Qualla: Harworth Colliery

Harworth Colliery: Introduction

Wed, 27 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

When work began on sinking the shaft at Harworth in 1913, the engineers on site were German and the equipment was German, supplied by the Northern Union Mining Company in a venture financed in Germany. A year later the First World War started, and that fact stopped everything. The German workers were interned. The company's assets were impounded by the British government. The half-sunk shaft sat in the Nottinghamshire ground until 1917, when Barber, Walker and Co. bought what remained of the company for £80,100 and waited for the war to end so the work could start again.

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Harworth Colliery: Reaching the Barnsley Seam

Wed, 27 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Sinking restarted in earnest in 1921. Water flooded into the shafts as fast as the engineers could pump it out, until they solidified the surrounding ground with liquid cement grout, a technique that had only recently become practical at depth. On 29 October 1923 the shaft sinker...

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Harworth Colliery: The Flying Scotsman's Fuel

Wed, 27 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Harworth coal had a reputation. The top layer of the Barnsley seam was excellent for steaming, the lower parts good for domestic and coking purposes, and the LNER bought heavily. There is a specific moment in the pit's history that gets pulled out by anyone who tells its story: i...

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Harworth Colliery: Modernisation, Strike, Decline

Wed, 27 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

The pit was modernised in the 1950s, with new concrete headgears that replaced the original Victorian-style winding towers. Coke ovens stood alongside. By the late 1980s, the headgears were replaced again, the No. 1 shaft in 1989 and No. 2 in 1994, and a new surface main fan was ...

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Harworth Colliery: Simpson Park

Wed, 27 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

After the mothballing, UK Coal kept the option of reopening the pit on paper, even doing underground work in 2008 to make several kilometres of roadway passable again. By April 2016 the calculation had changed. The headgear, which had been the visible landmark of the town for gen...

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