Industrial Archaeology

 The Mines of Gunnerside Gill, Swaledale (1)

Under construction and editing

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 This pictures which make up this article were taken during a walk which took me from Gunnerside village, up the east side of the valley to Blakethwaite Smelter and then back down the west side, visiting the mining remains along the way. The total distance is about 12 miles, including many diversions to look at the mine entrances.

The River Swale rises in the hills of North Yorkshire and flows from the village of Keld southwards to Muker and then eastwards down a classically glaciated valley, finally abandoning the hills at the town of Richmond.

 

Swaledale has been richly endowed with deposits of Lead ore, principally Galena, which is Lead Sulphide, a shiny silvery grey mineral.

 On the track above the outskirts of Gunnerside Village
The mine remains are scattered over a very wide area but at Gunnerside, within the distance of three miles along the valley there are examples of the early mining techniques of hushing, the entrances to a network of underground haulage levels, and the remains of smelt mills where the metal was extracted from the ore.

 Gunnerside Gill, looking North from the village

One of the first groups of remains are the mill of the CB Mines (CB was Charles Bathurst, one of the mine proprietors). The crushing machinery has been long gone but the remains of the waterwheel pit can be seen and the bouse teams, where the rock containing the ore was stored, are in good condition.

The ore storage hoppers at the CB Mines

Across the valley are the tips and buildings associated with the Sir Francis Mine. This was a level driven northwards to open up the highly productive Friarfold Vein at depth. At a point below the priscilla level, to which it connects by a rise, a shaft was sunk to explore the vien below the level of the valley bottom.

A hydraulic pumping engine was installed to wind material up the shaft and this machinery remains underground and is still accessible by following the flooded access level for over a mile in deep water.

 Sir Francis Mine, looking southwards

The extensive heaps of waste rock bear testimony to the huge amount of material that was extracted from the mines.

The remains of the Dolly Mine

Bunton Level drove into the Friarfold Vein and eventually connected with the Hard Level, driven from the adjacent valley. In the photograph the excavation of the Bunton Hush can clearly be seen.

In the early days of mining, the veins were worked at the surface and were exposed by hushing, damming up water which was then allowed to flow down the hillside to expose the mineral veins.

The surface material was loosened with paicks and crowbars and dug out. Repeated hushes flushed the ore down to collection points where it could be separated from the unwanted surrounding rock. Over a period of time very large surface excavations were formed.

 Bunting (Bunton) Level and Hush

 
  Eventually, the practical limits to working the surface outcrop were reached and underground mining commenced by the sinking of shafts and the driving of levels which acted as haulage ways but also provided a means of draining the higher workings.

 The Sun Hush