Quite remarkably, there is a small area of anthracite (or culm) in Bideford! It was worked for 200 years from the 1760s until the early 1960s and sports a piratey name – Bideford Black!
There are 2 seams identified in the local area; a northern and southern seam. One was mined up at East-the Water and down at Greencliff near Cornbrough the mining activity tapped into both seams at an intersection point.
The seams stretch unseen from Hartland and Abbotsham on the coast in a southeasterly direction beneath Bideford and inland as far as Umberleigh. There were various coal yards in the town and a Biddiblack processing plant in Chapel Park.
Inclined shafts and adits in Cleave Wood, extending east for 400 to 800 metres, have been recorded, but in the name of progress, the housing situation has encroached and in 2015 the site was up for sale with planning permission for an irreversible urban sprawl. The Bideford coal industry ended in 1969 with the closure of the last mine at Chapel Park, east of Bideford.
The northern seam is thought to have formed due to a substantial log jam in an ancient river system! Evidence for this is the composition of the coal (cellulose debris with no plant spores) characteristic of vitronite and because it presents as a series of lens shapes (such as you’d find with a culmination of logs in an Oxbow lake).
It was used occasionally as a fuel, but only for use in steam engines and lime-burning, well-away from domestic areas, because it gave off sulphurous and noxious fumes. The majority of the winnings supplied a local paint company because of its lovely black colour! (Anyone who recalls the Fast Show sketch, may pause for a reminiscent chuckle at this point!)
The southern seam (known as the Paint Seam) is a carbonaceous shale called carbargillite and was also no good as a domestic fuel, but found multiple uses as a dye in paints, antioxidant for iron clad ships and mascara!
The only other recorded coal in Devon is the Oligocene brown (lignite) coal in the china clay basins at Petrockstowe and Teigngrace, Bovey Tracey over towards the eastern coast.
Remember this juicy knowledge nugget, because nobody will believe you! Bideford Black – a colliery oasis.
Sources:
http://bidefordblack.blogspot.co.uk
Chris Popham’s report on Dr Chris Cornford’s AGM talk on Coal Mining in Devon (Feb 2015)
Images:
Miners with a tub of raw culm at Chapel Park Mine, North Devon
Mines Road sign in Bideford, North Devon