| Entry Type | Corporate |
| Corporate Name | Brinsley Colliery |
| Parent Body | Duke of Newcastle |
| Barber Walker and Co. Ltd |
| National Coal Board |
| Place | Brinsley, Nottinghamshire |
| Place | Brinsley, Nottinghamshire |
| Epithet | coal mine |
| Dates | 1842-1970 |
| History | The land for this colliery was originally leased and later brought from the Duke of Newcastle. Some shallow and small scale had been in use here under the private venture of the Duke before the deep mine by Barber Walker was sunk in 1872. These smaller workings were in existence around 1842. It was locally known as Bod Tod because of it's small size. It worked the Comb, Deep Hard and Deep Soft coal seams. The highest recorded output was 113,000 tons in 1949, with the highest recorded manpower in 1925 of 429.
The first closure came in 1934, but it was reopened in 1950 as a merged ventured with nearby Selston Colliery. It was also used as access shafts up until 1970 for Moorgreen and Pye Hill Collieries. Upon its second and final closure, the old headstocks were transported and re-erected at the Lound Hall Mining Museum near Retford, until the museum’s own closure in 1989. They were then transported back to Brinsley to be the feature of a new park.
The colliery is most famous for being one of the locations for D.H. Laurence’s Sons and Lovers and a workplace for his father, Arthur Laurence.
Known managers: Samuel Whitehead, William Chambers, Len C Hodges, C. F. Hoyle, John Robert Harrison, R. D. Robinson, Edward R Lindley, J Lea. |
| Key Events | 1842: First workings existed
1872: Deep mine sunk by Barber and Walker Company
1913: Appears as ‘Beggarlee’ Colliery in D.H. Lawrence’s Sons and Lovers
1934: First closure
1950: Reopened as a merger with Selston Colliery
1960: Preserved headstocks appear in the film of Sons and Lovers
1970: Headstocks taken to National Coal Museum at Retford
1991: :and reclaimed and headstocks returned and re-erected as part of a heritage and wildlife trail, known as Brinsley Headstocks Heritage and Nature Reserve
2008: Friends of Brinsley Headstocks created |
| Source | 250 Years in Coal: the History of Barber Walker and Company Limited, Colliery Proprietors in Nottinghamshire and Yorkshire, 1680-1946" by G.C.H. Whitelock
‘Brinsley Merged with Selston Colliery After 78 Years’, http://www.healeyhero.co.uk/rescue/individual/Bob_Bradley/Bk-4/B4-1950-E.html
Friends of Brinsley Headstocks, http://www.brinsleyheadstocks.org/site.html
Mining in the Midlands, 1550-1947 by A.R. Griifin (London: Frank Cass & Company, 1971)
Historic England, The Physical Landscape Legacy Phase 2: The Heritage of the Nottinghamshire Coalfield (2018) https://historicengland.org.uk/content/docs/research/the-physical-landscape-legacy-phase-2-the-heritage-of-the-nottinghamshire-coalfield/
Weiss, M., Coal Mines Remembered (2010) |
| Authorised Form of Name | Brinsley, Nottinghamshire; Brinsley Colliery; 1842-1970; coal mine |
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