January 28, 1835 (Partial Entry)

 

1835

January

Wednesday 28

No kiss.

Fine morning, tho’ rather hazy and dull – F 43 1/2° at 9 1/2 a.m. – Looked over from page 25 to 69, end of De la Beche’s Geological notes – Breakfast at 9 3/4 – to 10 3/4 –

Then out with Charles Howarth doing top cornice for North passage – then with Pickles at the dry bridge –

Holt at the drift – Came in with him at 11 50/.. and he staid till 1 3/4 – The deed made by Stansfield and Thompson ready for signing Mrs. Machin’s coal, 14 DW, to Mr. Rawson for £200 – But 7 people concerned, mother and children and ....... the saddler at Northbridge, having married the oldest daughter and not being consulted, would not let his wife sign and promised to bring all the rest over to sell to Holt – Valued at £40 per DW. but Holt thinks he can get them to agree for £300 down – Said I should be glad if he could – but he must give £350 rather than miss the bargain – In short, he must buy the coal –

Then, speaking of Spiggs, he had told William what I had said about the deed from Wilkinson, and said he (Holt) should be here this morning and expected William Keighley to come here and meet him and bring the deed – Said I should now 1st see about settling this matter about the deed –and that I did not care about agreeing with the Spiggs Company, for that I understood the Keighleys were indemnified by the 2 Clarkes (Tommy and his brother), of whom they bought their share –

Asked what Holt valued the Spiggs Colliery at as it stood -- £1000 – very well, said I – We shall see – If I open this Shibden Colliery, it will be my interest to stop Spiggs altogether – Why! yes! said Holt, it would – his cousins Holt had agreed to sell their 1/2 share to Stocks; but when I bought Staups, Stocks would have nothing more to do with Spiggs – He would have loosed Northern coal (Swain’s Coal) by Spiggs through Staups –

Stocks has only 1/2 of Swain’s coal and the two Clarkes have the other 1/2 – and Stocks will not care much about loosing it till he has it all – Wilson quite fast – Cannot stand many months longer – I could loose Stocks (Swain’s Coal) and a few acres of Upper brea top land by my water wheel at Tilly holme Stile if I liked – But I loose neither him nor anybody else unless I like –

Said I had made up my mind to loose my coal and set up the water wheel at Tilly holme stile and wished to begin of this job – The sooner the better – The 1st thing to do is to begin at Mytholm.  Dam stones and drive up a drift to Tilly holme Stile – This, at a rough guess, might be for 600 to 700 yards – Say at 4/. a yard if advertised; might be done for less – Might be done in about 8 months – Then would have a walled and arched culvert (3 X 2 feet) from Tilly holme Stile to the end of my library into the brook –

Say (said I) about 600 yards, all labor done at 5/. per yard and Stones (field wall stones for sides and parpoints for arching) and carting = 7/. per yard -- ⸫ [therefore] culvert total cost of per yard = 12/.  Then put down the water wheel – Wheel to be 6 feet broad – Put the wheel and engine pit just above the gall (that runs through Wellroyde land etc.) so that there would only be 14 or 15 yards to pump – Suppose the wheel and engine pit cost from £300 to £400.  the 2 coal-heads or drifts (large enough for hurrying gates – going corves along one and returning corves along the other) will pay for themselves by the coal got out of them – That is, will pay for driving but there will be rails to find – Those Hinscliffe had just got me from Farrer are to be £8 per ton, 4 feet long rails, of which one ton will reach 80 yards –

Told Holt my plan of sinking another pit 50 or 60 yards on this side of Walker Pit – Not necessary to sink another pit  -- Even if I stopt Spiggs Colliery, and kept it stopt (for which I should have to raise the water 3 yards) so that Walker Pit should be 3 yards deep in water, this would not signify – I could chamber the pit just above the water, or fill it up to that height, if I liked, and cut a gallery or drift from Walker Pit through the coal to communicate with the drifts (leaving between the pit and drift a yard’s breadth of coal as a landing or fence to keep the water from the drift) –

Holt quite sure I cannot stop Spiggs without letting the water 3 yards deep into Walker pit bottom – The dead water stands – That is the water rises as it is, as high up on the coal as the wall at the head of the clough in Trough of Bolland wood – I smiled and said I thought Hinscliffe would have no objection to my stopping Spiggs Colliery – which Holt seemed to agree in – I think Hinscliffe is afraid of his trespass being discovered when Walker Pit is bottomed –

We shall have to phey about 180 yards along the face of the goal in the old works at 3/. a yard for this gate will be good and then about 50 yards forward  through coal and then Holt thinks we shall come at the trespass – but the coal will pay when we get to it –

 

WYAS Finding Number SH:7/ML/E/17/0155