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The Compleat Collier

The Corves to be made of Hazle.

He must have a good Quantity of young Hazle Rods, provided for that Purpose, with young Plants, or Sippleings, as we here call them, of Oak, Ash or Aller, of about three Inches thick, or better, for the Corf-Bow; we buy the Rods by Bunch each Bunch, containing about a Hundred Rods, at about Six-pence per Bunch, and the Bows being better than two Yards long, for half a Crown or three Shillings per Dozen, or thereabouts.

Your Corver ought to be just to you, in keeping up your Corfe, for with Working the Coals, being drawn pretty briskly up, the Corves are subject to Clash and beat against the Shaft sides, and so beats down your Corfe dayly, that if your Corves be not dayly beat up and mended ; you may lose more than one Inch dayly, which would bring your Measure or Corfe, of fourteen or fifteen Pecks, down to nine or ten Pecks, and so lose you a third of your Measure, and cost of Working or Hewing, &c. for it is most usual to agree with your Hewers of Coals or Miners, by the Score of Corves, by chance for ten Pence or twelve Pence for each Score, according to the tenderness or hardness of the Coal, or according to what the Mine will afford, and not by the Day, or Shift Work, for it is common to give about twelve Pence or fourteen Pence for each Shift, when perhaps you will not have above thirteen or fifteen Corves a Man per Shift; so that is clearly best to agree by the Score, and then good Hand, good Hire, as we say, and you pay for no more then you have Wrought, or comes out of the Pit.

It is the Over-Man’s Business to place the Miners in their Workings, or Boards, or Headways; And every Hewer gives him an Account of what Quantity he will Work dayly, or give; so that he every Day taking the Account of the Work, finds what Number of Men will Compleat the intended Day’s Work or Quantity.

Besides these Miners, called Hewers, there is another sort of Labourers which are called Barrow-Men, or Coal-Putters, these Persons take the hewed Coals from the Hewers, as they work them, or as fast as they can, and filling the Corves with these Wrought Coals, put or pull away the full Curves of Coals, which are set, when empty, upon a Sledge of Wood, and so halled all along the Barrow-way to the Pit-Shaft by two or three Persons, one before and the other behind the Corfe, where they hook it by the Corf-Bow to the Cable, which, with the Horses is drawn up to the top, or to Day, as it is their Phrase, where the Banck’s-Man, or he that guides the Sledge-Horse, has an empty Sledge to set the Loaden Corfe on, as he takes it out of the Hook on the Pit-Rope, and then immediately hooking on an empty Corfe, he leads his Stead-Horse away with the Loaden Corfe, to what Place of the Coal heap he pleases.

One of these two Men that guides the SledgeHorses, on the Banck or Surface of the Earth, is called the Over-Man of the Tree, or chief Banck’s-Man, for he takes an Account of the Quantity of loaden Corves of Coals, which come to the Bank or out of the Pit every Day, by Sticks or Pieces of Wood, which is put in by the last Barrow-Man of the Number which is under Ground, so that if his Memory fails him, those Sticks immediately show him how many Rounds the Barrow Men have put, and so what quantity of Scores are Wrought: And if there chance to be any Hewers, who do not Hew their full quantity, they give first an Account of it to the Under-Over-Man, as before mentioned.

Then the Work falling short of the set Day’s Work of twenty or twenty one Scores, that Abatement is taken Notice of by the Banck’s-Man, and is made good another time, or else at the general Pay, (being noted by the Clarks of the Works, to whom the Banck’s-Man dayly gives an Account of the quantity Wrought) it is abated on these Persons that made the Abatement, that so the Coal-Owner may not pay for more Coals than be had.

And further, there is strict Notice taken dayly by the said Bancks-Men, if Honest, of the filling of the Corves with Coals, for otherwise both the Hewers, and Barrow-Men, will confederate under Ground, and if the Coals be Hewed or Wrought pretty Round and Large Coals, they will be sometimes so Roguish. as to set those big Coals so hollow at the Corfe bottom, and cover them with some small Coals at the top of the Corves, and make it look like a full Corfe, which Fraud when discover’d by the Banck’s-Man and the Coals shaken in close appears to be little more than a half Corfe, is Noted by the said Bancks-Men, who do not empty that false Corfe, but setting it by as it is, when shaken in, lets it stand on the Coal-heap, till the Offender comes to Banck or from under Ground, and there is Reprimanded Publickly before others, and the forfeiture is to give another full Corfe, with that bad filled one for it, or otherwise at the general Pay the Offender Forfeits six Pence per Corfe, for every such bad filled Corfe to the Owner, which is Deducted out of his Wages by the Steward or Pay-Master.

So that the Over-Man of the Tree, or Chief Banck’s-Man, has two Pence for each Day more then the other Bancks-Man, for taking Care of the Quantity Wrought, and of the bad filling of the Corves, the Common Wages is about sixteen Pence a Day for the Over-Man of the Tree, and fourteen Pence a Day for the other Banck’s-Man, or Sledder.

The Wages for the Barrow-Men is usually about twenty Pence, or two and twenty Pence a Day for each Tram (that is to say) for putting so many loaden Corves, as are carried on one Sledge, or Tram in one Day to the Pit Shaft, at the first beginning of Coal Work in a new Pit, it is usual to begin with six Trains, which put and hook to the Cable three Score and ten Corves a Piece every Day, which makes up twenty one Scores a Day, and then about every thirtieth Day, or so, afterwards, they have a BarrowMan, or Tram added, still at the same Wages of twenty Pence, or two and twenty Pence per Day, till by chance the Coal will be so far Wrought under Ground, that there must be sixteen Trains; which brings it so, from seventy Corves put, to about twenty six Corves a Tram, so that the more and further a Pit is Wrought, you see the dearer she lies in the Charge of Barrow-Men, or putting, for they still keep up the first Price of a Day’s Work, were you to add never so many Trains; nay sometimes a Pit may happen to have a Hitch or Dipping of the Thill or Bottom of the way, by which such Setling or Descent, you are sensible to pull a full Corfe, up such a sort of a rise requires more Strength, then where it is drawn down Banck, why then in such a Case these Barrow-Men will rise their Wages two Pence a Day for each Tram, or more according as the Hitch is, therefore it is always look’d upon to be of good Advantage to the Colliery, to have a rise in the Thill, and of the Coal, as we work, because it is easier in putting, and so consequently Cheaper to the Owner.