South Staffordshire Coalfield

The story of mining in South Staffordshire started a few hundred years ago and reached its peak about a century ago. Alongside the expanding canal and railway network there were a series of coal and ironstone mines fuelling the heavy industry of the area. The mines provided coal for power, for the iron and steelworks of the area and for heat in local houses. Ironstone provided ore for the iron smelters and foundries. Covering the area around Wolverhampton, Walsall and the Black Country, Nigel Chapman uses 200 old photographs to illustrate the story of this lost industry of the West Midlands.