SecretLeeds - History, culture and architecture in Leeds

I am researching the history of coal mining in East Leeds, I have come across the usual ones but does anyone have any info on the more obscure ones.

Are we doing free research for a book you're writing or something?

Hector wrote: I am researching the history of coal mining in East Leeds, I have come across the usual ones but does anyone have any info on the more obscure ones. whilst working as a taxi driver in east leeds,i was told by the then head of the n.u.m,that gipton pit closed in 1923,the site of the rail line to harehills lane,is now a ginnel,it goes from st wilfrids avenue down to harehills lane,near the fforde grene.as children we were not allowed on the school field (adjacent to the old slag heap) in wet weather,as the field would sink in places.during the war,my gran tells me that the locals would scratch about on the slag heap for usable bits of coal.even now,if you scratch the grass off,you see the slag undernath.the pit hill has been made smaller and smaller over the years,especially after aberfan,as it was also next to the old school.

No it is for my own personal use, I happen to be intereted in the subject and thought people may have memories they want to share. In osmondthorpe for example there is the 'Black Hills' which as the name suggests was the slag heap from the pit, which closed in 1928. Next to the White Horse on York road is an area of open land and builders yard, I believe this was the site of the White Horse pit. At the back of what was the Shaftesbury cinema, again this is a waste tip from mining.Neville colliery was on the site of East End Park and in the 1870s, thousands of West Riding miners held their gala on the recreation ground on Ponterfract Lane.

Hector wrote: No it is for my own personal use, I happen to be intereted in the subject and thought people may have memories they want to share. In osmondthorpe for example there is the 'Black Hills' which as the name suggests was the slag heap from the pit, which closed in 1928. Next to the White Horse on York road is an area of open land and builders yard, I believe this was the site of the White Horse pit. At the back of what was the Shaftesbury cinema, again this is a waste tip from mining.Neville colliery was on the site of East End Park and in the 1870s, thousands of West Riding miners held their gala on the recreation ground on Ponterfract Lane. are the blackhills seperate from the elephants back slagheap in east end park?i think it is a different pit?

I actually happened upon this site through Googling to find out about a disused railway line. This is the thread I came across.http://www.secretleeds.com/forum/Messag ... essage=0If you look on page two there is a map showing the rail lines serving the colliery at Osmondthorpe among others.

plenty evidence in and around garforth. we had loads of small pits but the bigger ones were "the sisters", "the isabella" and "trench pit." spoil heaps from sisters and isabella are still there and one of the main buildings of the trench pit still exists. we played on the "pit 'ills" as kids and on the one from the sisters pit the capped shaft was still visible.

The old Council estate between stretching from Seacroft Hospital upto Crossgates was rebuilt some years ago with the new roads around what was the 'Bridle Path' now named Mary Field after the old 'Mary' pit. A large fenced-off, as they usually were, slag heap sat just at the top end of the The Bridle Path which led up the back of the old houses, and in front of the grounds of Crossgates School. At the front of this heap there used to be the circular brick lining of an old shaft vissible. This was about 8 feet accross and was I think the air shaft shown on the old Godfrey map though I see from this that there appears to have been a second shaft nearby on the same heap.Just a few hundred feet to the west of this is the start of a field sittihg between the Hospital and the Leeds-York railway track. I remember this being very 'uneven' at the top end - again from the map I see this was also the site of old shallow workings.There is another slag heap, again fenced and quite well hidden by trees in nearby Farm Road, close to Crossgates library. I'm not sure whether this was a pit head or just another air shaft. Common practice was to cap these shafts with timber just below the surface when they fell into dissue. This particular one succumbed to the effects of time (I think in the early 70's?) - and collapsed. the line of wagons was endless for day after day delivering and tipping hardcore to properly seal it and prevent further problems - must have been quite deep!

found a 'MINE' of info at these sites;list of coal mines uk1880 and; coal mining history resource centre.i found lists of all the mines in leeds.some of them had names i have not heard of,but we cannot expect what were private workings to be called the same as the areas are called today.anyway have a look,there is shed loads of stuff on those sites.

Somewhere at work we have maps of the mines in east Leeds, from the Coal Authority records. I remember seeing Osmondthorpe colliery marked, though detail wasn't great as they were photocopied plans.The pit at Gipton was served by a tramway, with coal transported via the Leeds tram network, rather than via the heavy rail system. This was quite an unusual arrangement. Some of the alignment of the colliery line is still visible on Google Earth, I have a photo of a map of the layout somewhere.