Alexandra Colliery

Shafts
Single shaft, downcast, 19 feet diameter, commenced 1873 and sunk to Pemberton Four Feet at 257 yards. Deepening completed in 1887 to Arley Mine at 779 yards and passing through Great Haigh Fault. Shaft subsequently filled up to just below Wigan Four Feet (intersected at 411 yards)

Winding
Twin cylinder horizontal engine by W & J. Yates, Blackburn, 1876. 36 inches x 78 inches, Cornish valves 10 inches diameter admission, 12 inches diameter exhaust. Musgrave’s trip gear fitted on admission valves. Link motion with eccentrics mounted on stub shafts with drag link drive from crank pins. Winding drum parallel, 18 feet diameter, by 10 feet 6 inches wide, originally two centre brake paths for foot brake and steam brake. Bertram VISOR overwind/overspeed controller fitted 1888.

Winding (1892) from Haigh Yard Mine at 643½ yards at 56 winds per hour. Winding ropes 1½ inches diameter fitted with Ormerod detaching hooks. Four wire rope conductors per cage. Six tubs wound, each 7 cwt. capacity, in double deck cages, three tubs per deck.

Headgear of pitch pine construction, 66 feet high to pulley centres. 16 feet diameter pulleys. Top of shaft ran in, 1911, causing collapse of headgear. Shaft repaired and headgear reconstructed in timber, 1911.

Pumping
Two inverted vertical twin cylinder Cameron pumps, steam driven, at Pemberton Four Feet level. Cylinders 24 inches x 10½ inches stroke, 9 inch diameter rams.

Electric Lighting
Engine and generator located at Pemberton Four Feet for lighting Pemberton Four Feet and Haigh Yard insets.

Ventilation
Originally furnaces at Lindsay No.1 Pit and Dairy Pit. Cockson Patent “Silent Guibal” fan installed at Dairy Pit, 1883, replacing the two furnaces. 30 feet diameter, blades, 15 feet wide at inlet, seven feet wide at tip. Inlet (single) 14 feet diameter. 300,000cfm at 5 inches wg. and 80rpm.
Rope drive, 15 – 2 inch ropes. Duplicate engine 30 inches x 36 inches, running at 50rpm.

Boilers (1892)
7 Lancashire 7 feet x 28 feet, made by Wigan Coal & Iron Co. Ltd,
2 Lancashire 7 feet x 30 feet, by Robert Daglish, St Helens. 60psi., steam receiver 3 feet diameter running across full range of boilers. Proctor’s mechanical stokers with moving bar fire grates.
Circular chimney, 195 feet high.
Boilers later replaced by Lancashire boilers working at 100psi.

Screens Engines
Two 7 inches x 10 inches, single cylinder inverted vertical engines.

Seams Worked/Workforce (1954)
Crombouke (Ince Four Feet), Ince Seven Feet, Ince Six Feet (Furnace).
U/G 148 S/F 53

Accidents & Disasters
On the 4th December 1875 an accident in the shaft claimed the lives of 7 men. The descending cage struck the ascending cage throwing the men out, to fall down the shaft. The full report can be found here.

Another shaft accident occurred on the 22nd October 1879 killing a further 7 men. The full report can be found here.

CLOSURE – June 1955

Copyright © NMRS Records: G. Hayes Collection