A brief history of Fitzwilliam
Fitzwilliam Main Colliery was sunk in1876, on part of the estate belonging to the Honourable Charles Fitzwilliam MP. The mine was owned by Richard Fosdick, a London coal merchant. By 1879 over 300 men and boys were employed by the colliery. Miners travelled from Kinsley, Hemsworth, Ackworth and Crofton to work at Fitzwilliam Colliery. To finance the colliery Mr. Fosdick had borrowed money from the Great Northern Railway Company and had difficulty in paying back the loan.
Following the major pit disaster in 1879 the colliery was taken over in 1880 by the Hemsworth Colliery Coal Company. The colliery was still in financial difficulties ten years on and the Great Northern Railway Company was demanding payment of the loans. In 1890 the colliery went into liquidation and was bought by the New Hemsworth Colliery Company( Mr Fosdick was a director of the company).
To house the colliery workers a long row of new cottages was built for the miners in Kinsley, originally called Fitzwilliam Terrace it is now known as Fitzwilliam Street. Information in the 1891 census shows that the Kinsley Hotel was in existence then as was Gorton Terrace, now Gorton Street.
Kinsley Colliery School was built in 1885 to accommodate some 200 children.
In May 1904 the Colliery had another name change when it became Fitzwilliam-Hemsworth Collieries Ltd. The GNR were still chasing their money and the miners wanted more pay, in fact the miners came out on strike and stayed out for 3 years (leading to the infamous Kinsley Evictions of 1905) and this meant the Colliery had to go up for sale yet again.
Major JR Shaw of Purston Hall, who owned Featherstone Main and South Kirkby Collieries bought the colliery in July 1906 but it wasn’t until October 1907 that negotiations were opened with officials from Barnsley to get the miners back to work. It was decided that one shaft of the colliery could be restarted if a settlement could be reached. Major Shaw promised to make extensive alterations and improvements which it was said would transform the pit into one of the best equipped in Yorkshire. A ballot vote was taken and the majority of miners were in favour of accepting Major Shaw’s terms and went back to work. The colliery retained the name of Hemsworth not Fitzwilliam.
Fitzwilliam, the village, did not exist at this time. There was only Lane Ends Hamlet on the road between Kinsley and Nostell consisting of the farms and Lane Ends House which is now The Catchpenny pub. It was Major Shaw who had the inspiration of a “Model Village” for his workers. This became the Red City housing estate and the village of Fitzwilliam was in the making. The City, including a cricket ground, bowling green and the Miners Institute, was built before 1919.
Margaret Hall
Fitzwilliam Archive Group
May 2005