I have refrained from entering into this debate until now, but with tongue in cheek can I make the following comments please!
Colonel Mustard wrote "In the old days minerals were extracted AFTER the mineral rights had been secured. Without those rights, the removal of any material from any mine is theft".
Well spoken Colonel. In Derbyshire from time immemorial up until the two Acts of Parliament (i.e. The High Peak Mineral Customs and Mineral Courts of 1851 and The Derbyshire Mining Customs and Mineral Courts Act, 1852) which legally confimed a lot of the old lead mining laws, there was drastic action that could be taken by the Barmote Court against theft of lead from lead mines within the King's/Queen's Field. Edward Manlove the Steward of the Court in the mid seventeenth century composed a poem "The Liberties and Customes of the Lead Mines within the Wapentake of Wirksworth in the County of Derby" which set out the laws and customs of the Derbyshire lead field called the King's/Queen's Field (depending upon the reigning monarch) in rhyme for the mostly illiterate miners to memorise. Below is an extract from the poem describing the punishment dealt out to "cavers" as the lead miners called thieves.
"And two great Courts of Barghmoot ought to be
In every year upon the minery,
To punish miners that transgress the Law,
To curb offenders, and to keep in awe
Such as be cavers, or do rob men's Coes,"
Further on in the poem the punishment is then described:-
"For stealing oar twice from the minery,
The Thief that's taken fined twice shall be,
But the third time, that he commits such theft,
Shall have a knife stuck through his hand to th' Haft
Into the Stow, and there till death shall stand,
Or loose himself by cutting loose his hand;
And shall forswear the franchise of the mine,
And always lose his freedom from that time."
Bloodthirsty somewhat? Makes one think.
These laws only applied to lead no other mineral, any other mineral mined apart from lead had to be left either below ground as "deads" or left on the surface for the mineral owner who was not necessarily the land owner to dispose of. It is in these old mining hillocks that much opencasting work has taken place from the early twenthieth century onwards to recover the associated minerals of the vein, i.e. calcite, barytes, fluorspar, zinc blende etc. etc. A separate topic needs starting up about the history of the Derbyshire King's/Queen's Field, the Barmote Court, the Officers of the Court, the Mining Liberties, the Duchy of Lancaster etc. etc., the subject is too vast and complicated to include on this topic.
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Stuey wrote "I'd say that collecting and ordering things was a fundamental feature of the male pattern mind...................
minerals allow you to do this sort of thing and I suppose it has the same features of other male hobbies".
There must be a number of FEMALE members including myself, of Aditnow, albeit in the minority. Please stop being sexist Stuey, why can't girls be interested in geology, mine and cave exploration etc, why are such interests labelled "male hobbies"?. I first became interested in geology at the age of eleven when I passed a scholarship to grammar school, studied geology at Derby Technical College after having left school at 16 - there being few openings for girls in the careers that I would have liked to have followed when I left school in 1948. My interest in mine exploration came about originally through collecting rock specimans for my geology course (yes, all of us must plead guilty at some time or other of doing this but way back in 1951 there were plenty of specimans to be found on the old mine spoil heaps called "hillocks" in Derbyshire, without despoiling mines and it wasn't for financial gain!), thus I became interested in industrial archaelogy, mining history etc. etc. I met many interesting people from all walks of life, especially in the spar mining industry. From my interest in mines and history Nellie Kirkham became a very good friend, she took me under her wing, she was a prime example of a female caver/mine explorer/historian. My knowledge of rocks and geology I passed onto my four children, two of my sons who work for a land reclamation firm find their knowledge of rocks and what is below ground very useful in their work. Being retired now I enjoy being a member of Aditnow, there are many people (both male and female) from all walks of life with a lot of knowledge and experience to offer on various topics, so please Stuey in future postings keep sexist remarks where they belong - off the board. Thank you.
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Derrickman wrote "See also the thread elsewhere in this forum, about quarrying in the Peaks. I would come down firmly on the side that the lorry driver eating his chip-and-ketchup sandwich in a layby, sitting in his ARC owner-driver tipper's cab is AT LEAST as AUTHENTIC a piece of local mining history as an re-enactor in a 'Poldark' hat down in the museum at Matlock".
Being in Derbyshire, it wouldn't be a 'Poldark' hat a re-enactor would be wearing, it would in fact be a "BRADDA" hat! The village of Bradwell in the north of the Peak District was famous for the manufacture of felt hats worn by lead miners. In fact these hats provided the model for the soldiers tin hats of World War one, they were originally made at Sheffield. On many old photographs taken of Derbyshire lead miners in the nineteenth century many men are seen wearing a "Bradda" hat, they are very distinctive.