6. Mechanisation and the Development of the Coalfield

It is claimed that the first Newcomen pumping engines were installed at Paulton Engine and South Liberty collieries in 1750, although Donn’s map of the Bristol area, published in 1769, shows steam engines in the Coalpit Heath, Pucklechurch, Timsbury and Yate areas, but none at South Liberty. If the claim is true, however, it is, perhaps, some measure of the relative technological stagnation of the coalfield that the engine at South Liberty remained in use until the closure of the colliery in 1925. (C G Down & A J Warrington (nd: David & Charles: Newton Abbot) The History of the Somerset Coalfield, p. 89; Roy Webber (1985) “Ashton Gate: Industrial development of a suburb,” Bristol Industrial Archaeology Society Journal, 18, pp. 5-9, 5; B Donn (1769: B Donn: Bristol) Map of the Country 11 Miles around the City of Bristol)

The owners were slow to introduce steam winding, indeed, Bulley has suggested that it was the exception rather than the rule until the 1820s, by which time it was already common in other coalfields. (John A Bulley (1952) ““To Mendip for Coal” - A Study of the Somerset Coalfield before 1830, Part 1: Output, Marketing and Techniques of Mining,” Proceedings of the Somersetshire Archæological & Natural History Society, XCVII, pp. 46-78, 78) The first electric winder was that installed at Mells in, it is thought, the late 1930s. Other pits continued to use steam power until long after nationalisation, the last example being New Rock, which switched to electricity shortly before its closure in 1968. (C G Down & A J Warrington (nd: David & Charles: Newton Abbot) The History of the Somerset Coalfield, p. 46)

Perhaps the most important areas in which Bristol Information and Somerset Information lagged in the adoption of new technology were underground haulage and coal cutting, and these are therefore covered in greater detail below.

6.1: Underground Haulage

The haulage of coal away from the face was generally the work of boys and young men who were waiting to work their way up to better-paid jobs such as hewer. One of the commonest methods of haulage in Bristol and Somerset was the guss and crook Information which consisted of a rope (the guss) passing around the waist and between the legs of the carting boy and fixed to a metal hook (the crook) so that he could tow a sledge containing coal, known locally as a putt. It had been described in detail by Elijah Waring in the report of the Children’s Employment Commission; although it impressed him “… painfully at first…” as “… a barbarous and unnatural mode of applying muscular power,” on closer examination he felt that it was both less inhumane and more efficient than it appeared, leading him “… to a conclusion strongly opposed to my original impression.”(Children’s Employment Commission, Appendix to First Report of the Commissioners, Mines, Part II, Report and Evidence from Sub-Commissioners (PP 1842, XVII), p. 32) This is somewhat at odds with the recollections of Fred Flower, who worked in a number of Somerset collieries from 1922 onwards, and used the guss and crook, finding that “… although the guss had been tailor-made to fit the back, it continually bruised the skin, causing wheals and sores, and quite often at the end of a day’s work blood trickled from the wounds.”(Fred Flower (1990: Millstream Books: Bath) Somerset Coalmining Life, p. 17)

An unpublished Home Office report on the subject, dating from 1913, also concluded that the use of the guss had no harmful effects. (C G Down & A J Warrington (nd: David & Charles: Newton Abbot) The History of the Somerset Coalfield, p. 53) In 1925, however, an SMA committee, meeting to discuss the state of affairs at Mells colliery, commented that “carting coal by the “Guss” is obsolete and most objectionable.” [Bristol University Library: Somerset Miners' Association papers, DM443, minutes of meeting 20 October 1925]

In 1927 a committee set up by the Mines Department to examine the use of the guss noted that, although the guss was then only in use in Somerset, from the report of the Children’s Employment Commission “… it is clear that in 1840 the guss was commonly used in nearly all the coalfields… wherever the workings were restricted in height.” (Report of the Departmental Committee on the Use of the Guss in Somerset Mines, Cmd 3200 (1928: HMSO: London), p. 7)

They concluded that the guss and crook was an effective method of haulage in view of the narrowness of the seams, but that the carting boys should be given the option of using wheeled putts. At the same time, however, they were aware that it was an outdated technology and advised that “The development of the New Great Vein affords an opportunity for introducing modern methods with the minimum of difficulty, and there should be no need to use the putt and guss in this seam.”(Report of the Departmental Committee on the Use of the Guss in Somerset Mines, Cmd 3200 (1928: HMSO: London), pp. 46-49)

Whatever the arguments for replacing the guss and crook may have been, it is worth noting that the last pit to use it was the worker-owned Marsh Lane colliery, where it survived after nationalisation and was still in use when the pit closed in 1949. (C G Down & A J Warrington (nd: David & Charles: Newton Abbot) The History of the Somerset Coalfield, p. 53)

The ideal method of haulage from the face was by conveyor, but details of the numbers installed are only available from 1930, when 7 machines were in use in 3 out of the 15 pits at work, a total which had risen to 34 machines in 7 out of the 13 pits open in 1944. The early conveyors consisted of a series of pans, the coal being shaken from one to the next, which ran parallel to the face and were loaded manually, the cutting (either by hand or machine) and conveying being separate operations. The evidence suggests that conveyors were more widely adopted in Somerset than were cutting machines, indeed Fred Flower suggests that, in many cases, conveyors were introduced first, with coal-cutters following later out of necessity. (Fred Flower (1990: Millstream Books: Bath) Somerset Coalmining Life, pp. 86-89 & 101)

The main disadvantage of these conveyors was the fact that they could not be operated on a steep gradient, but this problem was solved with the introduction, after nationalisation, of belt conveyors which could run up steeper gradients and for longer distances. (Coal Mining. Report of the Technical Advisory Committee, Cmd 6610 (1945: HMSO: London), p. 41; Fred Flower (1990: Millstream Books: Bath) Somerset Coalmining Life, p. 117) The use of conveyors was, by and large, governed by many of the same constraints as that of coal cutters, and some of the difficulties encountered are dealt with in more detail below.

Away from the face, horses were used, although little is known about this as the only figures available cover the period from 1921 to 1938. These show that the number of horses working throughout the coalfield fell from 193 to 99. The number of pits involved is only known from 1925, when 18 out of 23 were using horses, falling to 10 out of 14 by 1938. The Bristol pits seem to have been more reliant on horses, with an average of 12.75 per pit in 1925, compared to 7.14 per pit in Somerset. Although it seems probable that horses were used in large numbers in the early days of the industry, by the twentieth century they seem to have been used in fairly small numbers in some level roadways, whilst powered haulage was used in all other cases. (Fred Flower (1990: Millstream Books: Bath) Somerset Coalmining Life, p. 47)

6.2: Coal-Cutting Machinery

The first recorded use of coal-cutting machinery was at Lower Conygre in 1874, where, although it was proved capable of producing 50 tons of coal from a 100 yard face in an eight hour shift, it was soon removed for reasons which remain unexplained. Further machines were installed at Dunkerton in 1910 and Wellsway around 1920, but no information regarding their effectiveness has been found. (C G Down & A J Warrington (nd: David & Charles: Newton Abbot) The History of the Somerset Coalfield, pp. 112, 120 & 178)

The earliest official report on the use of coal-cutting machinery was in 1910 when seven machines were in use in Somerset, accounting for 2% of total output; at this stage there were no conveyors in use; once again, the corresponding figures for Bristol are not available as they were combined with those for the Forest of Dean. (Reports of Hugh Johnstone, H M Inspector of Mines for the Midland and Southern District (no 8)… for the Year 1910, Cd 5676-VII (1911: HMSO: London), p. 8)

The published data is incomplete, but it is possible to prepare graphs showing the progress of mechanisation in both Somerset and Bristol. The details for Bristol are of somewhat dubious value due to the small number of collieries involved; in particular, the large increase in the percentage of coal cut and conveyed in 1937 is misleading, since it results from the closure of two of the three collieries in the district during 1936.

When giving evidence to the Sankey Commission in 1919, Sir Frank Beauchamp was asked whether coal cutting machines were used in Bristol or Somerset. He replied that

We have tried them. At the present time I have one pit working coal cutting machines. I could tell you some of the difficulties of that if you would like me to… we have tried conveyors , but we have had to give them up because the seams are so thin, and the district is so disturbed with faults that we never get a long enough face roof to instal conveyors successfully. (Coal Industry Commission. Volume II. Reports and Minutes of Evidence on the Second Stage of the Inquiry, Cmd 360 (1919: HMSO: London), p. 892)

Beauchamp’s reluctance to consider mechanisation is summed up by his claim that cutters and conveyors had “proved in most cases impossible, and in others more expensive than hand labour.”(Coal Industry Commission. Volume II. Reports and Minutes of Evidence on the Second Stage of the Inquiry, Cmd 360 (1919: HMSO: London), p. 893) His evidence is somewhat disjointed and lacking in detail, but his opposition seems to have been largely based on the view that machines would cut coal faster than it could be cleared and thus they and their operators would be idle for much of the time. This certainly seems to have been the case, although not, perhaps in the way that Beauchamp meant, at Bromley, where cutters and a conveyor were introduced on one face in the 1930s and produced coal at a much faster rate than it could be wound up the shaft. (Fred Flower (1990: Millstream Books: Bath) Somerset Coalmining Life, p. 115)

In 1928 the committee investigating the use of the guss reported that “…we were informed that coal cutters and conveyors were tried some years ago in certain mines and rejected as impracticable,” the failure of such attempts at modernisation being attributed to the fact that “… the faulting and folding which are characteristic of so many areas in Somerset present serious obstacles.” (Report of the Departmental Committee on the Use of the Guss in Somerset Mines, Cmd 3200 (1928: HMSO: London), p. 53) Thus, in 1927 the situation was that

Except at Pensford and Bromley Collieries where coal cutters have been recently introduced, the coal is everywhere undercut or holed by hand, and… it is subsequently got down by hand… Except at the machine faces already referred to, the whole of the coal gotten is cleared from the face in putts dragged by means of the guss. (Report of the Departmental Committee on the Use of the Guss in Somerset Mines, Cmd 3200 (1928: HMSO: London), pp. 29-30)

The committee suggested that the owners and managers might do well to investigate the possibilities of mechanisation and advised that “Past failures should not be allowed to prejudice further and more detailed study of the opportunities for using coal-cutting, conveying and loading machinery.” (Report of the Departmental Committee on the Use of the Guss in Somerset Mines, Cmd 3200 (1928: HMSO: London), p. 49)

The geology of the area was certainly a major factor in the economics of the coalfield, although whether it was such a major obstacle to mechanisation as the owners claimed is uncertain. The Radstock Slide Fault, Information for example, meant that some seams could be worked twice at different depths in the same pit. Apart from such large faults, however, there seem to have been numerous smaller disturbances which could result in the sudden disappearance of a seam and sometimes necessitate a great deal of exploration work to find it again. Very few seams were level and the most steeply inclined were those in the Nettlebridge Valley, Information where some were vertical and others folded over at 180° to their position in other parts of the coalfield.

Greasley has suggested, however, that such geological conditions would not have prevented mechanisation, since “coal-cutters could operate in inclines of up to 60°, and the shorter faces normally associated with the machine technology perhaps made faulting less of a problem than with hand cutting.” Furthermore, there was a potential economic advantage due to the enhancement of the quality of output from thinner seams, particularly when producing gas coal. (David Greasley, “The Diffusion of Machine Cutting in the British Coal Industry, 1902-1938,” Explorations in Economic History 19 (1982), pp. 246-268, 252-253)

There was, indeed, one factor which, in theory at least, should have been a positive encouragement to mechanisation: the use of longwall working, a system which was ideally suited to mechanisation. In 1902, William Steart, the manager of Braysdown colliery, explained the method of working in Somerset to the Royal Commission on Coal Supplies:

The method of working is a modified system of “long wall” to suit the peculiarities of the thin seams… Two men have 35 yards of coal face allotted to them… They get the coal entirely by manual labour. Boys or strong lads are employed to haul the coal away from the men as it is got… The whole of the coal is removed and no pillars are made. (First Report of the Royal Commission on Coal Supplies, Volume I, The Report, Cd 1724 (1903: HMSO: London), p. 60)

James McMurtrie explained that some coal had to be left behind, but that the amount was

… exceedingly small, probably not exceeding 5 per cent, the purposes for which it is left behind being shaft pillars, barriers against adjoining properties, and occasionally against accumulation of water in old workings… The system of working invariably adopted in the Radstock district is long-wall, which has been in operation from the earliest times… (First Report of the Royal Commission on Coal Supplies, Volume I, The Report, Cd 1724 (1903: HMSO: London), pp. 193-195)

Despite what McMurtrie claimed, however, pillar and stall seems to have been used at Nailsea and New Rock and to have been tried unsuccessfully at Radstock. (C G Down & A J Warrington (nd: David & Charles: Newton Abbot) The History of the Somerset Coalfield, p. 47)

By the late 1920s longwall working was universal in Somerset, with faces 40 to 300 yards in length. (Report of the Departmental Committee on the Use of the Guss in Somerset Mines, Cmd 3200 (1928: HMSO: London), p. 29) Nevertheless, there were several more unsuccessful attempts to introduce machine cutting: machinery was installed at Old Mills in about 1935, but once again this proved to be a short-lived measure, as was also the case at Braysdown, where the machines installed in 1942 were removed in 1946. (C G Down & A J Warrington (nd: David & Charles: Newton Abbot) The History of the Somerset Coalfield, pp. 140 & 202)

The coal-cutters in use up to World War II were of two types. Most were used to undercut the coal face, a process which involved cutting a slot along the bottom of the face, leaving the coal to fall or be ripped out by hand. The use of conveyors which could haul away very large blocks of coal if necessary, meant that, there was also a saving in the labour involved in breaking up the coal. (Fred Flower (1990: Millstream Books: Bath) Somerset Coalmining Life, pp. 101-105) Fred Flower recalls talking to older miners who were opposed to the introduction of cutters on the grounds that they resulted in a deterioration of working conditions, particularly in pits which where the conditions were already poor, such as Dunkerton. (Fred Flower (1990: Millstream Books: Bath) Somerset Coalmining Life, p. 83) This was the case at Mells where, in September 1936, there was an attempt to introduce the other type of machinery, pneumatic picks which were used to break up the coal; the workers objected on the grounds that the extra dust produced was a health hazard and there was a strike which lasted for several weeks. [Bristol University Library: Somerset Miners' Association papers, DM443, minutes of Council meeting 16 September 1936]

Not surprisingly, in view of what has been said above, the Regional Survey Report found that coal-cutting machines had not been employed on any extensive scale and their numbers had, in fact, reduced since 1930. The situation with regard to conveyors was little better, and no power-loading machinery had ever been used. Overall, the percentage of total output cut and conveyed mechanically was “much below” the national average. Whilst acknowledging that the coalfield faced special difficulties due to thin seams, faulting and steep gradients, it was suggested that the installation of such machinery was “both desirable and possible,” and it concluded that

Most of the collieries are at present working below capacity but it is probable that any intensification of mining with a view to substantial increase in output from the existing collieries will require major capital expenditure on plant, equipment and development work. (Bristol and Somerset Coalfield Regional Survey Report (1946: HMSO: London), pp. 33-35)

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