Record Details

Summary

Area of Gypsum mining, operational in 1937 when disused sections were requisitioned from Peter Ford and Sons by the RAF for underground bomb storage.

Monument Type(s):

• GYPSUM MINE (First mentioned, MEDIEVAL - 1300 AD? to 1399 AD?)
• GYPSUM MINE (Established, Victorian to Late 20th Century - 1870 AD to 1999 AD)
• GYPSUM MINE (MEDIEVAL to Victorian - 1400 AD? to 1869 AD?)
• CEMENT WORKS (POST MEDIEVAL to Victorian - 1486 AD? to 1899 AD?)
• GYPSUM QUARRY (POST MEDIEVAL to Victorian - 1486 AD? to 1899 AD?)
• PLASTER WORKS (POST MEDIEVAL to Victorian - 1486 AD? to 1899 AD?)
• GYPSUM MINE (MEDIEVAL to Victorian - 1400 AD? to 1869 AD?)
• PLASTER WORKS (Abandoned, Late 20th Century - 1968 AD to 1968 AD)
• TRACKWAY (POST MEDIEVAL to Victorian - 1486 AD to 1899 AD)

Full description

Area of gypsum mines, which had been mined and quarried in the area of heavy marls and clays between Tutbury and Uttoxeter since at least the 12th century. In its 'massive' form, alabaster, it was used extensively for ornamental and funerary sculpture. An alabaster frieze in the west door of St Mary's Priory church at Tutbury (1160-70) [PRN 08616] is the earliest known in Britain, whilst the effigy of Sir John de Hanbury (d 1303) in St Werburgh's church, Hanbury [PRN 08585], is the earliest known alabaster monument in the county. By the sixteenth century, alabaster was the standard material for funeral monuments. In the seventeenth century, however, changing fashion led to a preference for imported marble. Gypsum continued to the mined for medicinal purposes and this century it has enjoyed a revival for the making of plaster-board for interior partitions in the building trade.
Since 1937, with the prospect of war in Europe looming, the RAF had requisitioned disused underground sections of the gypsum mines of Peter Ford and Sons at Fauld as a storage dump for bombs and ammunition [PRN 50421]. Commercial working continued underground to the southwest of the RAF dump.
The plaster factory of Peter Ford and Sons [PRN 50420], which stood at the mine entrance, was almost totally destroyed by an accidental bomb blast on 27 November 1944 [see PRN 50422], killing 31 workers. (JM, 28/4/03) <1>

The site of Fauld Quarry, Alabaster and Gypsum Mines and Plaster and Cement Works, all of which are connected by a tramway to the North Staffordshire Railway. The plaster Mill was relocated to the west of original site and now lies in Fauld Quarry. Remains within the area include at least fourteen probable earthwork shafts of post-medieval date seen as a group of small (1-4 metre) round negative features, in a polyfocal pattern, evidence of subsidence caused by quarrying can also be seen in the area and evidence of gypsum quarrying surviving in the form of three large (15-50 metre) amorphous negative features, in a random pattern (see PRN 56244). There are also remains of an earthwork trackway of post-medieval date seen as abraded linear features each defined by a single ditch with a maximum length of 145 metres (PRNs 56241 and 56242).
Some of the disused galleries of this gypsum mine were used to store ammunitions which exploded in 1944 creating the Hanbury Crater (see PRN 50422). The area defined around the Hanbury bomb crater may contain some mining shafts but it is difficult to distinguish them from the small bomb craters.
Alabaster working in this area dates back to the 14th century, but modern mining commenced in 1870 by JC Staton and Company, and from 1890 supplied the plaster works in Tutbury. The plaster works was closed in 1968, but mining continues. During the Second World War 3,500 tons of high explosives being stored in the mine blew up killing 70 people and creating a huge crater (PRN 50422). The mine entrance to the west of the modern works is now disused and lies within a wooded area, although the tramway survives as an earthwork. The modern works consists of a compact complex of large metal sheds. (SB, 28-Nov-2013) <2>

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