Folklore: Treacle mines

Subject: RE: Folklore: Treacle mines
From: Steve Parkes
Date: 06 Mar 03 - 11:02 AM

There's a lot of treacle on the 'Net:

Subject: RE: Folklore: Treacle mines
From: Steve Parkes
Date: 06 Mar 03 - 11:13 AM

There's a lot of treacle on the 'Net: the Treacle Mine Hotel, Treacle Mine Rag, the Ditchford Treacle Mine -- and those are just the serious ones!

Mind you, it's made me think of something I'd forgotten from my childhood. Where I grew up in the 50s, there had been several 19th C ironworks: there was coal and ironstone inthe ground; and the whole place for (literally) miles around was covered in furnace slag. This was a greyish-white flint-like substance: very sharp-edged, and not much fun to play on. Some of it still had a lot of iron in it, and was a rusty brown in colour. In one place, in the "Badlands", as we called it, there was a Great Wonder of Nature: the Vimto Pool. (For any non-Brits: Vimto is the English equivalent of Coke or Pepsi.) The water had leached out so much iron oxide, it looked like Vimto, albeit pretty flat; it didn't taste much like it, though!

Steve (a Tizer lad)

Subject: RE: Folklore: Treacle mines
From: Mrs.Duck
Date: 06 Mar 03 - 12:18 PM

Schantieman the liquorice in Pontefract is grown not mined.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Treacle mines
From: Penny S.
Date: 06 Mar 03 - 05:53 PM

There are some songs on the freeserve treaclmine site, if you search it - there was apparently a terrible disaster down one of the mines - unfortunately, no tune is given.

Penny

Subject: RE: Folklore: Treacle mines
From: SussexCarole
Date: 26 Mar 03 - 04:06 PM

Admiral

Cookham Dean is apparently the Sompting Treacle Mine - the 'treacle' from that mine used to be used as pitch for boats. Any chance of the lyrics to that song please?

Carole

Subject: RE: Folklore: Treacle mines
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 26 Mar 03 - 06:35 PM

"Cod", is still readily used in the British Isles, along with "codding", meaning the same as "kidding".

Read here about the "Cod Fax" that caused a lot of people a lot of trouble a few years ago. I helped get a former Tory Cabinet Minister banged up in jail as a perjurer with sticky fingers, but not from treacle.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Treacle mines
From: Gareth
Date: 26 Mar 03 - 07:16 PM

Warning - Anorak Alert

Penny S - a belated reply to your post - and what was a nice girl like you doing in a model Railway Exhibition 30 years ago ?

The Cable drum circular model was, if I recall correctly, built by the Southend-on-Sea Model Railway Club. It incorperated the famous open cast Treacle mine with live action gloops.

How they did it I can not recall, but it was featured in "Model Railwayer" Magazine at the time.

Gareth

Subject: RE: Folklore: Treacle mines
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 26 Mar 03 - 07:50 PM

I missed a "t" out of that last post of mine - it should have read "It helped get a former Tory Cabinet Minister banged up in jail." I can't claim any personal credit.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Treacle mines
From: Seamus Kennedy
Date: 26 Mar 03 - 08:11 PM

I'm afraid treacle-mines did not originate in Ireland, as some 'Catters have speculated, but the Champ-mines of Co. Antrim are well-documented.
I just can't lay my hands on the documents at the moment.
Gareth, so sorry to hear about your people's hardships. You know, folks just don't think about the misfortunes of the treacle-miners until a disaster occurs or someone succumbs to black-sugar lung.

Seamus

Subject: RE: Folklore: Treacle mines
From: Tyke
Date: 26 Mar 03 - 08:32 PM

Goodness! I thought everyone knew about the Pudsey Treacle Mines!
Tha knows Pudsey were yon birds fly backads to keep t muck out or tha eyes!

Subject: RE: Folklore: Treacle mines
From: nickp
Date: 27 Mar 03 - 04:08 AM

Sompting, eh!? That explains the depression in my son's lawn there.... and I though it was the grandkids digging!!!!!!!!!!!

Fascinating thread!

Subject: RE: Folklore: Treacle mines
From: HuwG
Date: 27 Mar 03 - 08:50 AM

When taking my German O-level, a lot of years ago, I wished to describe the coal mines, or Kohlenbergwerke, of the Ruhr valley. Unfortunately, I mis-spelled them as Kohlebergwerke.

The external examiner commented that either my geography or his needed improving. He had never heard of cabbage mines in the Ruhr, or anywhere else.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Treacle mines
From: MMario
Date: 27 Mar 03 - 08:57 AM

obviously your examiner is less well read then he thinks. The Cabbage mines in the Ruhr are famous for the qaulity of their sauerkraut - having veins of both the more common white kraut and the ruby red sweet and sour variety.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Treacle mines
From: Steve Parkes
Date: 27 Mar 03 - 10:17 AM

Who says the Germans have no sense of humour? You only have to learn the language to realise!

Steve

Subject: RE: Folklore: Treacle mines
From: GUEST,Penny S. (elsewhere)
Date: 27 Mar 03 - 10:42 AM

It wasn't thirty years ago - Gravesend Model Railway Club held their exhibitions in our school for a couple of years about ten years back, usually near my father's birthday - so I popped in to pick up any Brighton railway books for him. This one wasn't opencast, though. And no gloop. And I thought it was original! A plagiaristic treacle mine.

It was one of my childhood regrets that my Granny had passed Dad's Hornby train and his Mamod steam engine on too someone, so I never got the chance of a good train set. A clockwork one which goes round in circles doesn't get the idea out of the system, though. My sisters' children's Brio sets were good for that, though. No drive for the engine means lots of track, and umpteen sets of points...

Oops, just remembered, I have to set up a number of marble runs for my literacy group tomorrow. Same old problem - not enough track...

Penny

Subject: RE: Folklore: Treacle mines
From: HuwG
Date: 27 Mar 03 - 01:31 PM

MMario - LOL !
Steve Parkes - Yes indeed ! Any German will tell you that apples don't grow on trees. You don't even need to mine for them. Horses and other animals will deposit them everywhere.


["Apfel" = apple, "Abfall" = droppings].

Subject: RE: Folklore: Treacle mines
From: GUEST,Banjoman
Date: 28 Mar 03 - 06:47 AM

The Treacle Mines are actually in Tadley Hants. where they still hold a regular Treacle Market.
Did you also know about the Kettle Factory in Liverpool where they knitted kettles from steel wool?
There was also the money tree which grew at the bottom of my mum's garden, but which alas died when she did. The world abounds with these relics of ancient times, including the Park Keeper who's main task was to wheel the sun into the Hot Houses every morning, or the man who wiped the sweat off the Bobby Horses at New Brighton Fair.
Keep 'em coming

Subject: Lyr Add: TREACLE MINING SONG (Dave Houlden)
From: trayton
Date: 28 Mar 03 - 09:02 AM

As mentioned by the Admiral this was not only performed by Dave Houlden by written by him as well, it's in his song book (perhaps I should not mention that)


TREACLE MINING SONG

The surveyors found the treacle mine in 1849
And off they went to Cookham recruiting for the mine
Underneath the mount far below Cookham Dean
The finest job creation scheme that Cookham's ever seen

CHORUS

Bang with the shovel lads make the picks to fly
Haul away the chalk we'll strike treacle by and by
In with the spigot forward with the can
Nobody gets the better of the treacle mining man

They flocked from farms and they left the boat yards
Some found the work was very very hard
Of course the main attraction was the Fowler company money
They soon found that treacle mining wasn't all honey

The collier thinks the treacle miner's life is soft
And so does the sailor as he's freezing up aloft
But picking treacle from our eyes and nose did near defeat us
And there's the treacle miner's scourge the dreaded diabetes

We had our mine disaster as it seems that all mines do
It wasn't an explosion, the fire damp or the dust
When the news was brought to Cookham you could hear the women scream
A swarm of wasps had built their nest in number two top seam

Now they've raised the target up to forty can a stint
The mine was near worked out all the miners skint
In nineteen nine they closed it down and ended all the larks
Now it's part of the history of South East Berks

Tune: I'm Marching Inland From the Shore

Subject: RE: Folklore: Treacle mines
From: The Admiral
Date: 28 Mar 03 - 09:10 AM

Thanks for that Trayton! Everytime I was near the PC I was nowhere near the book and vice versa!

Subject: ADD:Treacle Mining Song
From: MMario
Date: 28 Mar 03 - 09:12 AM

ADD: for above post - nice to see it's a tune we have already as well!

Subject: RE: Folklore: Treacle mines
From: GUEST,Gadaffi
Date: 14 Dec 04 - 04:07 AM

I am almost sorry to revive this thread so long after it was initiated. I initiated a thread in the Folklore Society quarterly newsletter FLS News about eleven years ago which drew quite a lot of response before petering out.
So far as the original question is concerned. The truth about the Frittenden Treacle Mine in Kent is down to the geological fact that the Beult Valley in which it is situated comprises a very sticky clay soil. The 'mine' itself is in Dig Dog Lane (check that out, I didn't make that one up!) about a mile south of the village and almost within sight of Sissinghurst Castle. It comprises a worked out brickfield site. Over the last fifteen years, there have been unsuccessful attempts to have houses built there - all refused by the local council. There are also legends about the Frittenden Band Chaps, and the 'dock' to be build where the Medway was to link up with the Royal Military Canal.
Chris Rose (the Molly of the Seven Champions) told me the story behind the Tovil Treacle Mines near Maidstone lay in that the local paper industry was under threat during the Second World War because they were unable to import timber. As a solution to this, somebody tried to ferment straw, it later being found a sticky goo resulted. Chris supported this to explain the street name Straw Hill Road.
I am still trying to corroborate stories of treacle mines at Trottiscliffe (another place where gravel excavation is taking place), Lamberhurst, Tudeley and Challock.
Any takers?

Subject: RE: Folklore: Treacle mines
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 14 Dec 04 - 07:11 AM

Cod: Straight - as in as cold as a dead codfish.

Theatre:
To play a (comic) role cod.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Treacle mines
From: KateG
Date: 14 Dec 04 - 10:38 AM

There is actually a real treacle disaster on record. On January 15, 1919 21 people were killed and over 150 injured when a large molassas storage tank in Boston, Mass (USA) ruptured. The resulting flood overwhelmed people who drowned in the sticky syrup. If you Google "Boston Molassas Flood" you will find lots of references to this genuine historic event.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Treacle mines
From: John C.
Date: 14 Dec 04 - 02:07 PM

I have it on good authority that the original treacle mines are at Dogsthorpe on the outskirts of Peterborough. They're a bit hard to find now as the area is a hideous mess of partially filled in brick pits, housing estates, bypasses, trunk roads etc., etc. - but, hey, that's progress!

Subject: RE: Folklore: Treacle mines
From: Fliss
Date: 14 Dec 04 - 02:22 PM

No body has mentioned the treacle mines at Wem in SHropshire.

Someone said it may have come from a brewery being opposite a butchers slaughterhouse and the residues running down the gutter mixed and formed treacle!

FLISS

Subject: RE: Folklore: Treacle mines
From: Dave Masterson
Date: 15 Dec 04 - 03:40 AM

If you look hard enough at the Kent & East Sussex Railway you will find the only remaining Frittenden Treacle Mines wagon left in existence!

Subject: RE: Folklore: Treacle mines
From: GUEST,c.g.
Date: 18 Nov 07 - 12:44 PM

The Treacle mine is at Dunchideock near Exeter, or at least it was in the 1960's

Subject: RE: Folklore: Treacle mines
From: GUEST,Marcus in New York
Date: 27 Nov 07 - 10:47 AM

Does anyone have any recollection of the lore surrounding the "Wareside Treacle Mines" in East Hertfordshire. And does anyone know where one can buy Fowlers West India Teacle (even at vast cost to import/smuggle past the FDA..)?

Best to all otherwise..

Marcus

Subject: RE: Folklore: Treacle mines
From: Georgiansilver
Date: 27 Nov 07 - 11:10 AM

I was aware as a child of the Northumbrian Treacle mines, where they mine rock treacle.....the female haggis gets a craving for this delicacy and flies many miles South of the Scottish border to partake of it.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Treacle mines
From: The Vulgar Boatman
Date: 02 Jan 08 - 06:49 PM

For a definitive answer, why not try [e-mail] - the front desk at British Geological Survey...
KYBTTS

Subject: RE: Folklore: Treacle mines
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 02 Jan 08 - 08:33 PM

"And does anyone know where one can buy Fowlers West India Treacle?"

A bit too late for that - Fowlers were absorbed into Tate and Lyle in 1976. But Lyle's Black Treacle is still produced. Here's an Amazon link for buying it, with a picture of the rather splendid tin it comes in.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Treacle mines
From: GUEST,Sparky
Date: 27 Jul 08 - 12:42 PM

I spent an evening with a very interesting old man in a pub just outside Maidstone, Kent...a few summers back. I had heard of the Tovil Treacle Mines...but had dismissed it as fable....but this old man put me right. I was still not sure....I was on a trip from the States and I realise it could have been a joke. I done more research and have found it to be completely true. Obviously there are a lot of hoax Treacle Mines...but The Tovil Treacle Mine was actually real. I found a video on YouTube. You just search for Unlucky Fried Kitten at Tovil Treacle Mine. It's wonderful...and very informing. It says how the Mines had to be closed during the Second World War cos the LuftWaffe (German Air Force)used the Treacle Fires as navigation as they flew over Kent. Also in the video you can see a row of cottages where the Treacle Mine Managers used to live...and each cottage has a treacle well in the back Garden.
At one stage in the video you see The Treacle Tower....which is basically a huge chimney from where they used to melt the treacle. The top of the tower was sealed off in the late 50's after 2 local lads fell to their death whilst looking for "treacle scrapings".
Maidstone had a huge Sweet Factory in town...by the river...called Trebor Sharps (which was bought out by Cadburys) and most of the Tovil Treacle was sent there to be made into sweets like The Tovil Tart and the Shooting Star ( a particular fave with the locals at the time)
Interestingly enough the area (Bockingford and Loose valley) had another delightful industry with the Ice-Cold Oggy Factory...just up the road. They made devastatingly refreshing Ice-Cold Oggies (soft-drinks) and , predictably, had a Treacle Flavoured one.
Their best-loved soft drink was the Barming Cherry Ice-Cold Oggy made from the cherries picked at Barming...on the other side of the River Medway in Maidstone.
I don't know if you can do a link on here...won't chance it...so...remember

YouTube....Unlucky Fried Kitten at Tovil Treacle Mines

You'll be pleasantly surprised

Subject: RE: Folklore: Treacle mines
From: GUEST,Adam Pallit
Date: 27 Jul 08 - 12:45 PM

There's also a group on Facebook called Tovil Treacle mine Appreciation Group...just fyi

Subject: RE: Folklore: Treacle mines
From: GUEST,Sparky
Date: 27 Jul 08 - 01:01 PM

There ya go...Tovil Treacle Mines
tovil treacle mines

Subject: RE: Folklore: Treacle mines
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 27 Jul 08 - 02:49 PM

Surely these are pale imitations of the Faversham treacle mines, the long guarded secret of which has only recently started to be revealed by Dead Horse Morris, who seem to be transforming from a secret society, to a society with secrets, to a society with rather fewer secrets than we might wish. There may be a sinister connection with German treacle groups too, as heavily disguised persons with blackened faces have been heard to speak that language at Dead Horse stands - ALL THE TIME DENYING THAT THE GERMANS HAVE A SENSE OF HUMOUR!

Subject: RE: Folklore: Treacle mines
From: GUEST,Sparky
Date: 27 Jul 08 - 10:03 PM

Although the Treacle Oggie was the most densely produced soft-drink at the Ice-Cold Oggie factory it was not considered to be the most delicious flavour. That mantle is bestowed upon the Barming Cherry flavour...made from cherries picked at arguably the UK's finest cherry-growing region of Barming, on the outskirts of Maidstone.
The factory founder-owner, Mr Harold "Slash" Wildly would make a twice-weekly trip to Barming on the trolley-bus which ended at the Barming Terminus and he would meet the local cherry-farmers in the Cherry Tree public house across the road....where they would thrash out their best prices for the world-famous Barming Cherries.
Back at Bockingford the valley was a favourite location of landscape artists....often seen capturing the idyllic rural scene of the streams and the mills...munching on a Shooting Star or a Treacle Tartello and guzzling on a Blackberry and Damson Ice-Cold Oggie.
An original Barming Cherry Ice-Cold Oggie sold on e-bay recently for £16,500...to a Japanese soft-drinks bottle collector

Subject: RE: Folklore: Treacle mines
From: GUEST,Sparky
Date: 27 Jul 08 - 10:09 PM

To Richard Bridge
There were indeed treacle mines at Faversham...but they were not on the scale of the Tovil Treacle Mines. In fact....I'd go as far as saying that they very rarely even hit treacle. I'd ask this Dead Horse Morris lot if they're not confusing this with the Faversham Licorice Farm. Jeez...some people.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Treacle mines
From: GUEST
Date: 27 Jul 08 - 11:12 PM

Somebody early on in this thread mentioned Sabden Treacle Mines (Lancashire). Derek Stanton wrote an epic in Lancashire dialect "The Sabden Treacle Mine Raid" or "The Battle of Sabden Treacle Mine". There's a link to a recording at http://lankylad.com/Derek%20Stanton.htm . I can't get it to work for me. It's a .wma file and iTunes doesn't appear to recognise it (or at least I can't find it in the iTunes library).

Ross

Subject: RE: Folklore: Treacle mines
From: GUEST,lorna
Date: 17 Sep 08 - 05:02 PM

in reply to a post from gadaffi 14 dec 04
my dad & his family grew up in frittenden, the treacle mines were actually down sand lane, there used to be an old tall iron windmill there, that was were the treacle mines are, also my uncle has a photo of the frittenden band chaps from 1860, he and my dad know the stories about them dancing around a haystack and 1 of them getting lost in london.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Treacle mines
From: Penny S.
Date: 17 Sep 08 - 05:18 PM

What a surprise seeing this up here again today. I was thinking about the Sussex mines earlier while reading a book about lost Sussex railways.

I feel it need to be said that if anyone does seek out and buy Black Treacle, they need to be aware that Tate and Lyle advise that if you have had an opened can for more tha a year unused, it should be disposed of without any attempt to open it for H&S reasons. It produces gas which cannot escape from the can which is sealed by dried treacle. If you prize off the lid, you risk it shooting up into the air, or your face, where it can do serious damage.

I managed all right outside on the lawn with a cloth over the can and a screwdriver - but it did want to escape forcefully.

This is not a joke.

Penny

Subject: RE: Folklore: Treacle mines
From: Penny S.
Date: 18 Sep 08 - 11:13 AM

I see that in skipping down to the end last night I missed that I had issued the lid removal warning already - still, I suppose if anyone else does the same, they won't miss it.

Penny

Subject: RE: Folklore: Treacle mines
From: romany man
Date: 18 Sep 08 - 12:19 PM

RB, oh god the secret of the faversham treacle mines has broken cover, Dead horse have the history of the mines, i have explored some of the shafts, oh the place is infested with ferrets and torn yorkers, there can be found several remains of the miners boots, (all thats left after the rampant ferrets got to them) i warn other beware the faversham treacle mines, those that were at the hop festival will have seen two of the ferrets freely roaming the campsite in the locality of dead horse ,bishops gundulf, and gongscourer morris, one of the beasts firmly ataching itself romantically to one particular female, it was not a pretty sight.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Treacle mines
From: Charmion
Date: 18 Sep 08 - 04:02 PM

It takes me anywhere up to four years to go through an entire tin of Tate & Lyle black treacle, and I have yet to experience a black treacle lid removal incident such as Penny describes above. I can hardly wait -- such an event would certainly put a bang into my annual fruitcake production!

Subject: RE: Folklore: Treacle mines
From: open mike
Date: 19 Sep 08 - 02:06 AM

once upon a time, a group of us started a food co-op.
we ordered in our first shipment of food, a 5 gallon tin of
molasses. it got fermented somehow, and the tim overflowed.
the church basement where we were storing our food had a
surplus of molasses that day!

thankfully there were no ants....or were there??

Subject: RE: Folklore: Treacle mines
From: GUEST,Gadaffi
Date: 19 Sep 08 - 04:56 AM

Faversham treacle mines?? Sounds like fake-lore rather than folklore to me, especially when perpetrated by a morris team! At least the 7Champs' stories were based on pre-acknowledged tradition at Frittenden.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Treacle mines
From: Penny S.
Date: 19 Sep 08 - 04:51 PM

I suspect the lid problem occurs with people who only use the stuff in Christmas cake.

Penny

Subject: RE: Folklore: Treacle mines
From: romany man
Date: 20 Sep 08 - 11:27 AM

Faversham treacle mines are a well known a constant source of fear to the locals gadaffi if you lived near faversham you would know not to take the stories lightly

Subject: RE: Folklore: Treacle mines
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 14 Oct 08 - 09:00 AM

The Welsh brewers, S A Brains, have a Treacle Mine pub in nearby Hereford.

Nigel

Subject: RE: Folklore: Treacle mines
From: GUEST,Chislehurst ,Caveman Pete
Date: 28 Nov 08 - 06:39 PM

Now rumour has it that the Faverham Treacle mines are supposed to link up with the Chislehurst Chalk mines and the Hever Castle Hash mines.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Treacle mines
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 28 Nov 08 - 07:16 PM

C Terry