Joseph Beete Jukes

“ Gilpin himself was convinced that the Stinking coal which he reached was the Top or Two-foot coal of the Brown Hills, which is almost certainly the true Sulphur coal, basing his opinion not only on the sulphureous quality of the coal, but on the occurrence of some igonstone measures above it, believed to be the Pennystone measures, and another which was recognized or supposed to be recognized as the New mine ironstone clod, although it was devoid of ironstone. If this be the Stinking coal, it follows that the Brown Hill and Pelsall coals may be found below it. ”

“ Rock faults, swells, rolls, &c.—There are some remarkable peculiarities and irregularities of structure, which, although by no means peculiar to the Thick coal, but occurring now and then in all beds of coal in all coal-fields, are yet so well seen in the Thick coal on account of the scale on which they are exhibited, that it is worth while to take this opportunity of describing them a little more in detail. ”

“ The richest part of the field in amount of coal-beds, both absolutely and still more in proportion to the whole thickness of the measures in which they lie is between Wolverhampton and Bilston, where the lower coals are becoming rapidly thicker, and the Thick coal is still nearly unbroken and undiminished. ”

“ These are caused by a rise of the floor of a coal up towards the roof, in such a manner as to form a long arched ridge running through the coal, sometimes for a very considerable distance. I examined one of these in the Baremoor colliery, when visiting it with Mr. Thompson. The black batt containing nodules of ironstone, which usually lies below the coal, seemed to thicken upwards very gradually, and the three lower coals ended against it with a distinctly rounded outline, and without any mark or sign of disturbance, either contemporary or at a subsequent period. ”

“ The relations between the Red coal-measure clays of Walsall Wood and the Coal-measures of Coppy Hall Colliery and the Aldridge Trial Pit—The Red clays about Walsall Wood and the neighbourhood have long been extensively opened by brick pits. Their general dip is northerly at very slight angles, not more than 3°. A shaft has now been lately sunk through a considerable thickness of these clays south of all the brick pits, and where, therefore, they are probably thinner than at any locality further north. ”

“ If these coals be other than the Thick coal they must be either above it or below it. If they are entirely above it then the Thick coal must lie in the district between Essington and Wyrley on the one side and Pelsall and the Brown Hills on the other, and must crop out to the surface in that district, inasmuch as beds, which are certainly below the Thick coal, themselves crop out to the eastward of it. ”

“ In the first six of these sections there is a remarkable agreement in the total thickness of Coal-measures below the Bottom coal, supposing that in each case the "blue binds" or "blue rock," from its colour and its preserving a uniformity of structure through so much greater thickness than the Coal-measures usually do, be the Silurian shale. At Parkfield (No. 7) , the beds below the Bottom coal are thicker than elsewhere, in consequence of the extra thickness in those between the Blue flats and the Silurian shale. ”

“ Now, the Bentley Hey coal, and the Heathen coal below it, are found at intervals, and worked, north of Bentley, up to the New Invention and Bloxwich. They have never been worked quite continuously, as they are said to be frequently thrown in and out of the ground, not only by a succession of small faults and one large one, but also by several undulations of the beds.
The Bentley Hey four-foot coal has also been worked north of the New Invention, with a general dip to the west or W.N.W., that is in the direction of Essington. ”

“ The Herring coal is generally about 18 'inches thick, and not worth getting; it is, however, very persistent in the district now described, and as we go towards High Haden we find other small coals, one of which is a cannel coal, coming in just below the Herring. Neither of these measures are mentioned in the section of the Oak-farm pit, nor in the borings at Holbeche Mill near Himley, on the west side of Dudley, nor do they occur at all on the east side of Dudley, except in one part of Tividale, where, in the record of an old sinking in 1797, given in Plott's History of Staffordshire. ”

“ Halesowen Sandstones.—There are beds, however, in which at least one coal occurs, which are much above this height over the Thick coal. A little bed of coal is to be seen in a small ravine nearly due east of Ham House near Old Swinford, in the brooks running down from Lutley to Lutley Mill, in the brooks in Uffmoor Wood, and Mr. Mathews, of the Leasowes, informed me that he came upon a similar little coal in some excavations in the Leasowes demesne. Mr. Richards also formerly sank at Wassel Grove, and passed through two little coals, one of four inches and the other eighteen inches thick. ”

“ In each of these cases the thickness seems to vary almost directly as the quantity of "rock" or sandstone. In the Congreaves district the whole of these beds are almost entirely composed of rock and rock binds. Around Brierley Hill there is not more than 6 feet to 12 feet of rock, while round Corbyns Hall the quantity of rock is generally about half the whole mass, being more or less interstratified with beds of binds or clunch, which are generally described as "strong," meaning that the argillaceous is largely mingled with arenaceous or siliceous material. ”

“ This in the central and southern parts of the fields often contains small nodules of ironstone, called the "Grains ironstone." Under that is 1 or 2 or 3 feet of a light coloured ground or clunch, containing also in some cases ironstone called the "Whitery ironstone." The three beds together never exceed 8 feet in thickness; they are rarely all present at once, the batt seeming the most constant, but they are sometimes altogether wanting, and the Thick coal rests on the measures containing the Gubbin ironstone. ”

“ The Bottom coal, thus separated into two, was worked formerly for some distance along the outcrop north of Pelsall Heath, till it was dropped out of reach of the "old men" by downcast faults into that which may now be called the High Bridge trough. The corresponding upcast faults on the north side of this trough brought these coals again near the surface about the Brown Hills, and they were there gotten both by the "old men," and the men of the last and present generation. ”

“ Just on either side of Dudley there appears to be neither Lower Heathen nor Rubble coal, but from Tipton northwards around Bilston and thence to Wolverhampton, there is almost always a Rubble coal varying in thickness from 2 to 4 feet, and in depth below the Heathen, from 7 to 24 feet. The interposed materials contain always clunch and other argillaccous matters, and often some sandstone, which occasionally thickens out, and causes the variations in thickness between the two coals. ”

“ In the northern part of the Brown Hills field, however, the beds are beginning slightly to curve round, so as to strike to the north-east and dip to the north-west. It is probable then that the beds all across the field will follow this curve, and that the Wyrley coals will curve round from Church Bridge and strike towards the north-west in the direction of Brereton.
This probability is confirmed by the fact of two outcrops of coal being still traceable in Cannock Chace by means of some old workings having this bearing. ”

“ New mine ironstone, or White ironstone.—This is perhaps the most widely-diffused bed of ironstone in the whole district, as it occurs and is worked from Bentley near Walsall on the north to Hawne near Halesowen on the south. The measures consist almost invariably of clunch, though sometimes they are called clod, or binds; they are always, therefore, of some form of clay; they contain from two to four bands or courses of ironstone, each of which varies from an inch to a foot in thickness. ”

“ Going still farther north, again, the ironstones seem to be rapidly dying out and disappearing. At Dudley Brothers colliery, for instance, about half a mile west of Bloxwich, although these measure were still recognizable, they contained so little ironstone as not to be worth working ; while around Pelsall they sank at one place 150 feet below the Bottom coal without finding either coal or ironstone, till at that depth they came on a little "lean" ironstone, which was conjectured to represent the Blue flats. ”

“ Intermediate measures containing the Pennystone ironstone, called also the Bluestone and the Cakes.—These beds are almost invariably dark clunch. They are called sometimes black clod and black ground. They contain sometimes throughout their mass, sometimes only in the lower portion of it, flat roundish nodules of ironstone, generally of a dark colour, and sometimes black, so as to be distinguishable from the New mine Whitestone above them, both in form and colour. The ironstone is sometimes called Blue ironstone, or the Cake ironstone, [7] as well as Pennystone. ”

“ In the latter shaft (of which a vertical section is given on Sheet 18 of the Vertical Sections. No. 25) there are about 50 or 60 feet of dark and grey rocks at the top containing a little nine-inch coal, underneath which come about 280 feet (or 93 yards) of red and blue marls, interstratified with ' blue ground," "blue rock," and "mottled ground," many of the so-called blues being rather green than blue, but the predominating colour of the whole a deep purplish red. ”

“ South and west of Dudley they rarely contain ironstone, and the whole mass scarcely ever exceeds 5 feet in thickness, being frequently altogether absent, the only exception I know being at the Graveyards near Lower Gornal, where they are described as "Pennystone measure, 18 feet." In the centre of the field between Dudley and Wednesbury ironstone is likewise often absent, as at Tipton Moat colliery, where we have only "dark ground 20 feet." South of that, however, towards Oldbury, ironstone is got from these bods under the name of Cakes or Bluestone ”

“ The same will be true also for the red brick clays of Essington Wood and the strip of country north and south of it, where these clays prevail; as also for the red clays of Rumour Hill east of Cannock and those of Littleworth near Hednesford, although near Cannock it is probable, from Mr. Gilpin's account, that the ground is too much cut up by faults to make exploration other than very hazardous.
The Cannock Chase District.—It has been already stated that the dip of the measures all across the part of the coal-field now being treated of is from east to west. ”

“ They are traversed by faults, and slickenside surfaces are seen in every direction, and sometimes the layers, especially those of coal lying in the sandstone have been bent, and are now tortuous like veins, while masses of the sandstone have likewise indented the coal. ”