Tower Colliery
Tower was the oldest working deep coal mine in the valleys, the UK and possibly the world, and at the time of its closure in 2008 it was also the last vestige of an industry that had until the recent past dominated and defined South Wales. You can tell they were proud of that – it’s emblazoned across the signs at the main entrance.
From humble beginnings in the early nineteenth century, the first drift was started in 1864 with new shafts sunk in 1941 and 1958, but as the twentieth century wore on there were widespread changes afoot. In the wake of the infamous miners’ strike of 1984-85 most of Britain’s coal mines were earmarked for closure on economic grounds. Tower Colliery was one of them, but with new underground roads linking Tower with Mardy Colliery the two operated effectively as one coalfield. While the product of both was raised at the former (effectively offering it a stay of execution), the latter closed at the tail end of 1990. Tower lasted a few more years before British Coal swung its axe again and shut it down in April 1994.
Here’s where the story becomes remarkable: 239 miners each put up £8000 of their redundancy pay-outs to buy the operation back from the government that had deemed it an uneconomic prospect, and from 2 January 1995 the wheels were turning again, coal flowing back out of South Wales.
It didn’t last though and as the viable seams became fewer, an options appraisal put forward a second closure of the deep mine as the best way forward. Accepted by the workforce, it closed again in January 2008. Since 2012 the company has been open cast mining on the site, which will ultimately be properly reclaimed and landscaped.
Exploring Tower Colliery
Let’s be honest this is firmly on the tourist trail at the moment, but then why wouldn’t anyone want to spend a few hours rummaging about in mining paraphernalia? Since I was in North Wales anyway I jumped at the opportunity to pop down to South Wales to take a look. The problem is that nowhere in Wales is easy to ‘pop down’ to, in fact it was a three hour drive and a welcome sight when we finally arrived.
Straight off I could see two figures on the headstocks so we ventured in to get the introductions out of the way and reassure the two chaps that we were doing the same as them. This seemed to put us all at ease, and although my instinct would be to leave the most visible part until the end we climbed straight up to survey the site from above.
It was at this point that the key holder for the gates arrived in a truck, with a dog, and a feeling of dread set in. Had we just committed to a six hour round trip only to have to make a hasty exit before we’d even seen anything? We ducked down between the headgear and hoped for the best while the guys below took the fall for us. It all seemed very amicable and they wandered back up the road having already seen it all. Thankfully the truck only stayed for 20 minutes or so before it went on its way, locking the gates and leaving us to enjoy a few hours of South Wales’ finest in peace.
Winding Engine House
The Workshops
Continued in next post below. Apologies, I’ve gone a bit overboard with the pictures on this one!
