| Description | The records for the company are arranged in the following series
NCB/A/GRV/1 Employee record books, 1872-1940
NCB/A/GRV/2 Management records, 1898-1922
NCB/A/GRV/3 Account books, 1872-1919
NCB/A/GRV/4 Colliery plans, 1872-1930
NCB/A/GRV/5 Sale plans and particulars for estates in which the company has interest, 1851-1925 |
| Administrative History | Court Dewes in 1823 had sunk new shafts (called Common and Church Pits) on the east of Swadlincote to reach the Main Coal Seam, which eventually formed Granville No. 1 Colliery. In 1872, the trustees of the late Court Granville offered up for auction the entire estate, including underlying minerals and the colliery, and all or most was bought by a syndicate of 23 merchants, manufacturers and gentlemen, most from Birmingham, for £75,000. The new company was incorporated on 12 July 1872. The Granville Colliery Company continued to develop the colliery site by expanded the workings. In 1887 a new pit was begun to the east of the old colliery, with a shaft being sunk to work the Kilburn Seam: the new pit became known as Granville No. 2 Colliery. Several additional mineral leases were obtained in the late 19th century, which ensured that production continued at the collieries for many years in spite of the rising costs caused by ever deeper mine workings. By 1888 the company's two collieries employed 91 surface and 335 underground workers, which rose in the 1890s to around 600 men and boys. In 1891 the company produced its largest coal output of 225,000 tons. The collieries worked the Main Coal, Little Coal, Woodfield, Stockings, Eureka and Stanhope Seams.
In 1947 Granville Colliery No. 1 was transferred to the National Coal Board following the nationalisation of the coal industry. |