Introduction

Although – apart from the vital innovation of steam-engine pumping – there were no technological inventions in the mining of coal, coal mines did change substantially 1700-1900.

After you have studied this webpage, answer the question sheet by clicking on the 'Time to Work' icon at the top of the page.

1   Harrington Mill Pit Colliery in Northumberland, c.1770

Interrogating Source 1:

Point out:

• the shaft into the ground (labelled A);

• the winding gear, used to lower miners down the shaft;

• the whim-gin – the horse wheel that was in earlier days used to lower the miners down the shaft;

• the steam engine house, where a new steam engine powered the winding machinery which lowered the miners into the pit and brought up the coal;

• the steam engine's copper boiler behind the house;

• the pile of coal in the foreground;

• a basket used to bring coal up the shaft;

• the loading platform, where the coal was sorted into sizes and loaded onto packhorses.

2   Hebburn Colliery in County Durham, c.1844

Interrogating Source 2:

Point out:

• the downcast shaft, with corves (coal tubs) being drawn out of the mine;

• the winding gear, used to lower miners down the shaft and to bring up the coal corves;

• the steam engine house, with its chimney, where a steam engine was used to power the winding gear;

• the upcast shaft, with a wind-vane to turn the chimney opening away from the wind at all times;

• the screening sheds, where the coal was sorted into different sizes;

• the railway, on which the coal was taken away to be sold (note the distinctive chaldron wagons).