Millclose Mine, South Darley, Derbyshire Dales District, Derbyshire, England, UKi

Regional Level Types
Millclose Mine	Mine
South Darley	Civil Parish
Derbyshire Dales District	District
Derbyshire	County
England	Constituent Country
UK	Country

DMS coordinates for New Millclose Mine (Millclose Mine) are: 53°09'30.9"N 1°36'29.3"W
DMS coordinates for Old Millclose Mine are: 53°09'10.8"N 1°36'57.3"W

At South Darley in the Derbyshire Dales District, there are two mines, New Millclose (down the hill) is flooded and below river level, and Old Millclose, up the hill in the fields behind the Red Lion in Wensley.

Old Millclose was running out of ore by the late 1850s. However, a breakthrough into a rich ore vein completely changed its fortunes. This vein had many subsidiary flat veins and pipes leading off it, so Millclose (in the form of New Millclose Mine) continued another 60 years or so. The new discovery opened up caverns containing huge quantities of sphalerite (zinc ore) and galena (lead ore). These ores were in a very pure state. Often, it took very little effort to mine them as they were of sedimentary origin. Underground water courses had eroded mineral veins elsewhere. The detritus was carried along underground and deposited where the flow slowed down in larger caverns. Fantastic crystals of calcite and galena were discovered, up to 30 cm in size. This new venture which became renowned as the largest lead mine in Britain. New Millclose reached more than 330m deep and the pumps had to raise more than 5000 gallons of water per minute to de-water the workings. The furthest workings reached nearly to Picory corner (near Haddon Hall). Over half a million tons of lead concentrate and over a 100k tons of zinc concentrate were produced over 75 years of working. The new mine became famous for being one of the most productive lead mines in the U.K. although little is now left as evidence. It closed in 1939 following an accidental flood after a shot firing in 1938. Attempts were made at the time to pump the mine clear, but this was unsuccessful because there was still over 2000 litres of water per minute pouring in. The mine site is no longer accessible to the general public. The whole area is contaminated with lead and is unsuitable for grazing. The current owners, H.J. Enthoven & Sons, have planted trees on large areas of the contaminated land. Enthoven lead reprocessing facility is located at the former New Millclose Mine site where lead production still takes place at their battery recycling factory.

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References