page_title: Mining on the Brendon Hills
section_title: Bearland Wood mine
hierarchical_section_title: Mining on the Brendon Hills / Individual mines / Bearland Wood mine
caption_attribution_description: English: Bearland Wood ventilation flue
context_page_description: The Brendon Hills are a range of hills in western Somerset, England. The hills merge level into the eastern side of Exmoor and are included within the Exmoor National Park. Iron ore and other minerals have been extracted for industrial purposes, primarily by the Brendon Hills Iron Ore Company in the later half of the 19th century.
context_section_description: The first adit was started at this iron mine in 1854, aiming to work towards Gupworthy. Little ore was found and working had ceased by 1864. Later that year the Mines Captain, Morgan Morgans, decided to drive a new adit, which proved very successful, yielding 12000 tons of brown Haematite which was taken to Langham Hill pit by an incline operated by horse powered whims. The ore was loaded on to WSMR wagons at Langham Hill. This incline was abandoned in 1866–7 when Bearland Wood mine was joined underground with Langham Hill pit.
  Mines on the tops of hills are usually sunk from above, with adits for drainage or access driven laterally to the hillside from the ore, coal or other target mineral. Bearland Wood mine was worked the other way round, with vertical working following lateral boring.
  Bearland Wood faced the universal mining problem of ventilation in a way which was both very old and radically new. Most industrial age mines were drained and ventilated using pumps, typically powered by steam engines. Morgans equipped Bearland Wood with a ventilation flue where a chimney stack was built above the mine's upward shaft and a coal-fired furnace was placed at the foot of the chimney. The furnace sucked air from the mine shaft which sucked fresh air from the lateral adit in turn. The air flow was guided by wooden ducts so that it always passed through areas where men worked. Miners extended or redirected the ducts as the working faces moved. This method long predated steam pumps, but as Morgans was erecting it at Bearland Wood the Mines Inspector at Risca Colliery (near where Morgans had been a colliery manager) declared steam pumps to be unsatisfactory and ordered their older ventilation furnaces to be reinstated. The ventilation flue at Bearland Wood is a scheduled Ancient Monument. Its conservation was supported by the Heritage Lottery Fund.
caption: Bearland Wood ventilation flue
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