Parkend Colliery

borntobemild · Sep 22, 2013

Parkend Colliery is in the Forest of Dean. It ceased to produce coal in 1929 but remained open to provide an emergency exit for New Fancy colliery about 3 km away. Nearby Castlemain also remined open and continued pumping for New Fancy until the latter's closure in 1944.

Like many forest collieries it remained derelict until demolition. There are rumours that the headstock stood until the 1990s but i can't confirm this.

The site has until recently been completely overgrown.

Forest Enterprise and/or British Coal Authority are currently giving the sites of both Parkend and Castlemain a 'makeover' as they have with many of the other collieries in the forest. This usually consists of capping the shafts, and levelling and grassing over the site so that nothing remains unless you look really closely. A real shame.

I just happened to cycle past while the makeover was in progress and took a few photos.

First four shots are of part of a beam engine I think. Partly sunk into the ground, so hard to tell. I'm sure someone will be able to confirm or otherwise.

Not sure about this either. Some sort of winding gear? Or a brake?

The two capped shafts. Probably about 15m apart.

Castlemain Colliery is only about 250m away. Some huge chunks of masonry (about 4ft by 2ft) which probably came from the engine house.

There's also an inclined plane which linked the mine to the rail/tram network in Parkend.

Lots more info about Parkend, Castlemain, New Fancy and other mines on this web site.

http://www.lightmoor.co.uk/forestcoal/Coalopen.html

flyboys90 · Sep 23, 2013

Some nice chunks of iron there think you could be right it does look like the beam off a beam engine.

borntobemild · Sep 23, 2013

flyboys90 said:
Some nice chunks of iron there think you could be right it does look like the beam off a beam engine.

I thought so. There is an industrial heritage museum not far away from the site. I'll email them a photo.

It would be a shame if it ended up in a scrapyard.

krela · Sep 23, 2013

Certainly looks like it! It's a good thing they're capping the shafts tbh. Dangerous places.

borntobemild · Sep 24, 2013

Agree that the shafts should be capped, but it's the obliteration of the whole site i object to.

Here's the response I got from the Dean Heritage Museum

Hi

This may be Castlemain Colliery where shaft safety work has taken place. The objects are part of a steam winding or pumping engine, but exactly which bits they are I do not know. The horizontal piece is either a small beam or part of a balance-bob mechanism. The two inclined pieces look like small beams but may be linkage. All look to be carefully sunk into the ground to defend against scrap hunters.