Alexandra Colliery
Used with kind permission of Stephen Wainwright
Pilkington Bros. sank this colliery in 1867 and named it in honour of Alexandra, Princess of Wales, who visited the sinking. An earlier colliery on, or near, the same site worked briefly in the 1840s.
By November 1868 ventilation came from a furnace suspended half way down one of the shafts. At the start of the previous week, the chain on which the furnace was hung broke and the live coals started a fire in the coal at the shaft bottom. The smoke eventually began to enter the pit and the underground manager, the underlooker and a wagoner went to tell the workmen to come out, which they did. The party went further, however, and did not return. Their bodies were recovered the following week.
On October 22nd 1879 Joseph Naylor, the engine man, forgot to reverse the winding engine and caused an over-wind which killed seven men in the 297 metre deep shaft. The winding engine was a double horizontal with 25-inch cylinders and a four feet stroke. The drum was tapered from 12 to 10 feet. The Mines Inspector found it to be in good order and fitted with a proper indicator. He further remarked that there was one fatal accident for nine and a half million windings, and advocated the use of detaching hooks.
Alexandra Colliery wound its last coal in 1925, but then it became a pumping pit for Ravenhead.
Further information:
- NMRS Records, Gazetteer of British Collieries
