Various coal mines at West Berrima (now Medway) have been in more or less continuous production since the 1860s.

This extensive historical period commenced in 1867 with the Cataract mine that was opened next to a waterfall on the banks of the Medway Rivulet, a tributary of the Wingecarribee River.

Coal was sold to the Fitz Roy Iron Works but the mine was small and basic and it closed in the late 1870s when the iron works shut down.

A new mine was opened in 1880 by the Berrima Coal-Mining and Railway Company formed by James John Atkinson. He was the son of James Atkinson who from 1822 held two grants of land - Oldbury and Mereworth - in the Sutton Forest area.

The company intended to mine coal about 500 metres west of the earlier Cataract mine. It was aware that the area had extensive seams of high-quality coal.

Mining conditions there were exceptionally good, with a minimum of roof support required to work safely as the limited sandstone cover (100-150 metres) caused little stress at the working face. Most coal mines in NSW are usually subject to faults, elevated stresses, gas, rolls and igneous intrusions. The only geological problems experienced at West Berrima were igneous intrusions in the form of dykes and volcanic plugs.

Atkinson built a private rail line from the mine head to a junction with the main southern line near Moss Vale and ballasted it with small coal.

In September 1882 a saddle tank shunting type locomotive (No 6114) arrived from the USA, having been built for the colliery by the Baldwin Company. It weighed about 16 tons, had a six foot wheelbase and a boiler pressure of 120 psi.

About 40 miners worked the pit and facilities were primitive. Daily output was estimated between 80 to 100 tons. Most of this was supplied to the NSW Railways for steam locomotive use. The company operated for eight years but, due to lower than expected income and the high cost of inefficient transport, it was liquidated in 1886. The mining equipment and the rail line fell into disrepair.

In 1923, W E Marsh opened the Loch Catherine Colliery, south of the earlier West Berrima colliery. A third mine known locally as the Flying Fox Mine was also established on the Medway Rivulet nearby where men and materials entered via a flying fox.

In 1924 the Medway Colliery and Railway Company was formed by Arnold Stanley (Stan) Taylor, who took over the Loch Catherine mine and opened a new site. Stan was descended from German immigrants and learnt about minerals from the Germans interned at Berrima Gaol during the First World War. He also established a blue metal quarry on nearby Mount Gingenbullen.

Stan relocated the old rail tracks to his new Berrima Colliery site and rebuilt the run-down rail spur to Berrima Junction near Moss Vale, mostly on the original 1881 railway right of way with its crushed coal formation (still visible today). It opened in February 1927.

The colliery was situated half way down a steep cliff on the bank of the Wingecarribee River. Within the mine, pit ponies hauled coal from the coal face up to a clipping flat half a mile from the mine entrance. The coal was then transported out on a rope skip-way and over the river by bridge, then up to the railhead on the river bank.

The pit ponies were 17-hand draught horses. Stabled at the surface, they went down into the darkness of the mine each day, where they learnt their way underground. These horses were a vital part of the process until finally retired in 1968.

Up to 150 men were employed at the mine until it became mechanised in 1968. Modern mining machinery, conveyor belts and electrically hauled cable shuttle cars replaced some 60 men, 36 horses, and more than 300 skips. Haulage of the coal by rail ceased some little time after the mine was mechanised. Road transport replaced rail and eventually the western half of the company rail line was removed.

Since 1929 Berrima Colliery has supplied up to 220,000 tonnes annually of high-ash coal to its single customer, the New Berrima cement works. In 1994 Centennial Coal leased the colliery from Boral (who had purchased it with the cement works in 1988) and continued supplying fuel coal to the cement works, as has DeltaSBD Limited, the Australian company that acquired the colliery lease in 2009.

For almost 150 years, coal mines at Medway have contributed significantly to the district's prosperity.

This article compiled by PHILIP MORTON is sourced from the archives of Berrima District Historical & Family History Society, Bowral Rd, Mittagong. Contribution of information and old photographs welcome. Phone 4872 2169.

Email bdhsarchives@gmail.com.

Web: berrimadistricthistoricalsociety.org.au