The Kilkenny and Laois collieries

The only "Hard Coal" or anthracite in Ireland is found in an area beginning just northeast of Castlecomer (right image below) and rising northeast into southeast Laois (middle image below). The only other option was dirty bituminous coal or peat turf. This made this coal very valuable and the owners very rich.

These owners were the Wandesfordes from England and their story is ably described in the link below the images. They owned most of the coal land in Kilkenny in one huge estate and over half of Castlecomer.

Their exploitation of the workers to accumulate vast riches helped turn the Whitefeet from a social club to a movement which the English described as an Insurrection.

The best resource for the Kilkenny and Laois collieries is "The Development of Mining in Castlecomer, Ireland 1640- 1969", an excellant history of the area.

We will only quote one passage about the Insurrection in 1831.

"By the 1820's the Wandesfordes embarked on a concerted effort to remove the middlemen from the practice of mining. This was for two reasons: the ongoing degradation of farmland by the mining practices of the master collier operations and the sharp decline in profits going to the estate from mining operations. Profits had declined from ten thousand pounds a year to a mere nine hundred and fifty-four pounds by 1826. Colliery supervisors from Durham were brought in to manage affairs. Deeper seams were sunk, and new mining practices were established. This led to violent reprisals from many native miners. In 1831 alone there were five murders of mining personnel in the Castlecomer area."

"A commission was appointed to investigate the murders. Led by Thomas Bermingham conditions in the area the commission revealed the brutality of the living conditions endured by the miners and their families."

The principal portion of the Queens county belongs to the great floetz limestone field, which forms the base of the greater part of the level country of Ireland; the Slieve-Bloom mountains in the north-west, are of the sandstone formation, and at the Slievemargue in the south-east the coal formation commences. The limestone field abounds with escars, already noticed. The coal formation commences near Timahoe, and extends east and south-east to the Barrow, and southwards almost to the Nore. It forms the northern extremity of the Kilkenny field, from which it is separated only by a small river, and the coal is in every respect similar in each part: the portion included in the Queen's county extends about 3 miles by 2. The strata range as in Kilkenny, but the dip being to the west, the pits on this side are deeper.

There are five collieries at work; namely, Newtown, Wolf Hill, Doonane, Poulakele and Moydebegh; those of Rushes and Tollerton, though very valuable, are not wrought at present. The pits at Newtown are from 45 to 48 yards deep, all those around Moydebegh are from 61 to 64 yards. The coal at Newtown and Doonane is equal to the best Kilkenny coal, and sells at 20s. per ton at the pits; that of the other collieries, though somewhat inferior, never sinks below the price of 17s. per ton. Hence the poor people, even in the immediate vicinity of the pits, cannot afford to use it, and it is entirely purchased by maltsters, brewers, distillers and smiths, by whom it is much sought after, inasmuch as, being almost pure carbon, without any admixture of bitumen, it requires no preliminary preparation even for malting purposes; it is conveyed to all the surrounding counties chiefly in one-horse carts.

In the summer of 1836, 64 pits were at full work, for unwatering which five steam-engines were employed, but the coal is mostly raised by horses. The works furnished employment to 700 men, and the value of the coal raised is estimated at upwards of £78,000 per ann. Yet, notwithstanding these advantages, the workmen, from their irregular and inconsiderate habits, are miserably poor; and the district is frequently disturbed by broils and tumults, so that police stations are thickly distributed throughout this portion of the county.

The Kilkenny collieries are situated two miles north from Castlecomer, twelve from Kilkenny, eight from Carlow, and forty-one from Dublin, and extend in length from Cooleban to the river beyond Maesfield, continuing thence into the Queen's county. In this county the coal field may be estimated at six miles in length by five in breadth, and the collieries are distinguished by the names of Firoda, Ballyouskill, Clogh,and Maesfield. The mines were discovered in 1728. A great number of men had been for several years employed in raising iron ore, which was smelted with charcoal from the numerous woods of the country; and having worked through the seam, came unexpectedly to a vein of coal. The first pits were sunk near the southern termination of the coal field, and were consequently unprofitable; others were then opened on the ridge of hill at Cooleban, where three separate seams were worked at little expense till exhausted.