Hi, I'm a new member! I am very interested in the iron workings in the north east and am really impressed with the standard of photography especially. I think I'm hooked!

Does anyone have information on the mechanics and structures of the old calcining kilns in Rosedale in its boomtime (late 1800's)? I am busy with a bit of a reconstruction thing on the working kilns and need some technical blurb especially on how they looked from the outside, ie loading and unloading facilities. I have looked around the sites myself, but unfortunately there isn't much left to go on.

Does anyone has any offerings? I am hoping to create a real Dante's inferno look here, but need to get it right. Even a suggestion of somewhere else to visit that may be able to provide some ideas would be fab.

Thanks guys - hope to hear from someone soon!

You could start with "Rosedale and its Ironstone Mines" by Simon Chapman. Available here:

http://moorebooks.co.uk/shelves/cart.php?target=category&category_id=315 

I'm sure there will be some knowledgable Clevelanders along later!

Some unknowledgeable ones might have something to add as well!

Another book which might be better for photographs – don’t know though as haven’t read it.
Rosedale Mines and Railway - Cleveland Ironstone Mines in Old Pictures

Rosedale isn’t in Cleveland by the way, he says somewhat pedantically….

Thanks guys, that was quick! I'm on it, seriously motivated now! Amazing what asking for a bit of help can do. Cheers!

Hi,

there are any number of excellent small books about the Cleveland Mines (and Rosedale) by Peter Tuffs and Simon Chapman that go into a lot of detail, even including all the mining accidents on a mine by mine basis. Although the ones I have don't show pictures of the Rosedale kilns in action - except for a view of calcining dust being recovered after the mines closed - there is a mention of the kilns having massive iron doors.

An intensive search on the web doesn't turn up much in the way of pictures either, so I suggest you try and get in touch with the authors - they may have something in their archives.

No we don't, it's in the books. We selected the best pictures for them; detailed views of the working kilns are minimal.

The large iron-fronted or 'new kilns' must have had doors low down on the front opening out to a stone platform for manual shovelling of the calcined ore to railway wagons adjoining. Have no idea whether the doors were hinged at the top, side of even bottom, nor of the arrangements at the stone kilns at both East and West mines.

However, from inspecting some of the metalwork still remaining within the stone arches, I suspect some form of large shovel was used, suspended by chain from above, to allow the operative to keep away from the heat similar to the arrangements used on some beehive coke ovens.

I also suspect the kilns were not exactly volcanic in appearance, even at night. A dull reddish glow with the occasional brighter light at the base when the kilns were being shovelled out might be more appropriate. It was the old open-top blast furnaces which were distinctly impressive at night, when the bell was lowered at charging and the escaping gases ignited, that was volcanic in appearance!

Until 1971 the night sky was regularly lit up by a sudden bright orange glow in East Cleveland as the slag from the Skinningrove blast furnace was tipped on the slag banks.

---

Thanks lads, this is great info! I have ordered one of the books mentioned previously, hopefully it will give me an idea!

Looking at the older kilns (west side of valley?), I would think that the wagons offloaded the wet(raw) ore on the top line into some sort of hopper, which then gravity fed into the kilns itself. Would this have been through the back of the kiln somehow, or was it through what I would have thought was perhaps a chimney hole in the top?

Then I'm wondering if there was a grate at the base of the kiln to allow ventilation - or am I thinking too much of a domestic fire...? Modern kiln structures just don't match up to these as far as I can see, dunno.

Other kilns of the time (limestone mostly) appear to have a chute/funnel type thing at the front, with a vertical sliding door, lifted by a chain mechanism as a gate - but I think on these kilns this would have been an incredibly heavy thing to manage at the time - so was there a counterweight somewhere? There are a few pics I found with what appear to be gantry arms sticking out of the pillars between each opening. It would have to be simple to do, as some of the literature I found says that a lot of scrap metal and old rail tracks themselves were used for ongoing maintenance due to the immense wear and tear and very nature of the beast itself, and that no two kilns ever looked exactly alike due to the ongoing repairs with whatever materials were at hand. What do you think.

And then I have also heard that the men who loaded the hot calcined/dried ore into the wagons at the front, used 18' long poles to rake the ore out with... but did they stand on platforms to the side..., and if so what did these platforms look like/made of? Maybe wood, as there is no trace of them now, but would wood have been able to take the heat of the kiln without going up in smoke itself? I like the big shovel idea - will have a little go at that one to see what I can make of it.

I appreciate that the glow wouldn't have been anything like a furnace, but it must have been smoky and hellish all the same, and looking at the spoil heaps left over now, everything must have been coated in red dust rather than black... I know there is mention of the black seams of ore, but the spoil heaps are red - so is that an ore thing or is it as a result of the calcination process I wonder. And am I right in thinking that the kiln was loaded with a mixture of coal and ore, layered or otherwise?

There is also mention of the boilerhouse - what exactly was that for - was it actually related to the kilns themselves, or something to do with the trains?

So many questions, I truly appreciate any and every response!

Cheers M

Quite simply, no one has really asked the questions you are asking now so whatever you can find out is worth recording and I'm sure Peter Tuffs would publish it in a future edition of 'Cleveland Industrial Heritage.'

The picture on page 72 of our Rosedale book shows that the pit tubs at the East Mines were hopper wagons so they were hauled out of the mine and run onto the top of the 'new' kilns (seen in the background as an end-on view). We can assume the kilns were open-topped with the rail tracks supported on wrought iron girders which also acted as tie-bars to prevent the front of each kiln collapsing. The broken ends of the girders and their 'ground-anchors' still mainly survive. This picture is dated about 1925 as it shows the calcine dust recovery plant in operation; and ironstone being loaded into wooden standard gauge wagons proving that calcining had finished.

Both sets of stone kilns I think would be similar with girders supporting rails for the tubs to be unloaded directly into the open tops of the kilns.

At the base and in front of each set of kilns there appears to have been a stone working platform against and below which standard gauge wagons would stand to be loaded by hand. That such features may not be seen now is largely because the stonework has been pinched by local people.

I certainly wouldn't describe any of the local ironstone seams as black in colour - all shades of gray is more likely and the red colur of the nearby tips is only because of calcination. Coal was added to the kilns to keep them going in a ratio of something like 1 ton of coal to 26 tons of ironstone - not sure about Rosedale because the ironstone was from the Top Seam but in East Cleveland where the Main Seam was below the bituminous shales it was said that once burning a kiln would keep alight using only ironstone because of its oily nature.

At Liverton Mines the 10 kilns were notorious for the smoke and fumes they gave off; about 1900 the nearest row of cottages were declared unfit for habitation and demolished, while the manager's house was at the end of the village furthest from them. An old miner told me that the men working on the tops of the kilns there had to sew their clothes together with string because of them being rotted by the fumes.

A boiler house near the kilns in Rosedale was not directly connected with them; there seems to have been one for a hauling engine on top of the 'old kilns' at East Mines (for hauling out of the drift) and another near the West side kilns for the incline up from the magnetic deposits. Near the main drift for the 'new kilns' was the engine house for the main-and-tail hauler which comprised a locomotive-type boiler with engines mounted on top; this is shown in one of the most popular pictures of the mines (p.68 of our Rosedale book).

---

Thanks very much, this is fabulous! I will have a good read and think about it all, and write up any further musings. Very much appreciated, I am so inspired by this. M