Derbyshire Lead Mining History - Mine Drainage

Mine Drainage

Until the 17th century mining had usually been abandoned when the work reached the water table. Efforts at draining lead mines by horse-powered pumps, or “engines” had little success. In the later years of the industry mines were successfully drained by hydraulic, steam, internal combustion and electric power, but the first successes were achieved by soughs, drainage tunnels driven into flooded veins to allow the water to run off. Dr Rieuwerts has provided a comprehensive gazetteer of the Derbyshire lead mining soughs. By lowering the water table and opening up large new deposits of lead ore, they transformed the industry.

The first sough, designed by Sir Cornelius Vermuyden, knighted for his work in draining the East Anglian fens, was driven over a twenty year period from a point on Cromford Hill, between Cromford and Wirksworth, into an area called the Dovegang. When it was completed in 1652 there was an immediate jump in ore production in the area. Vermuyden’s was followed by a succession of soughs which by the end of the century had drained enough of the mines in the Wirksworth Wapentake to cause a dramatic rise in production in the whole area. The most important were the Cromford sough, which was over thirty years in driving, between 1662 and 1696, and was continued in the 18th century, and Hannage sough, begun in 1693 and also continued into the next century. The Cromford Sough provided the power for Richard Arkwright's mills at Cromford, the first of which was built in 1771. Also among the important 17th century soughs were the Raventor, begun in 1655, Bates (1657–84), Lees (1664), and Baileycroft (1667–73). The Baileycroft sough drained mines in Wirksworth. Those in the area just to the north of Wirksworth called the Gulf were drained by the Raventor and Lees soughs. The Bates and Cromford soughs drained mines on Cromford Moor — Bates sough had reached the Dovegang by 1684. Hannage sough drained the area to the east of Yokecliffe Rake, on the south of Wirksworth.

Drainage of the mines in the whole of the Wirksworth area was eventually accomplished by the Meerbrook Sough, begun at the level of the river Derwent in 1772, at a time when lead mining ventures had become only intermittently profitable. The entrance to this sough is 10 feet (3.0 metres) wide and 8 feet (2.4 metres) high and has a keystone inscribed “FH 1772”. FH was Francis Hurt of Alderwasley, smelter, lead mine shareholder, iron-master and the main shareholder in the sough. It still discharges 12 million imperial gallons (55,000 m3) to 20 million imperial gallons (91,000 m3) a day, and by the 1830s had so reduced the flow from the Cromford Sough that in 1846 Richard Arkwright’s successor had to end production at the Cromford mills. In other areas the Millclose mines between Winster and Wensley, and the mines of Youlgreave were soughed.