Charles Ketley — The " Red Rocks " near Birmingham, 195 



The position of the boring at the " Euck of Stones " was more 

 than a mile east of Bullock's Farm Pit, and the general rise of the 

 strata to the west being at an angle of about 10 degrees, it followed 

 that a good part, if not the whole of the 700 feet of Permian at 

 Bullock's Farm, must be below the 660 feet passed through at the 

 "Euck of Stones," from which Jukes concluded "there must be in 

 the neighbourhood of West Bromwich a total thickness of 1500 feet 

 at the very least, composed of rocks of the Permian formation." 

 (South Staffordshire Coal-field, page 12.) 



After pointing out that in the southern part of the Coal-field we 

 have nearly or quite a thousand feet of Coal-measures over the thick 

 Coal, without including any Permian, Jukes remai'ks upon the lesser 

 thicknesses of Coal-measures shown in the above sections : "We have 

 in these facts a clear case of unconformability between the Permian 

 beds and the Coal-measures. We see that after the Coal-measures 

 had been deposited they had suffered largely and very irregularly 

 from denudation, several thousand feet of strata having been removed 

 from one place, which were left untouched at another, before the 

 Permian beds had begun to be deposited upon them." . . . "It 

 is perhaps rash to generalize from the very scanty data we possess as 

 to the precise relations between the Permian and Coal-measures. 

 On so important a point, however, it is, I believe, a duty to state 

 every opinion that may be fairly arrived at. I will therefore state, as 

 my belief, that not only near West Bromwich, but generally in South 

 Staffordshire and the adjoining counties, the Coal-measures suffered 

 very generally from denudation before the deposition of the Permian, 

 and that the Eed Sandstones of that formation were largely deposited 

 in hollows and excavations worn in the Coal-measures by this 

 denudation; and, moreover, that this excavation and denudation had 

 in places proceeded to the length of being continued right through 

 the Coal-measures down to the rocks below." (South Staffordshire 

 Coal-field, page 136.) And he says further, "It is probable that a 

 little further east of the Heath Pits, the Coal-measures are entirely 

 wanting, and the ' red rocks ' of the Permian formation rest directly 

 on the shale or ' bavin ' of the Silurian formation. This, then, 

 would be one of those cases where the denudation of the Coal- 

 measures had proceeded the length of totally removing that entire 

 series of rocks previously to the deposition of the Permian beds." 

 (South Staffordshire Coal-field, p. 139.) 



The conclusions then of some of the highest geological authorities 

 were that a Silurian bank, running north and south from West 

 Bromwich, cut off the Coal, and that east of that bank a great 

 thickness of Permian rocks would be found to overlie denuded Coah 

 measures, or else to rest upon older rocks. This view of the case is 

 well shown in the following horizontal section taken from the Geo- 

 logical Survey, Sheet 25, No. 7 E. and W., "through Kingswinford, 

 Dudley, and West Bromwich." (See page 196.) 



Or, supposing there had been no denudation, and the rocks to lie 

 in their natural thicknesses, then any one sinkiug for Coal was warned 

 that he must calculate upon the possibility of having to go through 

 1500 feet of Permian and 1000 feet of Upper Coal-measures, before 



