Coal Mining in East Leeds

The Parksider · Post by **The Parksider** » Mon 13 Jul, 2009 10:30 pm

stutterdog wrote: Anyone know if there was a pit in Armley off Winchester Rd? when I was a kid we used to play on an Area which now has houses on it that were built about 1958. We called this area the Pit and it was full of old brick rubble.There is a photo of what looks like the old winding house chimney being demolished in1938 on Leodis This area was right behind what was Marston Radiators factory now called Densa. I know this area is not in East Leeds but I would be interested in finding if there was a mine on this spot.I only lived 2 streets away from this area. It was a brickworks, but enough land was taken up by it to maybe have been a Fireclay pit, mining or extracting Fireclay from near the surface, then strainght into t'kiln with it.Leeds is very much a red brick city historically and these brickworks actually digging out the clay, making the bricks and building the houses all in the same place were very common and the order of the day.Several doubled as coal mines and fireclay mines and even trebled as ironstone mines. As for putting money on it "Mines" a fireclay only site.

stutterdog · Post by **stutterdog** » Mon 13 Jul, 2009 11:21 pm

Thank you Parksider for this information.It's amazing what can be found out on this site!

grumpytramp · Post by **grumpytramp** » Tue 14 Jul, 2009 9:21 am

The Parksider wrote: It was a brickworks, but enough land was taken up by it to maybe have been a Fireclay pit, mining or extracting Fireclay from near the surface, then strainght into t'kiln with it. Definately brickworks and an associated fireclay pit (ie quarry). The extent of the quarry workings are clearly visible in the 1893 1:2,500 and 1894 1:10,560 OS map (see www.old-maps.co.uk and search Armley)According to Kelly's Directory of West Riding of Yorkshire, 1881 the works were operated at that time by the Leeds Brickmaking Company (John Taylor, manager) of Armley Road, Leeds.Interestingly there is some debate about pliestocene bones uncovered in "an armley brickworks" in 1845 of which Henry Denny of the Leeds Philisophical Society recorded and preserved; and became known as the Armley Hippo:http://www.bbc.co.uk/leeds/citylife/anc ... ppo.shtmlI am not certain why it was referred to as the Armley Hippo as it was uncovered at the brickworks of Joseph Longley in Hunslett Carr ............. ooops veering way way off topic !

Post by **chameleon** » Tue 14 Jul, 2009 11:12 am

grumpytramp wrote: The Parksider wrote: It was a brickworks, but enough land was taken up by it to maybe have been a Fireclay pit, mining or extracting Fireclay from near the surface, then strainght into t'kiln with it. Definately brickworks and an associated fireclay pit (ie quarry). The extent of the quarry workings are clearly visible in the 1893 1:2,500 and 1894 1:10,560 OS map (see www.old-maps.co.uk and search Armley)According to Kelly's Directory of West Riding of Yorkshire, 1881 the works were operated at that time by the Leeds Brickmaking Company (John Taylor, manager) of Armley Road, Leeds.Interestingly there is some debate about pliestocene bones uncovered in "an armley brickworks" in 1845 of which Henry Denny of the Leeds Philisophical Society recorded and preserved; and became known as the Armley Hippo:http://www.bbc.co.uk/leeds/citylife/anc ... ppo.shtmlI am not certain why it was referred to as the Armley Hippo as it was uncovered at the brickworks of Joseph Longley in Hunslett Carr ............. ooops veering way way off topic ! I do like seeing your posts Grumpytramp - you certainly come up with the goods with worrying ease! I think it's amazing how many related discussions are prompted and inspired by answers to others - if we went the other way, there'd be so many bitty threads keeping track would be impossibleIn my youth (so to speak!), a pit heap or old workings always meant coal - iron ore and clay were not even a consideration but I now know how well they all fit together with the geology of the area and how this in turn explains so many other remains that we see.

stutterdog · Post by **stutterdog** » Tue 14 Jul, 2009 2:34 pm

I remember seeing the Hippo bones or the Rhino's at the old Leeds Museum in Park Row. I'm sure it said that the bones were dug up on the Jail Field? But I wouldn't want to argue with an expert like you Grumpytramp.

grumpytramp · Post by **grumpytramp** » Fri 07 Aug, 2009 8:34 am

Time to go back to that old chestnut of Foundary Mill and its water supply. Having convinced myself that the water could not have been led from Wyke Beck by a leat; time for me to backtrack completely!I was having a root around the Miscellanea volume of Volume 1 of the publications of the Thoresby Society, and came across a paper entitled "Local worthies and genealogy" by J W Morkill which discusses Sir James Falshaw, John Smeaton and the Graveley Family of Halton.As an aside I had never heard of James Falshaw (born 1810 in Leeds) but it turns out he was a railway engineer of some considerable note; principally in Scotland where he built several important railways and became the first Tyke (and englishman) to become Lord Provost of EdinburghAnyway in the short biography of Smeaton he refers at the end intriguingly (and this will get the pulses going) to Foundary Mill: Quote: In the immediate neighbourhood of his home may still be seen two specimens of Smeaton's ingenuity - the hydraulic ram at Templenewsam, by means of which water is forced to the roof of the hall (mentioned by Smiles); and a water wheel at the Foundary Mill, in the parish of Seacroft. Perhaps the most interesting feature of the latter is the canal and tunnel through which the water is conveyed from a point in the Roundhay Beck a mile away OK I am convinced now but where was the tunnel?

Post by **chameleon** » Fri 07 Aug, 2009 5:50 pm

grumpytramp wrote: Time to go back to that old chestnut of Foundary Mill and its water supply. Having convinced myself that the water could not have been led from Wyke Beck by a leat; time for me to backtrack completely!I was having a root around the Miscellanea volume of Volume 1 of the publications of the Thoresby Society, and came across a paper entitled "Local worthies and genealogy" by J W Morkill which discusses Sir James Falshaw, John Smeaton and the Graveley Family of Halton.As an aside I had never heard of James Falshaw (born 1810 in Leeds) but it turns out he was a railway engineer of some considerable note; principally in Scotland where he built several important railways and became the first Tyke (and englishman) to become Lord Provost of EdinburghAnyway in the short biography of Smeaton he refers at the end intriguingly (and this will get the pulses going) to Foundary Mill: Quote: In the immediate neighbourhood of his home may still be seen two specimens of Smeaton's ingenuity - the hydraulic ram at Templenewsam, by means of which water is forced to the roof of the hall (mentioned by Smiles); and a water wheel at the Foundary Mill, in the parish of Seacroft. Perhaps the most interesting feature of the latter is the canal and tunnel through which the water is conveyed from a point in the Roundhay Beck a mile away OK I am convinced now but where was the tunnel?

Arrrrrh! Nope. There's no tunnel, stake my life on it. Davison would have photos on here if there wasSeriously though Grumpy, that would help explain the persistant references to water being brought from Asket Hill, even though we have shown that at least part of the supply ame from the higher parts towards Seacroft, these other references won't go away.A 'tunnel' would though surely put the received water at an even lower level - if this was so, how was it raised to the ponds or the wheel? Unless tunnel simply refers to aculvert under the roadway, which would leave as back at square one!

The Parksider · Post by **The Parksider** » Fri 07 Aug, 2009 9:30 pm

grumpytramp wrote: Quote: In the immediate neighbourhood of his home may still be seen two specimens of Smeaton's ingenuity - the hydraulic ram at Templenewsam, by means of which water is forced to the roof of the hall (mentioned by Smiles); and a water wheel at the Foundary Mill, in the parish of Seacroft. Perhaps the most interesting feature of the latter is the canal and tunnel through which the water is conveyed from a point in the Roundhay Beck a mile away OK I am convinced now but where was the tunnel?

Like Chameleon and maybe yourself the problem with accepting this is how does any water course, turf cut, tunneled, canal or whatever get from the beck UP to the mill ponds??It is up isn't it? As for a tunnel of course the watercourse from the Adel woods arches was tunneled to Weetwood. I don't think that a mill could have affored that sort of tunneling.So as much as such an account strengthens the theory, the practice still isn't there????Negative post I know. What an amazing conundrum......

The Parksider · Post by **The Parksider** » Tue 29 Sep, 2009 6:47 pm

grumpytramp wrote: Time to go back to that old chestnut of Foundary Mill and its water supply. Having convinced myself that the water could not have been led from Wyke Beck by a leat; time for me to backtrack completely!I was having a root around the Miscellanea volume of Volume 1 of the publications of the Thoresby Society, and came across a paper entitled "Local worthies and genealogy" by J W Morkill which discusses Sir James Falshaw, John Smeaton and the Graveley Family of Halton.As an aside I had never heard of James Falshaw (born 1810 in Leeds) but it turns out he was a railway engineer of some considerable note; principally in Scotland where he built several important railways and became the first Tyke (and englishman) to become Lord Provost of EdinburghAnyway in the short biography of Smeaton he refers at the end intriguingly (and this will get the pulses going) to Foundary Mill: Quote: In the immediate neighbourhood of his home may still be seen two specimens of Smeaton's ingenuity - the hydraulic ram at Templenewsam, by means of which water is forced to the roof of the hall (mentioned by Smiles); and a water wheel at the Foundary Mill, in the parish of Seacroft. Perhaps the most interesting feature of the latter is the canal and tunnel through which the water is conveyed from a point in the Roundhay Beck a mile away OK I am convinced now but where was the tunnel?

Can't let this lie and some information is coming through about the feed to the Foundry Mill in the early days taking a watercourse from a dam ellers close at asket hill (easterly road now) to the mill pond.The point here is the wyke beck valley today is not what it was several hundred years ago and probably had a steeper higher east side which may have taken a watercourse down to the pond. The beck itself was a small river rather than a trickle of a beck too.That seems to be one system, but later came smeaton whose aim was to pump back used water to the mill pond during the dry summers to keep the wheels going.He may have had a watercourse and conduit but only of short length, those features being re-titled "canal" and "tunnel" asa per yoru post.Apparently smeatons writings do not mention this aspect of the development at the Foundry Mill, but it may be that Roundhay beck is erroneous in that smeaton may have simply augmented a steam engine, conduit and watercourse arrangement with extra water from the old existing channel from roundhay......

Phill_dvsn · Post by **Phill_dvsn** » Tue 29 Sep, 2009 7:10 pm

There still is the small feeder stream into Wyke beck running through the woods parallel to Easterly road, It crosses under Wetherby road near it's junction with Easterly road. It stays in the open for a bit, then it seems to run underground at some point (It's very overgrown around there) But i have noticed several strange looking raised manhole covers around those woods before. There is something substantial under there before the farm at the top of Easterley road.