The New Cairnmuir Colliery Company
Location #186. New Cairnmuir Coal Mine.
Group Number 1

Group Members

The table below shows the people that make up the group.

No Last Name First Names Maiden Name Relationship Occupation Born Died School Year
1 Hodson William James Smith Partner Coal mine proprietor
2 Holloway Vincent Gordon Partner Financier

Notes

The table below shows any historical notes about the party group.

Note Date Short Description Note Text
2292 1941 Mine location.

The mine was located on Slaughteryard Hill, eastern end of Revells Gorge. Access track is directly opposite Bannockburn Inlet picnic area toilet block (see layout plan) on the western side of Cairnmuir Road.

2293 1941 General notes.

The New Cairnmuir Coal Company opened up their mine on Slaughteryard Hill. This may have been the same shaft that had been worked by Mess'rs Cooper, Gibson an Burrows (location #187). The mine was drivn into the Cairnmuir seam of coal with a decline of approx 130m at a grade of approx 1 in 2.5 - in a northerly direction with workings eastward. The seam of coal was standing nearly vertical, about 2m thick at the surface and about 4m thick at a depth of 100m. The length of the seam was about 1000m. The inclination of the seam made for difficult and expensive mining. The mine was all electric and employed one shift of six men usually, including a surface crew to bag coal and run the winch. Water was a problem in this mine. Some of the workforce included : Charlie Scott, Kevin Scott Bill Hodson George Crabbe (1) Charlie Ellis Albert Higgins Adam Smith Bub Curry Norman Scott. Initially the mine did not produce very much coal and water was a problem, along with encountering older worked out areas. It appears that Mr Holloway, the company's financier left the company after a short time. The company was restructured, possibly worked on a tribute or refinanced locally, but continued to operate with Bill Hodson as the manager.

2294 c1945 General notes.

About this time there was a large cloudburst that caused surface flooding upstream of Revells Gorge. The water poured through the gorge and floded the mine on it's way to Bannockburn Creek. At the mine, much of the water poured down the decline and flooded the workings. With no power to pump the water initialy, the mine was de-watered using tank wagons. However, the mine was successfully de-watered and mining continued. The mine continued to be worked successfully by the removal of coal pillars.

2295 1951 The mine was closed.

The New Cairnmuir Mine was finally worked out and closed down after producing a total of approximately 13,949 tons of coal.


Images

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Image Id Source Date Short Description
742 Mr K Scott - Bannockburn June 1943 New Cairnmuir Coal Company - location #186 looking south. View Image