Reports and Proceedings — S. Stafford and Warwick Institute. 383 



of the conglomerates 750 gallons per minute of water were tabbed 

 back. Passing through a thick bed of Red Marls, with haematite 

 nodules, the shaft was continued down through shales, sandstones, 

 ironstone bands, and clays to a depth of 813 feet, but no workable 

 seam of coal was found. Below this a bore-hole 1-J inches in diameter 

 was continued in Coal-measure shales and sandstones to a depth of 

 975 feet. A feeder of salt water was met with at 960 feet, and 

 a little lower a feeder of fresh water, together amounting to about 

 70 gallons per minute. 1 



Before abandoning the undertaking it was decided to search for coal 

 by driving headings in the Coal-measures. Accordingly, at some 

 distance above the bottom of the shaft, a heading was driven for 

 44 yards on the full dip of the measures, and from it headings were 

 driven for nearly 150 yards at right angles on the strike. All 

 operations were suspended on December 1, 1875, four years from 

 the commencement. 



It must have been in one of the exploring headings that the 

 Carboniferous Limestone was found, because its position on the spoil- 

 bank shows it to have been the last material deposited there before 

 the place was abandoned. 



After having lain undisturbed and exposed to the elements for 

 nearly forty years, it was discovered by Mr. George Wetherall, of 

 Rugeley, seven years ago, and he with the writer made a thorough 

 search, with the results now described. The limestone lying exposed 

 for so long a time has weathered away, and left the fossils very clearly 

 defined. In no instance is there any appearance of the limestone 

 being water-worn, and those pieces which were covered up have all 

 the appearance of having been blasted out of the mine. 



The section of strata passed through explains why the search for 

 •coal at this spot ended in failure ; indeed, it would be difficult to find 

 a better illustration than this affords of the immense amount of 

 denudation to which the Coal-measures were subject, either previous 

 to or at the time when the Bunter Conglomerates were laid down. 



The marls and clays of Cannock and Wimblebury, etc., indicate that 

 originally the Upper Coal-measures were present over some portion, at 

 any rate, of the coalfield. Not only, however, have nearly all traces 

 of these Upper Coal-measures been lost, but the productive Coal- 

 measures themselves have in places been almost entirely removed. 



It is quite certain that from whatever direction the great water- 

 borne mass of conglomerate came in Triassic times, the coalfield on 

 which it rested was of very irregular shape. The Fair Oak trial-pit 

 proves that at that spot all the Coal-measures to an horizon below 

 the Deep Coal Seam were denuded. 



The area of this denudation is not of large extent : its limit on the 

 south was proved by an exploring heading driven from a shaft sunk 

 by the South Staffordshire Waterworks Company, while on the north- 

 east the shallow coal-workings in Brereton Coppice Colliery have 

 proved the position for an extent of over 1,000 yards. 



The ' wash-out ', as it is locally called, probably owes its existence 



1 See Mining Journal, p. 192, 1876. 



