History

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 The Village Hall has a history dating back to the 1930’s and its origins are closely linked with the colliery that was located on the opposite side of the main road. The land on which the Village Hall is situated was originally named 'Gadbridge Meadow' and was part of the extensive Cruckton Hall Estate, owned by the Harries family.

After the First World War that estate's land was largely sold off.

Much of this land was bought by Mr. Elijah Sandells, including the field, then known as 'Lower Harrisells' where the Village Hall is located. He sold 5.4 acres of this field in 1931 for £375 to the

Hanwood Colliery Miners' Welfare.

The land, and the pavilion built on it, was for the recreation of the miners. The money to fund the project came from a levy of one-shilling (5p.) placed on every ton of coal raised. This was one of the proposals that had been introduced to benefit miners following the 1919 Royal Commission on Coal. One ex-miner from Hanwood colliery remembers that the miners themselves also contributed to the cost and were able to use the washing facilities following their shift at the colliery. The original miners' pavilion still forms the central core of the present, much-extended, Village Hall and is identified by the foundation stone visible in its wall

  LAYING THE FOUNDATION STONE AT THE MINERS' WELFARE HALL, 1938. FROM THE LEFT:
MR. BOLTON (PIT MANAGER), MR. & MRS, KYNASTON, MR. A. JONES (BUILDER).

AN INVITATION TO THE OPENING OF THE MINERS' WELFARE HALL

THE OPENING OF THE MINERS' WELFARE HALL IN 1938, BY THE MAYOR OF SHREWSBURY, ALD, FRANK SMOOT.

The ownership of the Village Hall passed from the Hanwood Colliery Miners' Trust into the hands of the Villagers of Hanwood in the 1970's. This is still the case, but in the Spring of 2012 the
Village Hall, the recreation field and the new Waterside Park were registered in a scheme known as the 'Queen Elizabeth Fields in Trust', This means that these grounds are now protected from any adverse development 'in perpetuity'.

HANWOOD COLLIERY, SHOWING THE SHAFT HEADGEAR AND THE WINDING ENGINE HOUSE.
TAKEN FROM THE POUND LANE END LOOKING BACK TOWARDS THE VILLAGE.

The colliery was always privately owned. We know that Mr Nicholas Fielden bought it from Mr. Samuel Atherton, its long-term owner. in 1921.
Fielden continued to own it until closure came in 1940. The coal produced was high quality and was used for both steam engines and for household use.
In the period when Mr. Fielden owned it, the colliery produced around 25,000 tons of coal a year. The coal sold for around 29 shillings (£1.45) a ton in 1929. Fielden linked the colliery underground with the adjacent Moat Hall colliery, which he also owned, having purchased that colliery from the Shorthouse family in 1919. Maximum output was in 1923 when 35,000 tons was produced. This equates with around 15 acres of the coal seam being removed from underground in just that year. In 1921 the colliery had employed 248 men underground, but this figure declined until by the time it closed in November 1940, the seam having been exhausted, there were just 50 underground workers remaining.

  Hanwood's coal was contained in the Carboniferous 'Erbistock Beds', These layers of coal sloped downwards towards the north. This meant that the shaft in Hanwood reached the coal measures at around 450 ft. down, but the workings had to follow the coal downhill, reaching about 900 ft. in depth at the northern limit of the workings beneath Horton Lane. The coal seams were not thick, measuring an average of just 2 ft. in thickness for much of the coalfield. The thickness of the seams meant that it was not practical to introduce coal cutting machinery. As a result, the coal was extracted largely by manpower alone, with the miners hewing the coal by lying on their sides most of the time. The tunnels were so low that conventional trucks could not be used. Instead, low sledges called 'Dans', pulled along by boys known as 'Drawers', were used to take the coal back to the main tunnels.
 

This was a long uphill struggle due to the slope of the seams. Only the main tunnels, used by the miners for the long walk to the coalface, would have been high enough to stand in or to allow pit ponies to be used.

Hanwood Colliefy was situated imnrdiately opposite the present Prinnary School, the;overgrown bank by the lay-by is part of the old spoil heap. The colliery shaft was one of several sunk Into the coal Ineasures that stretched fronl Pulley to Pontesbury and northwards to Cardeston. This coalfield had been exploited since the eighteenth century, but this colliery at Hanwood was opened in the iddle of the nineteenth century. The shaft was 468 ft. deep and underground the workings sloped downwards to the north, where the workings reached around 800ft below the surface at Horton Lane, near to the Yockleton road.

  MR. CHALLINOR, EDWIN 'WRANGLER' THOMAS, CHARLIE THE HORSE, GEORGE COOPER IN THE CAGE AND THE PIT MANAGER MR. BOLTON (FROM LEFT TO RIGHT)

One positive aspect of the Hanwood colliery was that it did not contain dangerous explosive gases. The miners used candles to light their work. Indeed, when the owner, Mr. Fielden, tried to introduce safety lamps in the 1920's the men went on strike claiming that the lamps were a needless imposition!
 

Once at the surface the coal was taken by tramway to Cruckmeole to be sorted by size and loaded onto the railway. The grooves caused by the cables pulling the tramway wagons can still be seen on the railway bridge at Cruckmeole. The process of sorting was known as 'screening' and the coal was divided into four grades: large coal, nuts, steam peas and coal dust.