- Cefn Coed Colliery Museum
Cefn Coed Colliery Museum is a former
coal mine , now operating as amuseum . It is located atCrynant nearNeath inWales .Background
Coal mining in theNeath area began with the development of the port of Neath in the 16th century. In 1743Sir Herbert Mackworth , one of theMackworth Baronets , began mining atOnllwyn , with production rising with the opening of theNeath and Brecon Railway in 1864. David Bevan opened a pit a Blaendulais in 1872, naming it the Seven Sisters after his seven daughters. The Evans-Bevan family then began exploiting theSwansea Valley from the 1870s, and by nationalisation in 1947 owned seven collieries within seven miles of each other.History
Cefn Coed Colliery was opened as an
anthracite colliery by the Llwynonn Colliery Company during the 1920s. Three attempts were unsuccessfully made to sink shafts at Cefn Coed, but it was not until the Llwynonn Colliery company was bought out by the Amalgamated Anthracite Combine ofAmmanford in 1926 and high capital investment made, that a break was made in the hard Blue Pennantsandstone . The firstcoal raised in 1930, with the shaft and workings powered by a steam engine, fueled by the gas form the old workings.Like much of western
South Wales coalfield , the coal was high qualityanthracite . The best coal came from the deepest seam called Big Vein, broken into at a depth of 750 yards. Cefn Coed during its working life at depths of over 2,500 feet (800m), was the deepest anthracite mine in the world [ [http://www.bbc.co.uk/wales/southwest/sites/local_history/pages/clive_reed.shtml BBC - South West Wales Local History - Neath Port Talbot County Borough History ] ] . Other shafts worked at Cefn Coed included: Peacock, White Four Feet and the Nine Feet.Brammallite was identified in the Dulais seam, byX-ray diffraction by theNatural History Museum ,London ; making Cefn Coed one of only two sites in all of Wales for Brammallite [ [http://www.mindat.org/loc-29823.html Cefn Coed Colliery, Crynant, Neath-Port Talbot (West Glamorgan; Glamorgan), Wales, UK ] ] . However, at such depths and with frequentmining accident s due tomethane gas and roof falls, the pit and it soon gained the unenviablenickname of "The Slaughterhouse."By the end of
World War II in 1945 there were 908 men employed [http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0016-7398(193909)94%3A3%3C228%3AMOMITS%3E2.0.CO%3B2-E] . Nationalised by theNational Coal Board , continual investment was required to combat the need to keep roadways open at the extreme depths. Changing economics lead to a reduction in the workforce from the 1950s, and the mine ceased production in 1968.A majority of the men were transferred to the new Blaenant
drift mine , built to extract coal form the No.2Rhondda seam at a shallower depth. One of the two shafts at Cefn Coed was used to ventilate Blaenant, and as an emergency exit, until the closure of Blaenant in 1990http://www.page-net.com/swansea.localhistory/llansamlet/pages/miningtrail.html] .Museum
The complete above ground mine workings remain intact on site, with the steam winding engine from No.2 shaft now electrically driven.
Manufactured in 1927, the Worsley Mesne steam winding engine sits in the boiler house with its suite of six Lancashire steam boilers [http://en.erih.net/index.php?pageId=109&anchor=144&filter= European Route of Industrial Heritage ] ] . The engine has two cylinders with a bore of 32 inches, while the drum is 10ft wide. The drum held two ropes each over 800 yards long, with a breaking strain of 234
ton s. The ropes were inspected everyday, weight tested every three months and replaced completely every 2½ years. Every six months they were shortened by about 6 feet in order to eliminate wear and stress at the end of the rope.There is no access to the underground workings within the museum, but a simulated gallery provides full accessibility for blind and disabled visitors. As well as artefacts from the mining industry, the museum also houses a restored and unique gas tram, which ran in Neath until 1920.
The museum is an anchor point on the
European Route of Industrial Heritage .References
External links
* [http://www.neath-porttalbot.gov.uk/leisure__tourism/attractions/npt_heritage__history/cefn_coed_colliery_museum.aspx Official website at Neath Port Talbot County Borough Council]
* [http://www.welshcoalmines.co.uk/GlamWest/CefnCoed.htm History of mine at WelshCoalMines.co.uk]
* [http://www.swansea.gov.uk/westglamorganarchives/index.cfm?articleid=8307 Plan workings at] Neath Port Talbot council
* [http://www.welshcoalmines.co.uk Welsh Coal Mines - all the Welsh pits (and their histories in brief)]
* [http://www.forlornbritain.co.uk/cefn.htm Forlorn Britain - Exploring the Remains of Cefn Coed Colliery]
* [http://www.gtj.org.uk/search/simpleSearch.php?srch=Cefn+Coed+colliery&lang=en 5 pages of artifacts associated with Cefn Coed colliery held on Gathering the Jewels, the Welsh Cultural History website]
* [http://www.geograph.org.uk/search.php?i=3047853 Cefn Coed colliery on www.geograph.co.uk : photos of the site and surrounding area]
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