk, the original pumping shaft, 875 feet deep;
two winding shafts, North and South; and an upcast shaft, the original
winding shaft, now used to remove the foul air from the underground workings
and for the smoke and exhaust steam from the underground boilers and engines;
these three were all 894 feet deep. In 1858 the pumping shaft was
described as being 9 ft. 6 in. by 14 ft. The pumping engine was supplied
by the Neath Abbey Iron Co. in 1845 and was of the Cornish Beam condensing
type. It had a 78 inch diameter cylinder with a nine feet stroke,
eight feet in the shaft. It was connected to an 18 inch diameter
forcing pump with a 90 yard lift, a 9 inch forcing pump of 80 yards lift
and a 9 inch bucket pump with a lift of 130 yards. With the engine
working at seven strokes per minute 605 gallons of water could be lifted
in that time. The water was delivered into the old Meerbrook Level
which carried it away into the Cinderford Brook. During the drier
summer weather the engine worked at three and a half strokes per minute.
At seven stokes the four egg-ended boilers, each 40 feet long and 6 ft.
6 in. in diameter, used to supply the steam consumed 12 tons of coal in
twenty-four hours. At around this period the output of the colliery
was 86, 508 tons per year.
In 1861 William Crawshay, writing
to his brother Richard, described Henryís works thus; ëhis Pits,
Engines and Collieries are the most perfect in the Kingdom.í
About 1862 Henry Crawshay, with
financial assistance from his father, bought out the interests of his partners
in the Forest for £50,000. The colliery was extended over the
years with other gales being acquired. By 1863 the Resolution and
Safeguard gale had been bought and it was intended to sink new shafts on
this property at Reform Bridge to the south-west of Lightmoor. to
bring the coal from these shafts it was planned that the Lightmoor Railway,
as Crawshayís private line was known, would be extended but although earthworks
for the railway were prepared no other work was done. Another gale
aquired was Soundwell.
Henry Crawshay treated his men very
well and their regard for him was shown during a coal strike for three
months in the winter of 1874-5 when they continued to work. By this
date it would appear that Henryís son Edwin was managing the concerns for
Henry Crawshay & Son, Henry having taken both his sons William and
Edwin into partnership. Upon the death of Henry, aged 67, on 17th
November 1879 at his home of Oaklands Park near Newnham, [something strange
happened check with Mabel]
In February 1880 an accident occured
which could have had serious consequences for the colliery. One of
the most dreaded occurences underground is fire and one Saturday night
it was found that the timbering in the main roadway was alight for a distance
of 10 - 15 yards. By the time assistance arrived this had increased
considerably especially as great difficult was encountered in obtaining
water. Eventually it was got from the extreme dip of the workings
and brought to the scene of the fire in a ëgooseí, an iron vessel drawn
by horse. Relays of men worked through Sunday and until five oíclock
Monday morning to extinguish the flames. As considerable damage had
been done to the roof supports in the main roadway the colliery was
unable to work for a further day.
On the 14 August 1889 Henry Crawshay
& Co. Ltd. was formed with an authorised capital of £140,000
in 4,000 preference and 3,000 ordinary £20 shares. The new
company was to acquire both Henry Crawshay & Sons and Henry Crawshay
& Co. The first directors were William Crawshay, Sir Gabriel
Goldney, Tudor Crawshay, Colonel Augustus Arthur Kilner Brasier Creagh,
and Frederick Hastings Goldney.
On the 4th January 1894 another
occurence brought the colliery to a stand. For some reason the ësheeveí,
or pulley wheel, on the top of the south shaft headframe moved on its axle.
This meant that winding was impossible and the men underground had to be
hauled up the Big Shaft. The wheel defied every effort to move it
back for almost a week during which time nearly 600 men and boys were out
of work and 500 tons of coal a day were lost at a time of great demand.
In February 1899 the Dean
Forest Mercury carried a long report of developments at Lightmoor.
It would seem that the 1890s had been a period of change and expansion.
A new set of screens had recently been installed, possibly by the firm
of Heanan & Froude of Worcester, which replaced the old method of raking
the coals on a bank. They were worked by a horizontal egine with
a 12 inch cylinder and two foot stoke. Electrical plant had also
been installed to provide light, both on the surface and underground.
The provision of this was in the hands of Messrs. Scott and Mountain Ltd,
of Newcastle-on-Tyne and a new engine house had been erected containing
a vertical high-speed engine. It was intended that a second engine
should be provided to act as standby. Working at 60 lbs. pressure
with an 111/2 inch cylinder by 9 inch stoke and fitted with piston valves
and Pickering governors the engine made 180 revolutions per minute and
produced about 15 h.p. The engines 3 ft. 6 in. flywheel was connected
via a cotton belt to a ëTyneí horse-shoe pattern dynamo which gave an output
of 45 amperes at 210 volts. The dynamo was connected to a switchboard
at which point the current was split into two circuits. One supplied
the surface buildings and the other supplied the underground lights by
means of two cables taken down the shaft in wooden conduits.
In 1898 the colliery had broken
the record for the output from a Forest of Dean colliery due to the fact
that in the development of the works great foresight was shown with regard
to the future and the pit was one of the best of the Forest housecoal collieries.
In 1899 there were 594 persons employed underground and 110 on the surface.
Those working below were in safe hands whilst vbeing wound up and down
the shaft as the winding engine in addition to the normal break also had
a steam brake fitted at which a second man always attended whilst men were
riding. This attention to detail and safety appears to have permiated
throughout the management and working of the pit.
The Deep Pit was later sunk further,
to a depth of 936 feet, until the Brazilly seam was reached. This
deepening passed through a further eighteen seams, the more important being
the Twenty Inch or Smith Coal,the Lowery, Starkey, Rockey and Churchway
High Delf. The area of coal worked was about 1,000 acres.
The screening plant too was modernised
and by 1935 was capable of handling up to eight hundred tons per day.
In later years the big fear at Lightmoor
was water. It was this that made the Lightmoor management purchase
the Speech House Hill Colliery in 1903 and then to purchase Trafalgar Colliery
jointly with Foxes Bridge in 1919. The closure of both Crump Meadow
and Foxes Bridge put a great strain on Lightmoor, which together with the
slump in demand for coal during the 1930s almost brought about closure
but the fatal day was delayed until June 1940.
Notice was first given in January
1933 that the gales would be surrendered in March due to the additional
cost of pumping the Crump Meadow and Foxes Bridge water. The surrounding
district were worried by the news in the knowledge that between seven and
eight hundred men would be made unemployed. However, in February
the managing director, Arthur Morgan informed the local press that ëI have
beenh successful in my effortsí and that the colliery would not close for
at least another twelve months. The wages bill at this time for Lightmoor
was £70,000 a year.
One rather startling statistic for
1933 was that a Mr. Alfred Drew, who had started work at the pit aged 13
years, had walked 140,000 miles to and from work over a period of fifty
years from his home at Viney Hill, about four miles as the crow flies.
In all that time he had never lost a shift through illness.
In May 1940 it was announced that
the colliery was to close the reason being put down to the exhaustion of
the coal and the drift of men from the colliery to the war-time factories.
This time there would be no redundancies as the 172 men could be absorbed
at Crawshayís other collieries, Eastern United and Northern United.
The output at this time being about 118 tons a day. Although the
official date of closure was Saturday the 8th June 1940 some small coal
was still being forwarded for a further three weeks although the last wagon
of coal to go over the Lightmoor Railway was dispatched on the 5th June.
At the time of closure the colliery was served by one Severn & Wye
train per week, the 9.30 am Lydney - Coleford freight which traversed the
Mineral Loop on Fridays only.
When the decision to close was made
the question arose in respect of the recovery of the redundant track and
colliery equipment. Lewis Brothers Ltd. of Eastmoors, Cardiff were
commissioned by Sir Alexander Gibb & Partners, who were the agents
and consulting engineers to the Ministry of Supply, to purchase on their
behalf 6,000 tons of rails required in connection with the urgent construction
of munitions factories.
Lewis Bros. purchased the sidings
in and around the colliery on 4th June 1940. They also consulted
with the GWR to enquire if they would be willing to let them have the connecting
branch from Bilson Junction on behalf of the Government, offering to remove
the rails themselves. It seems to have been forgotten that the line
was privately owned and belonged to the colliery. The sidings and
the Lightmoor Railway were removed in July 1940.