Brickbarn Pit - Shallcross Hall Colliery

Shallcross Hall Colliery, known locally as Brickbarn Pit was opened by the Buxton Lime Firms company in 1909. Coal was mined until February 1925 by which time the reserves had been exhausted. There was an additional mine entrance through an adit to the west of Buxton Road and this was known as Walker's Pit.  Much of the output was taken out of the Walker's Pit adit and over a narrow bridge crossing the River Goyt nd straight into Botany Bleach Works. Coal was also raised from the Brickbarn shaft and taken down an inclined plane which led to Shallcross Sidings and also to the nearby Mevril Bleach Works .  This shaft gave access to the Yard Seam which here was six feet thick. The workings extended over a large area although the coal beneath Shallcross Manor was not mined.  A steam engine with a Galloway boiler provided power for the pithead and Worthington pumps kept the workings dry, releasing the water into the Goyt at the Walker adit and into the Blackbrook near Wheel Farm. 

Mining in this area has a long history. The Shallcross Mines were among the oldest in North Derbyshire and had been worked by the Shallcross family since the mid seventeenth century providing much wealth.  By the early nineteenth century, Thomas Boothman was mining at Shallcross and in the latter years of that century, local coal owners, Levi and Elijah Hall were working the Shallcross New Pit which was located to the south of The Manor.

The photographs below are courtesy of Arthur Philips.

 

 

This 1919 map has been marked to indicate the approximate location of known shafts and adits. Most of the shafts were to ventilate the workings.