| Entry Type | Corporate |
| Corporate Name | Holmewood Colliery |
| Parent Body | Hardwick Colliery Company |
| Also Known As | Hardwick Colliery |
| Place | Holmewood |
| Epithet | coal mine |
| Dates | 1870-1968 |
| History | Hardwick Colliery, also known as Holmewood Colliery was first sunk by the Hardwick Colliery Company in 1870. It worked the Top Hard, Waterloo, Silkstone, Deep Hard, Tupton and Threequarter coal seams. The colliery was transferred to the control of the National Coal Board as a result of the nationalisation of the coal industry in 1947.
The highest recorded manpower was 1410 in 1959, with the highest recorded output in the year 1966-67 of 486,025 tons.In 1935, a water pipeline and pumping station was built at nearby Ramcroft Colliery, which piped water so that water could be sent to Hardwick to cool down batteries in use there. A small training centre was also provided, but only lasted for a few years between 1952 and 1955, until a larger training centre was opened at Grassmoor, which centralised all training in the area. Other onsite facilities included a coal preparation plant and pithead baths (the latter opening in 1954), which stayed open following the wind up of the colliery in September 1968, to cover workers in the process of being transferred over the Arkwright Colliery. The rest of the underground workings were merged with Williamthorpe Colliery.
Known managers: John Ward, William Robert Shaw, Joseph W Barlow, Fred Chambers, Tom Nelson Limb, J Searston, GE Collis, EB Flint, Ossie T Storrs, William Sharpe, Sam B Pick, Alan Hird, Edward (Teddy) R Maiden. |
| Key Events | 1870: opened
1947: nationalisation
1968: closed |
| Source | ‘Holmewood’, http://www.oldminer.co.uk/heath,-holmewood.html
‘Holmewood Colliery (North Derbyshire) Was Closed After 95 Years’, http://www.healeyhero.co.uk/rescue/individual/Bob_Bradley/Bk-5/B5-1968-K.html
‘Williamthorpe Colliery (North Derbyshire) 1970 - Closed After 65 Years’, http://www.healeyhero.co.uk/rescue/individual/Bob_Bradley/Bk-5/B5-1970-B.html
Bagshaw, S., History, Gazetteer and Directory of Derbyshire, with the Town of Burton-upon-Trent (Sheffield: William Saxton, 1846)
Bell, D., Memories of the Derbyshire Coalfields (Newbury: Countryside Books, 2006)
Bridgewater, A. N., North Derbyshire Collieries (2009) https://www.aditnow.co.uk/documents/Doe-Lea-Coal-Mine/North20Derbyshire20Collieries20Small20Update.pdf
Deeds relating to the acquisition of the Ramcroft Colliery by the Hardwick Company following the liquidation of the Ramcroft Company (1930), N36/8/5
Wain, K., The Coal Mining Industry of Sheffield and North Derbyshire (Amberley, 2014) |
| Authorised Form of Name | Holmewood; Holmewood Colliery; 1870-1968; coal mine |
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