Sutton Manor Colliery, St.Helens (1906-91)

Of all the old pits in St.Helens, SUTTON MANOR COLLIERY perhaps evokes the most passionate reminiscences. One reason is that it's still in the recent memory of so many Sutton folk. It was, in fact, the only St.Helens pit to be opened during the twentieth century and the last to close. There were two inter-linked shafts that comprised Sutton Manor Colliery. The sinking of no.1 shaft with a diameter of 18 feet began in May 1906 and was completed by December 1909 to a depth of 1,823 feet.

The sinking of no.2 shaft began in July 1906 with a diameter initially of 22 feet and was completed by 1912 to a depth of 2,343 feet, which made it one of the largest pits in the Lancashire coal field. A third shaft was begun in 1914 but when war broke out sinking was suspended at a depth of 180 feet and the shaft was subsequently filled in.

In the financial year of 1907-8 the colliery had a budget of £35,000 of which £1200 was spent on a boiler, £2175 on winding engines, £1000 on railway & siding and £4000 on wages. However, the creation of the new pit had more than a financial cost. In July 1908 34 year-old Fred Tiplady was fatally injured by a falling girder whilst attempting to erect a new headgear.

During 1952-7 the colliery was re-organised and no.1 shaft was deepened by 683 feet and no.2 shaft by a further 183 feet. Sutton Manor's heyday was during the post-war years when output rose and innovative methods were used to produce coal. In 1956 the colliery began diverting the deadly gas methane to fire its boilers and during the 1960s it was annually outputting over 300,000 tons of coal. More than 1,000 miners and ancillary workers were then employed, many from the Sutton area of St.Helens.

Miner at Sutton Manor Colliery St.Helens

As a consequence of the National Coal Board's controversial streamlining initiative, the adjacent and apparently uneconomic Clock Face Colliery was closed in 1966. However, Sutton Manor with its record-breaking production figures seemed to have a much more secure future. The NCB removed it from the 'jeopardy' class of at risk pits and extensively advertised to recruit boys for an expansion of mining operations at Sutton Manor and Bold. In the many adverts placed in the St.Helens Reporter during 1966, 15 year-old school leavers were promised a job for life:

Coal mining offers Apprenticeship and a Lifetime's career....boys entering coal mining today can look forward to a lifetime in the industry.

Recruitment adverts for Sutton Manor Colliery and pay check

They were promised "good pay right from the day you start". If they chose to work underground they would receive a weekly wage of £7 3s 6d a week. The wage on offer for a 15 year old surface worker was slightly less at £6 9s 6d. Benefits included access to the canteen, pit-head showers, a club and sports facilities.

Ex-miners were also targeted by the NCB as part of their recruitment campaign using the inviting headline 'Come Back Into Mining'. They were promised better pay than before plus "permanent employment and a secure future". The strap-line of the ads used uppercase to emphasise the longevity of employment on offer:

Britain will need coal and mines for a LONG, LONG TIME(St.Helens Reporter 29/10/1966)

In Spring 1968 the colliery was reorganised and coal production ceased in no.1 pit as no.2 pit possessed more economic seams. This did inevitably lead to a reduction in the workforce. No.1 shaft was still used for essential ventilation and winding operations. In 1974 a new 10 ton triple drilling rig was introduced which was said to resemble a mechanical octopus and two years later an untapped coal field was found just south of Sutton Manor at Barrows Green. A scheme was proposed which involved driving two 1,150 yard underground roadways through a major geological fault. Colliery manager Peter Male was quoted in the local press as saying that it boded well for the future of the colliery:

Sutton Manor has been in jeopardy for some years because of a shortage of results from the coal face and we have lost some money. But this new field opens up new roads for the future and there are reserves of coal to last the pit for up to thirty years.

(St.Helens Reporter 8/10/1976)

Coal was obtained from the two faces in the Higher Florida and Wigan Four Feet seams and marketed locally to power stations, industry and the domestic market. In 1982 the colliery announced its intention to sell surplus methane gas to the ICI Pilkington Sullivan works at Widnes. A five mile-long pipeline linked Sutton Manor with the ICI works and five to seven million therms of methane - equivalent to over three million gallons of oil - was pumped through it. Cooling, distribution and pumping facilities were sited at the colliery and filtration and metering equipment at ICI. The scheme cost £3 million and began on July 14th 1983.

In December of 1983 the National Coal Board announced a £14 million investment in Sutton Manor which they said would provide a "kiss of life" for the "viable" pit and convert it into one of Britain's most modern-equiped collieries. The St. Helens Star began its report saying:

Happy days could be here again for pitmen at one hard-grafting colliery.

(St.Helens Star 15/12/1983)

However, in 1986 the NCB's successor, British Coal, shocked mineworkers by announcing 250 redundancies as the pit was now considered uneconomic, apparently losing £25 for each tonne of coal that it produced. Jack Evans of British Coal told readers of the St.Helens Star that in his opinion some members of the workforce weren't grafting hard enough:

Despite our best efforts to make the pit a success, there is an apparent reluctance on the part of some members of the workforce at Sutton Manor...Its future is in the hands of the men.

(St.Helens Star 9/10/1986)

However, the Sutton Manor colliery was unable to sufficiently boost its productivity to satisfy its management and finally closed on the 24th May, 1991. British Coal claimed that the pit had lost £23 million over the previous five years and was unviable. The mineworkers who'd lost their jobs felt differently.

St.Helens newspaper cutting on the closure of the Sutton Manor Colliery, St.Helens.

St.Helens Star report on the closure from May 30th 1991
There is so much heritage in the Sutton Manor site. Not many know that it was the last colliery in the country to employ a steam winder as the St.Helens Reporter reported almost thirty years ago:

The sounds and smells of steam engines have left the railways and the factories but they still hang over Sutton Manor Colliery. For steam power is alive and well and putting in a 24 hours a day shift...every year visitors come from all over the country to take a look at one of the last refuges of the steam age (St.Helens Reporter 14/7/1978)

Sutton Manor Colliery with its two winders

In fact during its latter years the colliery was unique in having one of the newest winding engines in the country as well as one of the oldest in the steam winder. The latter was used for winding men and materials and the same company which built the engines for the ill-fated Titanic also manufactured its engine.

Sutton Manor Colliery (St.Helens) – the remants of shaft no. 2.

The old National Coal Board gates in Jubits Lane and the remnants of the pit shafts (see right - pit no.2) are all that’s left to remind visitors of the site's illustrious past. Due to their depth a decision was taken not to fill in the shafts. Instead two concrete plugs, about three yards thick, were lifted into position over the twin shafts with venting pipes provided for methane. From being a very productive colliery with enormous slag heaps, the 230 acre site is now a Forestry Commission-managed woodland.

The people of Sutton haven't forgotten the site's heritage and hopefully the old NCB gates will remain as an ever-present reminder. Former mine workers have considerable affection for their former workplace and several have had their ashes scattered or interred there. A number of former miners became councillors or civic leaders such as Harry Williams who worked at Sutton Manor for 50 years as a foreman in the power house. He held the distinction of being the Mayor of St.Helens in 1973, its final year as a borough council prior to becoming a Metropolitan Borough under Merseyside.

In 2008 as part of the Big Art Project a work of art will be sited at the apex of the former spoil heap which rises 270 feet above sea level. Hopefully a fitting memorial will be chosen.
CLICK ON ANY OF THE ABOVE IMAGES FOR A LARGER VIEW

CLICK HERE FOR A SUTTON MANOR COLLIERY PHOTO-ALBUM
CLICK HERE FOR A PLAN OF SUTTON MANOR COLLIERY

We are continuing to research Sutton Manor Colliery. If you have any further information or photographs of the pit, do please contact us. Also see Sutton Beauty's page on Clock Face Colliery.

Research sources for this page and photo-album include:

St.Helens Local History & Archives Library
Mining Memories by Geoff Simm & Ian Winstanley
Frazer Nairn
Mel Moran
Our Heritage in Sutton and Bold by FW Free
Forestry Commission
Sutton Historic Society

(Nb. Sutton Manor Colliery in Sutton, St.Helens should not be confused with Sutton Colliery in Sutton-in-Ashfield in Nottinghamshire.)