untitled
untitled
Wingate Quarry History
Wingate Quarry is located on a Magnesian Limestone escarpment that runs through eastern County Durham and from the early 1800s limestone was taken from here to the steelworks at Middlesbrough. But it was mainly quarried for local use as building stone or burnt in kilns to produce lime for fertilizer. Quarries were once scattered all over East Durham but most have now vanished, either worked out or abandoned and reclamed for agricultural use. Limestone was extracted here at Wingate from the mid 18th century until the 1930s.

Quicklime served many purposes: for use on agricultural land to break up clay soil and 'sweeten' the grass; as a mortar in building; as a flux in iron and steel-making; for lime-washing house walls to make them waterproof; and a decoration to brighten and disinfect the interiors; or, found in heaps at field-gates to prevent foot rot in livestock.
It was also used as a medicine, as a bleach in paper-making, and for removing the hair from hides in leather-making. The effect of lime in contact with moisture also made it useful to sprinkle on cess pits - its caustic action killed off germs and helped decompositipn.
In lead-mines lime was used to fill the 'jumper' drill holes, it was then wetted and allowed to expand and shatter the rock face.

Lime Kiln

Although the main period of activity for the field kilns was between 1750 and 1850, quicklime was in use on land as early as the sixteenth century... Two important developments in the agricultural revolution of the eighteenth century were better land drainage and the use of lime.' Lime for building is derived from chalk or limestone (carbonate of lime). The process is very simple. It consists in heating the stone in kilns constructed in the open air, in the vicinity of places providing the fuel and the raw limestone, for there is no point in transporting the untreated bulk material. The limekiln is about eighteen feet in height and is lined with bricks able to endure the fire. An opening at the bottom gives access. Either an arch of limestone is built over the fuel and then the kiln filled above this; or alternate layers of limestone and fuel are packed into the kiln. The fuel is them ignited, and the heat can be prolonged by shutting the top opening of the kiln 'chimney' with sods of grass. The heat decomposes the limestone into pure lime (quicklime) and carbonic gas. After the process is complete, the lime is broken up and removed from the kiln, and shipped to where it is needed. Many kilns in East Durham are found near the mouths of denes, as the limestone could be hacked from the dene sides and the manufactured quicklime easily transported by water to likely markets in cities along the North East coast. (It could also be spread on fields as a fertiliser.) To make mortar, the quicklime is first doused with water to become 'slaked lime', and then needs to be left to 'mature'. For use it would be further mixed with sand and water, to form a paste-like consistency. This has been the standard 'adhesive' for joining bricks or stones into walls for centuries, and the many lime kilns marked on old versions of the OS maps - and in some cases surviving as ruins in the denes - attests to the demand for building mortar in the 19th century especially.

As with all mining operations danger was never far away and on 4th August 1914 George Lofthouse performed a feat of heroism that won him the Empire Medal. For a full account click here

BACK TO HOME PAGE