Holme Bank Chert Mine - Bakewell

Holme Bank was one of the first Derbyshire mines I visited years ago where I could stand and walk around freely. Prior to this, I had been exploring caves and smaller mine workings in the Peak District, so spending a day without crawling through collapsed passages was a welcome change. 

My initial visit involved sneaking through an ungated entrance near the quarry and avoiding the landowner. This was made more nerve-wracking when someone, seemingly living in a caravan within the quarry, had a barbecue next to one of the many adits, causing smoke to fill some passages. The dog barking at our presence when we approached the adit didn't help matters either. Since then, gates have been installed, and access is now gained by contacting the owner Click Here.

I've returned to Holme Bank frequently over the years. It's an easy walk, a good place to introduce new explorers and have them practice navigating the relatively straightforward passages, and a nice location for underground photography. Some notable features within the mine include miners' boots, positioned sole-outward between a collapse. At first glance, you might mistake them for a crushed miner, or at least I did on my first visit. 

The operational winches and carts are interesting relics, but the main attraction for explorers is the flooded workings. It's a popular training site for cave divers, with its extensive submerged passages and the clear water, which offers crystal clear visibility, a relative rarity in Derbyshire.

Here’s a great video i found of such activity Click Here

History

"Chert is a fine-grained, flinty siliceous rock, typically found in veins within limestone. Prehistoric people used it for tools because it could be easily shaped by chipping flakes to create sharp edges, similar to flint. More recently, chert was ground into calcined flint and used as a whitening agent in earthenware manufacture. At this mine, 90% of the limestone has been replaced by a laminated form of chert, occurring in two beds up to 2.4 meters thick: the main mottled "throstle breast" bed and the overlying, more flinty "roof chert." Chert's popularity surged in the mid-1700s, driven by Thomas Benson's patent for a new "wet" grinding process for flint used in pottery. Previous dry grinding methods, using grain-grinding millstones, produced hazardous dust that caused silicosis in workers. Benson's initial "wet" process, attempted in 1726 using iron balls, resulted in iron deposits in the pottery. He then switched to colored granite stones and subsequently chert, which yielded superior results. In the mid-1800s, chert extraction shifted to mining, made economically viable by rising chert prices and declining transport costs. Chert production from the mine averaged around 3,500 tons in the late 1870s and early 1880s, as the workings expanded into an extensive system of passages with eight entrances, aided by compressed air drilling. Tragically, on June 19, 1899, 53-year-old Matthew Hollis of Bakewell was killed when a delayed charge detonated as he and two other men prepared a second charge. A second fatality occurred in 1919, when 62-year-old John Bond was killed on April 17th by a premature detonation of his 11th charge of the shift. In 1925, the mine employed 41 men, and Derbyshire chert production peaked at 6,369 tons in 1928. By 1945, only 21 men were employed, with only 12 working underground. The mine eventually closed between 1959 and 1961. In recent years, the mine has been visited by a few underground explorers, including cave divers who utilize the clear subterranean waters for training."