Bonvilles Court Colliery 1910

Bonvilles Court Colliery was named after the medieval castle of Bonvilles Court (if you notice no 's). Bonvilles Court Farm house can be seen in the left of the photo and next to it is the last remaining tower of the Castle. The tower was used as a store for the colliery tools before the spoil heap covered the farmhouse and Castle in the 1920s (they weren't demolished). This photo is taken looking to the East. The old Valley Road ran North South to the left of the Castle in the bottom of the valley, the new road runs up over the pit and to the right of Rose Villa in the right of the photo. The spoil heap was reduced in height in the 1940s when thousands of tons of waste was transported by lorry to make the wartime runways at Templeton and Milton aerodromes. The rest of the spoil heap was flattened off in the 1980s to make a coach park. Recently a company wanted to build affordable houses on the spoil heap. Which is complete madness as the coal content of the shale is very high and I saw one spoil heap burn for two years before it could be put out in the 1980s not very far from the Colliery site.

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This photograph is by Gazdav and was uploaded January 11^th 2009. © Gazdav please do not copy or distribute without prior express permission.

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