Hospital level, Coniston · AditNow Community

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Pete Monkhouse
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Newbie Topic Starter

5 years ago

Can anyone tell me why it was called this?

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royfellows
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5 years ago

This is a very good question.

Some connection with Greenwich Hospital, London Lead Company suggests itself, except that Hospital level was driven about 1864 when John Barratt was running the mines.

The area was worked originally by German miners and afterwards acquired by Royal Mines Copper which is associated with LLC, but we talking nearly 200 years earlier!

I actually love these sort of questions and eagerly await the answer to the riddle.

My avatar is a poor likeness.

Pete Monkhouse
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Newbie Topic Starter

5 years ago

It caused a pleasing level of reserved and slightly anxious thought in those I took through it last weekend 🙂

royfellows
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5 years ago

A few more thoughts, and this is pure conjecture

Hospital Level could be so named simply because it connects with Hospital Shaft. Hospital Shaft, I have no date for its commencement but could well have been initiated as part of the Elizabethan endeavours, and LLC was formed from Royal Mines Copper and the Ryton Company in 1692.

Its possible that the land may have originally belonged to the Earl of Derwentwater who backed the wrong side in the Jacobite rebellion of 1715. As a result he was executed and his estates confiscated by the Crown. These were then passed on to the Greenwich Hospital. I should however mention that the mineral lords at the time of Hospital level were the le Fleming Estate.

My avatar is a poor likeness.

Hattlebags
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Newbie

5 years ago

I believe it was called “Hospital Level” because it was where any miner who was poorly or infirm or simply elderly were sent to work. Even today Mines and Quarries have “Light Duties” areas or tasks and this is the equivalent. A Hospital used to mean a place of rest rather than somewhere you went to be treated by medical staff. And Hospital Level is the easiest place on the set to work. It involves no ladders to work in there as the entrance and vein are on the same horizon as the Mill (Paddy End). Hospital Level was used to work The Great Open, which would have been a relatively easy working area as it is only 125 yards into the mine and on the same horizon as the entrance & Mill. Contrast that with the levels 90 fathoms below Deep Level or accessed from high up at Levers Water with multiple ladders.

Hattlebags
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Newbie

5 years ago

The other one of my pet theories is why Thriddle is the name used for the shaft and incline, around the fellside from Hospital Level. I believe Thriddle is the condensed version of the full name of that area, which is The Red Dell. Imagine saying “The Red Dell” quickly and in a Cumbrian accent.

Pete Monkhouse
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Newbie Topic Starter

5 years ago

Many thanks all, interesting!