Robin Hood Mine (Swinton)

Loading map...

{"minzoom":false,"maxzoom":false,"mappingservice":"leaflet","width":"34%","height":"400px","centre":false,"title":"","label":"","icon":"","lines":[],"polygons":[],"circles":[],"rectangles":[],"copycoords":false,"static":false,"zoom":false,"defzoom":9,"layers":["OpenStreetMap","NLS","Stamen.Terrain"],"image layers":[],"overlays":[],"resizable":false,"fullscreen":true,"scrollwheelzoom":true,"cluster":false,"clustermaxzoom":20,"clusterzoomonclick":true,"clustermaxradius":80,"clusterspiderfy":true,"geojson":"","clicktarget":"","imageLayers":[],"locations":[],"imageoverlays":null}

Site of the Robin Hood Mine.

By Henrik Thiil Nielsen, 2019-02-26. Revised by Henrik Thiil Nielsen, 2019-04-05.

The Robin Hood Mine in Clifton (Swinton, Manchester) was probably situated opposite the present Robin Hood pub on 180 Manchester Road.

The secondary sources do not tell us where the colliery was situated, but the earliest of the O.S. maps listed below have a mine opposite the Robin Hood pub at what is now 180 Manchester Road. A few hundred meters to the east was Robin Hood Siding, but most likely the unnamed mine in the O.S. maps was the Robin Hood Mine. It is said to have been "midway between the Wet Earth and Botany Bay collieries, but farther from the Irwell." This tallies better with the location near the pub.

Operations at the mine were begun or taken over by Matthew Fletcher, whose period of activity seems to have begun c. 1756. He did in 1808. If Fletcher gave the colliery its name, this would then have been between those dates. However, it is also possible that the mine already existed under that name before he acquired it or that it was in fact only renamed the "Robin Hood Mine" at some later point, perhaps even after Fletcher's time. The fact that it is now referred to as the "Robin Hood Mine" is no guarantee that this was its original name. Despite the fact that both its name and history probably went a good deal further back, the 1892 allusion is therefore the earliest certain reference. Template:PnItemQry

Gazetteers

• Not included in Dobson, R. B., ed.; Taylor, J., ed. Rymes of Robyn Hood: an Introduction to the English Outlaw (London, 1976), pp. 293-11.

Maps

• 6" O.S. map Lancashire XCV (1850; surveyed 1844-46)
• 6" O.S. map Lancashire XCV.SE (1894; surveyed 1889-91)
• 6" O.S. map Lancashire XCV.SE (1910; rev. 1907) (georeferenced)
• 6" O.S. map Lancashire XCV.SE (1910; rev. 1907)
• 6" O.S. map Lancashire XCV.SE (1930; rev. 1926-27)
• 6" O.S. map Lancashire XCV.SE (1936; rev. 1936-37)
• 6" O.S. map Lancashire XCV.SE (1947; rev. 1938)
• 25" O.S. map Lancashire XCV.12 (1893; surveyed 1891)
• 25" O.S. map Lancashire XCV.12 (1909; rev. 1907) (georeferenced)
• 25" O.S. map Lancashire XCV.12 (1909; rev. 1907)
• 25" O.S. map Lancashire XCV.12 (1928; rev. 1927)
• 25" O.S. map Lancashire XCV.12 (1938; rev. 1937).

Discussion

• The Industrial Heritage of Britain: Denton Colliery (Ellis Pit)
• I remember when Salford...: Clive's Memories
• Wikipedia: Matthew Fletcher (mine owner and engineer).

Notes