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Essex Rock & Mineral Society
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Some Recent “Boring Finds” From Stutton, Suffolk

Background: A few months ago I paid a routine visit to Stutton, Suffolk to examine the fossiliferous Brickearth which is about 210,000 years old ( Oxygen Isotope Age Stage 7). This deposit is beautifully exposed in the low cliff on the north bank of the River Stour. The river here forms the county boundary between Essex and Suffolk. To reach the river it is necessary to walk a mile or two, down a private road, trackway and footpath. This trackway, near Crepping Hall, has recently been re- metalled with hardcore from a recently demolished barn. Amongst the hard core rubble I noticed numerous pieces of broken 4” diameter greyish stone which I immediately thought were either smashed pieces of medieval Purbeck Marble turned columns, or fragments of the Stutton borehole.

Quick close examination of the slatey rock fragments suggested the source to be the Stutton Borehole. These “boring finds” have a most fascinating story to tell about the deep seated geology of the south-east of England and the search for coal in late Victorian England.

The Search for Coal: As early as the 1820s the geological connection between the coalfields of southern Somerset with the coalfields of northern France and Belgium was recognized. Mr. Godwin-Austen argued in 1855 that coal would “some day be reached, along the line of the valley of the Thames” beneath a variable thickness of Secondary and Tertiary Rocks. Impetus to further exploration came in 1889 when coal was found in a trial borehole at Dover. Collieries were later established in Kent. The search for coal reached south Suffolk and north Essex in the 1890s. The Eastern Counties’ Coal Boring and Development Syndicate Limited published, in 1893, a prospectus and a series of short reports inviting subscribers to apply for £1 shares. By 25th February 1893 £2,101 had been raised.

T.V. Holmes (1840-1923), J.E. Taylor (1837-1895) and William Whitaker (1836-1925) were advisors to the company. Their published reports still make fascinating reading. They comprehensively outlined the available evidence and suggested putting a trial boring down “three or four miles north east of Colchester”. In reply the Rev. Dr. A. Irving penned a substantial 12 page report on “The Question of workable Coal Measures beneath Essex” which appeared in the Essex Naturalist . He wrote the following about coal bearing deposits “ Of their occurrence in north Essex I see no probability” (Irving 1894 p. 140). In reply the editor of the Essex Naturalist reprinted Holmes’s and Whitaker’s reports to the Syndicate entitled “Coal under south-eastern England” (Whitaker and Holmes 1894 pp. 142-150). W. Jerome Harrison now entered the debate and published a pamphlet about the existence of a coal-field beneath Essex. He suggested that a trial boring was put down near Quendon ( Harrison 1894 p. 28).

In events a trial boring was sunk at Stutton, Suffolk close to the north bank of the River Stour in 1894-5, to a depth of 1,524 feet (Whitaker & Holmes 1896 pp. 213-218). This passed through more than 530 feet of Silurian rocks, which would, incidently, underlie any Carboniferous Coal Measure deposits. The rocks were found to be dipping almost vertically and were also highly cleaved. The only Palaeozoic fossil found was a rather doubtful Orthoceras (Watts 1897 p. 6.). Mr William J. Graham of Crepping Hall, presented core samples to the Essex Field Club. Some of the rest of the core must have been dumped on site. It is broken pieces of this 4” diameter bore that may now be seen in the metaling of the trackway near Crepping Hall.

Undeterred the Syndicate sank a further trial bore hole near Weeley railway station in 1896. This was drilled to a depth of 1,221 feet. Again no coal measures were reached, but it only penetrated 125 feet into Silurian or Cambrian rocks which again would have underlain and Carboniferous age deposits (Holmes & Whitaker 1897 pp. 9-10). Samples of this core are also in the Essex Field Club’s collection by courtesy of Mr. G.F. Mansell, the secretary of the Eastern Counties Coal Boring Association.

Great Wakering was selected as the site for a third trial boring, but the Eastern Counties’ Coal Boring Association went into voluntary liquidation in 1898 after having expended £1,645 on the Stutton boring and £1,132 on that at Weeley (Cole, W. 1899 pp. 136-139 & 296).

The search for coal in Essex and Suffolk was accordingly unsuccessful and further work was reluctantly abandoned. Although the whole enterprise was a dismal failure, geologically the results obtained were of great interest. Even today, more than a century later, we still only have a handful of deep borings in Essex and its borders, which have penetrated through Mesozoic rocks into the underlying Palaeozoic strata.

For those who would like greater information of the borings a log of the Stutton borehole may be found in Whitaker’s book The Water Supply of Suffolk (Whitaker 1906 pp 140-142). The Weeley log is written up in his Water Supply of Essex (Whitaker 1916 pp. 343-344.

Conclusion: Pieces of Silurian rock may still be found scattered in the metalling of the track way near Crepping Hall. This must be a rare example of hard core being actually formed of core. These are pieces of rock from a borehole sunk nearby in 1894-1895. The rock fragments are a distant tangible link with a long forgotten futile attempt to find local workable coal deposits. Even today, 110 years later, the Stutton borehole is still one of the deepest boreholes to be sunk in southern England and one of the very few to penetrate into Silurian rocks.

Bibliography:

Cole, W. 1899. Boring for Coal in Essex. Essex Naturalist Vol. 10 pp. 136-139 & 296.

Harrison, W. Jerome. 1894. On the Search for Coal in the South-East of England; with special reference to the probability of the existence of a coal-field beneath Essex. Pp.28. Birmingham: Hudson & Son.

Holmes, T. V. & Whitaker, W. 1894. Coal under South-Eastern England. Essex Naturalist Vol. 8. pp. 142-150.

Irving, A. 1894. The Question of Workable Coal Measures beneath Essex. Essex Naturalist Vol. 8. Pp. 130-142.

Watts, W.W. 1897. Annual Report of the Geological Survey and Museum for 1896. 107pp. p.6.

Whitaker, W. & Holmes, T.V. 1896. Coal Under South-Eastern England. Borings in search of coal in Suffolk and Essex. Essex Naturalist Vol. 9 pp. 213-218.

Whitaker, W. & Holmes, T.V. 1897. Boring in search of Coal in Essex. Essex Naturalist Vol. 10 pp. 9-10.

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