Muker – SD 931956
From around 1730, a company of national importance took a lease of the Trustees of the Duke of Wharton’s lead mines on the south side of Swaledale, between Spout Gill, Keldside and Sleddale. This was the Company of Mine Adventurers of England, which was a joint stock company, established in 1698, with extensive mining interests in Cardiganshire and Montgomeryshire.50 The company had its own smelt mill at Spout Gill, a drawing of which, dated 1735, is preserved in the Egerton MSS.
The company gave up its lease around 1757, but Spout Gill mill did not close because Thomas Smith, the owner of Smith’s mill on Barney Beck, claimed that it was part of the Lordship of the manor of Healaugh, which he had purchased in 1738. Under this pretext, the lessees of Smith’s mines at Beldi Hill smelted at Spout Gill until June 1769 when Lord Pomfret’s agents took forcible possession of it.
Further information and references can be found in:
- Gill, M.C. Yorkshire Smelting Mills Part 1, Northern Mine Research Society Memoirs 1992, British Mining No 45, pp 111-150
