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I remember back in the 1950's when I was at Beauvale Junior school and a classmate invited me to tea.He lived in the Watnall Lodge which is at the entrance to Watnall Hall.His mother was Canadian and

Hi I have only just found this site and forum. To add some information about Watnall Hall....In the sixties I lived in the cottage a couple of doors away from the Queens Head before the houses were b

I was born in Watnall and used to go to Hollygirt  School in Nottingham.  At that time the school had both day girls and boarders and the boarders lived at Watnall Hall and were bused into Nottingham

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On the subject of Watnall Colliery / Brickworks, On Monday 19 July 1955 I started my first job there as a clerk in the admin office.

My wage was £2.19s.0d a week.

The colliery had closed down but the buildings were still all there. The shafts were still uncapped although fenced off. Of real interest was the magnificent (to me) winding engine which was still in situ. In spite of not being used for 4/5 years at that point it was still in really good condition

Strangely it was wandering amongst all the equipment in the old colliery that really started me questioning whether I wanted a career in administration. I became more and more attracted to some sort of engineering job. In the event that was where my life took me via an apprenticeship in the hosiery industry and 25 years in the RAF.

The brickworks made common bricks, used in those days on the inner walls of buildings. No breeze blocks then. They were made from crushed colliery spoil. This was ground to a powder as fine as talcum powder, mixed with water to the right consistency and the resulting "puddle" clay pressed into shape. If I remember correctly the bricks were baked for 14 days or so. We also supplied unbaked bricks (Puddle bricks) to various collieries for use in sealing up galleries where there were fires burning - perhaps an ex-miner can shed more light on that. (At the back off my mind the term "Gob FIres" rings a bell).

The spoil for use in the brickworks was delivered daily at 3 pm from Moorgreen pit along a branch line that terminated in the Brickyard,- although the trackbed which went originally to join the Midland Railway was still in existence then - we also got spoil by road from a Nottingham colliery, Woolaton I think.

Part of my duties was to go to the N.C.B. area HQ at Eastwood Hall every Friday and help prepare the wage packets for all the weekly paid employees in that area.

All seems a long time ago now

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hello again. My daughter and i have revisited the burial ground and managed to get in side. we took some photos of the 4 very grand graves in there . If anyone is interested in them please let me know. The plot was very overgrown with brambles and bracken and was hard work.

Also can any one tell me what the area near the plot is. it is raised and has steps leading up to it.


sorry i cant copy the picture from google earth put if the plot is at the top of the page the area i mean is to the bottom near (behind) Trough Lane

Also does anybody know if and where the was a water tower in Watnall

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Lisa, are these your steps??

The first post on this topic contains a story on the original Hall and makes mention of steps:

They served to guard a flight of ancient and worn stone steps, almost immediately in front of the house. The steps are there still, though they are not used. Lichens have eaten into them; moneywort and other parasitic plants grow profusely from their crevices. These steps have never been moved, and I should think they never will be whilst a Rolleston owns Watnall. Mary Chaworth probably tripped light-footed down that picturesque flight after dancing at the balls with the young gallants of the county. You can see the hills of Annesley from the terrace, and it is said that Byron’s Mary sometimes escaped the vigilance of her guardians, and left her home, surreptitiously to dance at the balls, for which Watnall was famous. The house is as old as the steps

Also, post #13 mentions steps as well.

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Also can any one tell me what the area near the plot is. it is raised and has steps leading up to it.


sorry i cant copy the picture from google earth put if the plot is at the top of the page the area i mean is to the bottom near (behind) Trough Lane

Are these the steps you are referring to? http://binged.it/10JC3Lg

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Hmm maybe not , looking at them again the ones on the Bing link are much longer and thinner, I'll keep looking

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hi

Yes they are the steps i am asking about. Driving me mad trying to figure out what they are.

When we look at pictures of the hall it doesn't look the same as these staps as these go right up to a porch like area on the ruins that we have seen and visable on the link.

Lisa

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sorry the ones on the Bing map

I'm glad you said that, because now I can answer your question :dry:

Those steps belong to the feature on this map which isn't too clear, but is labelled "Watnall reservoir"

reser.jpg

And since it is/was a reservoir, it may answer your other question

Also does anybody know if and where the was a water tower in Watnall

If there was a reservoir, there might've been a water tower nearby.

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No Trev, "top pit" wasn't at Watnall, just on Watnall Road, that tower was part of the washery for Hucknall No1.... Good aerial photo of the old pit, most of which was gone when it was the area training centre in the early 60's.

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Just another point here, I'm not 100% sure, but that looks more like an old photo of the bottom pit, there were no spoil heaps that close to the old top pit, and the top pit was a lot closer to Watnall Road than that one. I'm almost certain that road is Portland Road/Hucknall Road in the late 1800's early 1900's.

The rail line is to the south of the pit just like at the bottom pit.

There is a road to the top of the photo, my guess is that is Watnall Road and top pit is just out of the photo...

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Just copied and enlarged that photo, it is NOT the old No1 colliery...No1 had a tandem headgear, that one doesn't. The tandem headgear for the top pit was built when the pit was sunk and lasted right into the 1940's until one of the shafts was filled and capped, when it was replaced by a single headstocks, with single cage and balance weight.

I'm not sure when RR works were built, together with the runway, which was used as a Royal Airforce base during WW2, but would have been on the left hand side of the pit..(West side).

I'm sure that's the same water tower No2 colliery had when I used to pass the pit on the bus on my way home every day from Portland Road Tech College.

I'll check my photos of No2 pit soon.

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Here's the tower still in tact in the 80's.

hucknallno26.jpg

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I would suggest the railways around the pit are completely wrong for bottom pit - and the town centre should be much closer, on the right.

I would go for top pit. The farm (Shortwood Farm) in the foreground is in the right place and the curved railway line just beyond it does show on later maps in the mid-1950s. They also show tips in the places shown on the photo. There is a small quarry on the opposite side of Watnall Road to the pit, in the large field with a sports pavilion, also shown on OS maps.

The airfield, even in its later form would be off the picture to the left. Even the Ruffs Estate would be off the picture.

The huge field of allotments in the distance are in the right place and the right shape for No1 pit too.

The only puzzle for me is that Long Hill Rise doesn't show - apart from maybe a few houses at the extreme right of the photo. That might be a good way of dating the photo.

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What puzzled me was I can't see the tandem headgear when I enlarge the picture, it looks more like the two old shafts serviced by one winder at the bottom pit,

No1 pit had similar tandem headgear to Brinsley colliery pre 60's.

The photo would have to be turn of the last century...I recall when walking up Watnall Road in the 60's the houses would have been built in the 30's style.

The only tips I recall were to the south and east of old No1 pit, I walked the footpath a few times after finishing for the day at the training centre to the NCT bus terminus.. But, on saying that, the tip on the west side of the pit could have been cleared years before I started with the NCB..

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I looked on the Old-Maps.co.uk site.

I can't argue with you about the headgear, but all the buildings, field patterns, roads, stream, railways etc fit perfectly. The curved railway siding in the near foreground and the pavilion on the sports field seems to have been quite late additions - maybe late 1930s or later.

The curved railway siding is odd - very expensively engineered for a mere siding. I just wonder if it had any role in the modernisation of Hucknall Aerodrome? It is certainly heading in the right direction, though the only maps showing it suggest it only went just beyond the edge of the photo.

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I doubt the aerodrome would have been there when the photo was taken, the tandem headgear may well be in place, just that I can't see it when I enlarge the photo.

No2 pit did have two of the original shafts serviced by one winder, but had a different headgear, could be called tandem, but look totally different to No1 and Brinsley which shared roughly the same design.

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