Coal Mining in Cheshire

[britliz1960]

I am doing genealogy, of course, and I found a census record from 1871 that shows my great grandad was a cola miner. He lived in Hyde Cheshire England and I did not know there was coal mining occurring there.
My question is where would the coal mine have been? Around Hyde or further away?

Thank you in advance for any information you can provide.

Elizabeth

[jorose]

https://www.genuki.org.uk/big/eng/CHS/Hyde
Bolding below mine -  quote from Samuel Lewis A Topographical Dictionary of England  (1831)

In this village and neighbourhood are some of the largest spinning and power-loom establishments in the kingdom, giving employment to nearly five thousand persons; an additional conveyance has also been made to Manchester by water, by the Peak Forest canal, which passes through this place, and unites with the Ashton canal: there are extensive coal mines in the vicinity.

Hyde Lane Colliery seems to have been one of the major and long-running mines in the area, there was a famous disaster in the mine in 1889.  But there were likely others at the time he could have worked for.
http://www.pittdixon.go-plus.net/lpfc-hyde-wharf/lpfc-hyde-wharf.htm#tithe

[maddys52]

Welcome to RootsChat.

You may be interested in this: "The Coal and Iron Industries of the United Kingdom" by Richard MEADE (1882)
https://archive.org/details/cu31924004666404/page/92/mode/2up

[britliz1960]

Thank you for your replies. Very interesting

[AlanBoyd]

Here's a  6 inch map from an 1872 survey overlaid on a modern street map. You can slide the slider to reveal the modern map, and you can scroll around etc to explore.

I've centred on Hyde Lane Coal Pit, but I also see in the vicinity, Bayleyfield Coal Pit, Daisyfield Coal Pit and Peacock Coal Pit (disused). There are probably others that I have missed.

https://maps.nls.uk/geo/explore/#zoom=16.6&lat=53.45300&lon=-2.08843&layers=257&b=osm&o=100

[AlanBoyd]

An interactive map at Northern Mines Research Society. If you zoom in to the Hyde area the pit locations are marked and you can click on the icons to see some basic information about each one.

https://nmrs.org.uk/mines-map/coal-mining-in-the-british-isles/collieries-of-the-british-isles/coal-mines-england/

[MollyC]

The previous map half zoomed in makes a good impression of the coalfields flanking the Pennines.  Hyde is due east of Manchester and lies near the southern edge of the Lancashire coalfield.  This is the Geological Survey map, with Hyde in the far SE corner.  Don't worry about the detail, just the general impression.

https://largeimages.bgs.ac.uk/iip/mapsportal.html?id=1001573

All the northern part of the map shows coalfield on the surface, grey and dark green.  Grey is Coal Measures where the thick black lines are the coal seams in clays and shales.  Dark green is Coal Measure Sandstone, used as building stone in these areas.  Manchester sits on younger rocks, orange and yellow.

Beneath the coal, half of Hyde is on brown and pale green areas which are older and harder Pennine sandstones, known generally at Millstone Grit.

Look at the vertical sections below the map to get an impression of the structure.  Coal mining usually began where the seams were close to the surface and moved to deeper mines as mining technology improved.

[britliz1960]

Oh my gosh these are amazing! Thank you!

[MollyC]

P.S. We know more detail about how the coalfields are constructed than about any other part of the country -- because we spent many years inside them.