Coal
People have made use of South Wales’ geological riches for
centuries.
From Roman times onward, the region’s rocks were mined for
ironstone. By the Industrial Revolution, coal became the key
resource — powering steam engines, ironworks, and homes, and exported worldwide from Cardiff and Barry.
The lucrative coal deposits in the South Wales Valleys drove investors to search new workings to extract the ‘black gold’.
Collieries traded from 1849 on this site, with names of Van Colliery and Ironworks, the Glamorgan Iron and Coal Company, the Llantwit and Black Vein Coal Company, Wernddu Colliery and The Caerphilly Colliery.
Over the years a total of 11 seams were worked at this site driving the miners deeper and wider, but poor access, bad design and mineral quality led to successive closures over the years. Coal mining finally ceased on 1922.
Clay
By 1900, clay extraction had begun. Clay was worked until the 1960s and used to make Caerphilly Bricks.
Located at or close to the surface allowed easy extraction of the clay, the workers following the deposits and leaving the outcrops of rock in place seen as undulations today.
From the working face the clay was loaded into trucks to be moved by a cable-operated tram road down the site. The main path into Coed y Werin is called ‘The Dram Road’ in recognition of its historical use.
The trucks passed firstly under the brick bridge, before being re-routed to serve the larger southern workings. Follow the later route past The Long Pond where wooden sleepers can still be seen in the track bed.
Brick
Cutting the cost of transport through manufacturing bricks near the clay mine was common. The Caerphilly Brickworks and later The Wernddu Brick and Coal Company manufactured bricks from the clay won on site, marking the frog of the brick with their trading name. Driven by local coal the pug mill would have stamped each brick with a brass plate that held the reverse of the image found on the bricks. Brick making ceased in 1951. Only the brick chimney stack now stands.
The site once resembled a moonscape due to the excavation of clay where very little grew except for some older deciduous trees, shrubs and ferns. Today, only fifty years later, the area is now a mixed woodland consisting of conifer and deciduous trees, open glades and boggy areas.
