Pendleton Colliery
Pendleton Colliery was a coal mine operating on the Manchester Coalfield after the late 1820s on Whit Lane in Pendleton, Salford.
In the late 1820s John Purcell Fitzgerald started to sink shafts to the Three Foot and Worsley Four Foot mines at Whit Lane, Pendleton on his estate.
[[Robert Stephenson (1788-1837)] supervised operations as manager and engineer until his death in 1837. In 1832 he was able to report to Fitzgerald that the four foot seam had been reached.
In 1843 the shaft tubbing burst and the colliery was flooded out. New tubbing and large pumping engines were installed and mining operations recommenced in January 1847. However the disaster had ruined some of the company's directors and in 1848 Fitzgerald filed for bankruptcy.
1852 Andrew Knowles and Sons bought the underlease. The company developed the colliery by sinking new shafts on the east side of the Manchester, Bolton and Bury Canal in 1857 to access the Rams mine. As the coal was worked from coal seams that dipped at 1-in-3, Pendleton became the deepest coal mine in the country when the workings reached 3,600 feet, where the temperature at the coal face reached 100 degrees F.
1872 The upcast shaft was relined in 1872, reducing its diameter to 7 feet 2 inches, giving Pendleton the record for the narrowest shaft.
1925 Ground upheaval in the Rams mine caused five deaths.
1929 The colliery became part of Manchester Collieries, by which time the Albert and Crombouke mines were exhausted.
The new owners fitted new headgear to No. 1 shaft in 1931.
1939 The colliery closed when coal in the Rams mine was exhausted.
The colliery site was subsequently used by the Manchester Oxide Co to process spent iron oxide.
See here[1] and here[2] for the sources of the above information, and a great deal more.
The 1893 O.S. map shows Pendleton Colliery located between Whit Lane and the Manchester, Bolton and Bury Canal. South west of the canal was the Manchester and Bolton line, but there was no rail connection with the colliery. A short distance north east of Whit Lane was the River Irwell. A short distance downstream the river passed Britannia Mills and the Irwell Bleach Works and its weir, before finding itself in pleasant countryside again. After going under Waterford Bridge, Pendleton, the river passed Fitzgerald's 'Irwell Castle'.