Worsley Civic Trust and Amenity Society was set up in 1963 by residents mainly from Worsley Village. Their aim was to help honour and safeguard the historic fabric not only of the village but the area that was once covered by the former Worsley Urban District Council. This included the ever expanding Little Hulton, Walkden and Boothstown areas. Since the Local Government Act 1972 the former Worsley U.D.C. was integrated into the expanded area of the City of Salford in 1974. Since that time there has been a massive increase in population which has eroded lots of green spaces within our catchment area. We help to challenge this expansion were necessary to help maintain our local landscape.
The Underground Canal system featured below starting from Worsley exploits the coal measures between Worsley and the southern boundary of Bolton to the north.
The Main Level, as it was referred to by the builders and miners, had branches that followed up to 20 different seams of coal on 4 levels, above and below the Main Level. The underground system excavated coal up to 1880 when deeper mines were sunk to take coal from the lower levels of the same seams as they sloped down to greater depths. The canal system was used up until 1969 as a drain for those deeper mines which pumped up water to the Main Level for it to exit it in the Delph at Worsley and provide water for the Bridgewater Canal. The orange colour in the Canal comes from iron deposites(orchre) that leaches from the rock strata into the mine water. The ochre is today removed by pumping the minewater from the Main Level into a filter bed system a short distance away on Worsley Moss adjacent to Junction 13 of the M60 motorway. The cleansed water is returned back into the canal about 300 metres west of Worsley Village.
The below picture shows the geology of the terrain that the Main Level travels through on rising land from 82 feet (25 metres) above sea level which is the mean level of the Bridgewater Canal to over 400 feet (122 metres) at Plodder Lane, Bolton. The coal measure inclined from outcrops at the surface at a gradient of 1 in 4 to 1 in 5. The picture shows the Main Level as a white horizontal line with 2 deeper levels beneath Edge Fold and a higher level from Walkden Town Centre to Bolton. The vertical white lines are the access points that were used to build the canal system. There is a unique underground inclined plane that transferred coal barges between the Upper Level and the Main Level under the former colliery at Ashton Fields in the north of Walkden. (Inclined Plane Full Translation.pdf on Publications page) The coloured lines at 1 in 4 are up to 20 different coal seams. The fault lines caused some of the seams to repeat themselves.
When Mosley Common Colliery closed in 1969 the underground system was sealed off and became in accessible. Other than the exit at Worsley in the Delph the only other evidence of the canal system is a gas breather on Manchester Road opposite McDonalds.
WORSLEY CIVIC TRUST & AMENITY SOCIETY
Picture by Mike Shaw
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The Delph at Night
An excellent publication about Worsley’s coal mines and the underground canal system, ‘The Canal Duke’s Collieries 1760 -1900’ by Glen Atkinson can be found in Worsley and Walkden Libraries. Copies can also be purchased direct from the publisher, Sue Richardson, 88 Ringley Road, Radcliffe, Manchester, Greater Manchester, M26 1ET tel no 01204 578138
Worsley Green Monument Armistice 2023
