Black Gold In Somerset

STEPHEN ROBERTS goes digging for details on a long forgotten Somerset industry.

- Stephen Roberts

HERE’S A QUESTION. What industry once employed 4,000 people in Somerset, but none today? Answer; the Somerset coal industry, the county’s ‘black gold’, mined from the 15th century, to 1973, although it is thought some mining may have started as long ago as Roman times.

Coal was mined close to the surface to start with, but reverted to deep seams, the deepest over 1,800 feet below ground. I don’t know about you, but I always associate coal mining with South Wales and the North East; I needed to check this out and find out what evidence there is left on the ground today.

I began at Radstock, a town nine miles south-west of Bath. This was a town owing its growth from the mid-18th century to coal’s discovery. The museum, in a former market hall, is a good place to start. At one end the fascia proclaims, ‘North Somerset Coalfield Heritage’. Prominent outside is an old colliery winding wheel (for raising and lowering within the mine shaft) on a headframe (the structural frame above the shaft). Old colliery wagons are planted up, bearing names of onetime pits, for example, Ludlows Pit, 1782-1954; a reminder of times past and a splash of colour. The Wellow Brook adds water to a tranquil scene; the winding wheel a reminder of a back-breaking, dangerous industry, gone over 40 years.