The Sainte-Barbe Coal Mine is a former shaft of the

Ronchamp coal mines The Ronchamp Coal Mines were an area of coal mines located in the Vosges and Jura coal mining basins, in eastern France. They covered three municipalities; Ronchamp, Champagney and Magny-Danigon. Operated for more than two centuries, from th ...

located near the Champagney ballast pits (

Haute-Saône Haute-Saône (; Frainc-Comtou: ''Hâte-Saône''; English: Upper Saône) is a department in the Bourgogne-Franche-Comté region of northeastern France. Named after the river Saône, it had a population of 235,313 in 2019.

department), in eastern

France France, officially the French Republic, is a country located primarily in Western Europe. Overseas France, Its overseas regions and territories include French Guiana in South America, Saint Pierre and Miquelon in the Atlantic Ocean#North Atlan ...

. The shaft was excavated in 1854, and mined for

coal Coal is a combustible black or brownish-black sedimentary rock, formed as rock strata called coal seams. Coal is mostly carbon with variable amounts of other Chemical element, elements, chiefly hydrogen, sulfur, oxygen, and nitrogen. Coal i ...

from 1860 to 1872. It was used to ventilate the Sainte-Pauline shaft from 1869 to 1884, before being backfilled. Its longevity and productivity were less than those of the company's main extraction shafts. In the second half of the 20th century, the site was used as a

sand pit A sandpit (most Commonwealth countries) or sandbox (US and Canada) is a low, wide container or shallow depression filled with soft (beach) sand in which children can play. Sharp sand (as used in the building industry) is not suitable for su ...

. A short-lived

equestrian center An equestrian facility is created and maintained for the purpose of accommodating, training or competing equids, especially horses. Based on their use, they may be known as a barn, stables, or riding hall and may include commercial operations de ...

existed at the beginning of the 21st century. An explanatory panel installed in 2017 tells the story of the Sainte-Pauline and Sainte-Barbe shafts.

Excavation

Digging of the shaft began on June 1, 1854, 835 metres from the Saint-Charles shaft, with a section measuring 5.1 metres by 2.5 metres.François Mathet, ''Mémoire sur les mines de Ronchamp''. p. 582. By September 1856, it had reached a depth of 93.60 metres. The water was drained (20 m3 per hour) using a ten-horsepower

steam engine A steam engine is a heat engine that performs Work (physics), mechanical work using steam as its working fluid. The steam engine uses the force produced by steam pressure to push a piston back and forth inside a Cylinder (locomotive), cyl ...

consisting of a horizontal cylinder and gears. This engine was used to drive the pumps and raise the skips of excavated material, while a horse-drawn

engine An engine or motor is a machine designed to convert one or more forms of energy into mechanical energy. Available energy sources include potential energy (e.g. energy of the Earth's gravitational field as exploited in hydroelectric power ge ...

François Mathet, ''Mémoire sur les mines de Ronchamp''. p. 583. was used to lower the equipment and carry out various manoeuvres. A casing was installed in the rectangular section. At 25.70 metres, the shaft was circular in cross-section and 3.20 metres in diameter. In September 1856, a 12-horsepower direct-drive steam engine accompanied by pumps was ordered from Le Creusot for dewatering; this equipment was operational in June 1857 and sinking resumed. The dewatering machine operated at a rate of seven or eight strokes per minute, but was capable of twelve strokes per minute if necessary. The water was pumped up through sheet metal pipes 24 centimetres in diameter. In May 1858, the installation of the

dodecagon In geometry, a dodecagon, or 12-gon, is any twelve-sided polygon. Regular dodecagon A regular polygon, regular dodecagon is a figure with sides of the same length and internal angles of the same size. It has twelve lines of reflective symmetry ...

al casing, made up of sides 94 centimetres wide and a total height of 98.50 metres, was completed. However, the casing was fragile and eventually began to leak, so a small pump driven by a four-horsepower steam engine was installed 104 metres above the surface in June 1873. It collected between 100 and 120 m³ of water a day in a

cofferdam A cofferdam is an enclosure built within a body of water to allow the enclosed area to be pumped out or drained. This pumping creates a dry working environment so that the work can be carried out safely. Cofferdams are commonly used for constru ...

Exploitation

On June 1, 1860, at a depth of 249 meters, the Sainte-Barbe shaft encountered the first layer of

, 1.66

meters The metre (or meter in US spelling; symbol: m) is the base unit of length in the International System of Units (SI). Since 2019, the metre has been defined as the length of the path travelled by light in vacuum during a time interval of of ...

thick, which almost lay on the transitional ground. A connecting cave system was created with the Saint-Charles shaft for

ventilation Ventilation may refer to: * Ventilation (physiology), the movement of air between the environment and the lungs via inhalation and exhalation ** Mechanical ventilation, in medicine, using artificial methods to assist breathing *** Respirator, a ma ...

, and cross-connections were drilled with the Sainte-Pauline and Saint-Joseph shafts. Ventilation was provided by the fan installed in

Shaft No. 7 Shaft may refer to: Rotating machine elements * Shaft (mechanical engineering), a rotating machine element used to transmit power * Line shaft, a power transmission system * Drive shaft, a shaft for transferring torque * Axle, a shaft around whi ...

.François Mathet, ''Mémoire sur les mines de Ronchamp''. p. 588-589. The 60 hp motor driving the

winding engine A winding engine is a stationary engine used to control a wire rope, cable, for example to power a hoist (mining), mining hoist at a pit head. Electric hoist controllers have replaced proper winding engines in modern mining, but use electric motor ...

came from the cleat machine at Saint-Charles, and drove the coils via gears. In August 1861, a railway line known as the "new shafts" was built, linking the shaft to the colliery railway network. Coal production reached 26,292.5 tonnes in 1861 and 8,000 tonnes in 1863. In 1863, the shaft was deepened to create a cross-bank. Annual production was around 20,000 to 24,000 tonnes of coal. But the shaft encountered a deposit of poor quality, limited to the north and east by uplift, and to the west and south by the workings of the Saint-Charles and Saint-Joseph shafts. Finally, large reserves were discovered in the second layer, although the quality of the coal was mediocre. Mining ceased at the Sainte-Barbe shaft in September 1872.

Ventilation

In order to prevent overloading the ventilator at Shaft No. 7, a Lemielle ventilator was commissioned at the Sainte-Barbe shaft in June 1869. This ventilator provided a flow rate of 12 m³/s, which was sufficient for the works at Sainte-Pauline, which were not extensive and did not contain much gravel. The Sainte-Barbe shaft was used as an air outlet, and its opening was closed by mobile flaps that were raised by the extraction cages when they reached the surface revenue. After extraction ceased in 1872, the shaft remained open to ventilate the Sainte-Pauline works. The shaft closed in 1884 at the same time as its neighbor (Sainte-Pauline), and was backfilled with shale.

Vestiges

At the beginning of the 21st century, the well was located in a clearing near the Champagney ballastières, on the edge of the Bois des Époisses. An equestrian center opened there around 2010 before closing in October 2014.Aerial photography missions available on

Géoportail Géoportail is a comprehensive web mapping service of the French government that publishes maps and geophysical aerial photographs from more than 90 sources for France and its territories. The service, first developed by two public agencies (the ...

by year. The route of the old railway line is a path running through the Bois des Époisses. This path is part of the wood's

fitness trail A fitness trail, trim trail or parcourse consists of a wikt:path, path or wikt:course, course with outdoor exercise equipment or obstacles installed along its length for Exercise, exercising the human Human body, body to promote good health. ...

. A sign explaining the history of the Sainte-Pauline and Sainte-Barbe wells was installed at the start of the trail in the autumn of 2017.^(fr)
Un parcours de santé moderne et visiblearchive
on ''L'Est républicain'', November 28th, 2017. File:2018-05 - Puits Sainte-Barbe - 03.jpg, A sign for the shaft at the entrance to the fitness trail. File:2018-05 - Puits Sainte-Barbe - 04.jpg, Overview of the well site (similar to the 1884 photo). File:2018-05 - Puits Sainte-Barbe - 05.jpg, Location of the Sainte-Barbe coal mine. File:2013 - Puits Sainte-Barbe 01.JPG, The old railway line.

Terrils

A flat slag heap formed around the shaft. After the well was abandoned, the slag heap was gradually overgrown by woodland, before a

was built between the late 1960s and early 1990s, which radically altered and leveled the site. At the beginning of the 21st century, it was used for

pasture Pasture (from the Latin ''pastus'', past participle of ''pascere'', "to feed") is land used for grazing. Types of pasture Pasture lands in the narrow sense are enclosed tracts of farmland, grazed by domesticated livestock, such as horses, c ...

Excavation

Exploitation

Ventilation

Vestiges

Terrils

References

See also

External links

Bibliography