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I discussed in my last post, The Derwent Iron Company who ran the Upleatham mines early years of Ironstone Mining, located in my home village of New Marske, which sits a mile or so from the sea on the North East coast of England.
After the Company's failure in 1857 those Quaker 'Men of Business' as they were called, had provided capital to re-start the Consett Iron Works. Chief among those entrepreneurs, were the Pease's. Joseph and Joseph Whitwell Pease, they had realised the value of the Ironstone hidden under the hill you see in the photo above and had taken over the Leases of the Derwent Iron Company in 1854, but by 1923 the majority of Ironstone had been extracted and the mine was closed.
As per the conditions of the Leases with the Landowner, Lord Zetland, all traces of the mining site were to be removed and the hillside restored to its original condition, which as you can see is a very lush 'managed' woodland that is now owned by the Local Authority and looked after by volunteers of the Friends of Errington Woods in conjunction with Redcar and Cleveland Borough Council. You can find the group here...
https://www.facebook.com/groups/1457471431212753/about/
It is hard to imagine the extent of the mine workings but by looking at the hill during the Autumn (below) it is easy to see by the contrast of deciduous trees that were planted in the 1930's along the mid slopes of the hill, and the green Larch trees planted at the foot and top of the hill to stabilise the surface of the hill. The bottom terrace that was created also had extensive shale waste heaps so these Larch trees held the terrace that contained all the buildings and rail equipment together. It looks really nice at any time but...it would be nice to know, Where, actually, did all the Miners Go...
The original Leases in around 1850, had been negotiated with a Mr GD Trotter (Lord Zetland's Land Agent at that time) and had seen the 'Certain Rent' (the Annual payment to the landowner, wether mines were worked or not hence 'Certain') set at £1000 per annum, for which 34,285 Imp Tons could be worked and then, anything over was to be paid at a 'Tenfold' for royalty Rent of 7d per Ton. The Lease would last for 21 years and any buildings or rail infrastructure could be built to facilitate the extraction of the Iron Ore.
Unfortunately the last few miles to the weighing and tipping point at Coatham went across Mr Newcomen's 'Kirkleatham Estate' so a 'Wayleave' or Rent of the ground crossed was agreed in July 1851, the sum of £300. 11s. 2d. was tp be paid for every Ton (of 24cwt) of stone.
It was agreed between Theresa Newcomen and William Backhouse (another member of the Society of Friends or Quakers of Darlington), John Mounsey of Sunderland and Edward Richardson (Yes you guessed it another Quaker!) of Tanfield, they represented the Derwent Iron Company.
When it failed in 1857, Joseph and Joseph Whitwell Pease wrote to Mr Trotter, they were anxious that this Ironstone, known to be of the best quality in the Cleveland District, could be acquired after the settlement of the Derwent Iron Company debts. They also wanted to alter the Leases...
The letter shown above was sent to Mr G B Forster, who was the Mines Engineer at Upleatham Mine in 1857, it shows that the Pease's were offering a Certain Rent of £3000 per Annum until January 1st 1861, after which a £4000 certain rent would be paid for a further 21 years.
If the Lease was extended to 40 years they offered to increase the Certain Rent over the following 7 years to £6000. Which Lord Zetland readily agreed to, Pease had actually contemplated paying £8000 per annum as long as the trade continued as it was at the time but Lord Zetland thought it hard upon the Pease's to oblige them to pay such a high rent.
It seems that there was honour among these cut throat Capitalists of the 19th Century after all.
Having concluded these terms Pease sent their mine engineer a Mr William Cockburn, to Upleatham to inspect the workings he reported that "the workings were mainly well dry as there had been some under level drifts put in to dewater the rock".
Wet workings were to bedevil the enterprise right through it's lifetime due to the faulting of the rock strata, which allowed the top bed or 'Hard' that formed the roof of these workings, to trap significant amounts of water. Releasing it when the fault or 'Trouble' as these reports worded was breached.
"There was a Main Drift well established and work to enter the seam with further drifts had been made, the work to remove the 'cover' or top layers of soil and vegetation above the bed in the East and West ends was well underway and quarrying could commence to increase the output of Ironstone".(Information from Simon Chapman's, 'Cleveland Ironstone' Series of books, available at www.landofiron.org.uk )
Shown above are three views of the same buildings, the two on the left were possibly taken in circa 1880 and I believe are earlier than the one on the left which is believed to date to around 1910. Both views however show the main drift hauler building.
If you look closely at both pictures you can see several changes between them. The main engine house left, has gained an extra chimney which would coincide with the point at which it was recorded that the company increased the size of the hauler and its drum.
Central to both pictures can be seen the Incline Drum, that ran down from the mine's 'Bank top' to the holding yard for the rail wagons at the fot of the hill. It's not possible to see the tipping station that was built behind the winding drum but the weighing station is quite clear.
The right picture also shows one end of the structure that housed a forge and workshops, where tubs were repaired and parts created for the equipment required within the mine.
Sadly all that is left of the buildings in the centre of the photos, are these brickwork remains below...
It was noted in 1869 by Samuel Gordon in his book 'The Watering Places of Cleveland' That 'On a bright March morning they had walked up to the village of New Marske from the station, a collection of 82 'cottages'.
(Which from my research I think were Right, Railway Terrace (later re-named Arthur Terrace) and Left, Zetland Terrace).
These views above are from 2020 and you can still see the original boundary walls which were built to enclose the land provided for housing by Lord Zetland.
Railway Terrace was probably named because it ran alongside the 'Railway' that was originally the tramway to Coatham but then became a Standard Gauge when J&JW Pease took over.
As Samuel Gordon and his party during his visit to Upleatham Mine recorded in Watering Places of Cleveland, as they walked up the Incline they noted various buildings describing their purpose...
As he explains, at what he termed 'Bank Foot', they observed a large 'enclosure' within which was an immense stock of timber.
These were the trees that had originally been growing on the hillside but when they were exhausted were later were brought in via the branch line from the North Eastern Railway line from Redcar to Saltburn.
Next he described the sawmill, which had a 'Fowlers Traction Engine' driving three huge circular saws cutting timber into the required sizes by means of a 'moving bed'...
Before passing on into the 'workshops' that produced wooden mine tubs for carrying the 24cwt (hundredweight, approx 50.8Kg) of ironstone from the mine.
Accompanied by the mine manager mr Cockburn they made their way next to the stables, which held about 40 horses that were used to pull the tubs from the 'working places' (where the miners worked blasting the ore and collecting it) pulling them to what was known as a 'headway' were they were coupled together ready for hauling out of the mine...
The party next visited the 'Stables, which was where the mine horses were kept. The stables mentioned have since been converted into houses but the building still retains the shape described by Samuel Gordon.
Gone are the harness rooms and stalls but the photo below may have been taken at the 'wash house' remarked upon in the book...
As the party kept on up the Incline, probably using the 'Black Path' reputed to be the route to the Bank Top, and passing into the Bank Top Yard he passed through the building seen on the right of the next photo...
The main building above, is the engine house and the 'smiths shop'is to it's right...His account mentions that 'balls of scrap' were being fed into a furnace which had a fan attached driven by a steam engine, the white hot metal was then taken and shaped on 'one of Joy's steam hammers', which reminded him of Fergusons poem 'Forging the Anchor'
"A hailing fount of fire is struck at every squashing blow,
The leather mail rebounds the hail; the rattling cinders strew,
The ground around; at every bound the sweltering fountains flow"
And so from here they progressed underground, which will be a tale for next time...
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