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King Jamie's Silver Mines (adit [1]) [Hilderston]

Bathgate Hills, Cairnpapple, Wester Tartravan, West Lothian.

An opencast limestone quarry and a lead and silver mine, with one open adit and the surface remains of workers houses, spoil heaps and lime kilns between the farms at Wester Tartravan and Knock. About 120 m downhill from field gate beside the road passing the Cairnpapple Chambered Cairn. A single car can park in the field gate entrance but care should be taken not to obstruct the narrow road or to block the gate when access to the field might be needed. It is safer to park at the layby entrance to the Cairnpapple ancient monument but this gives a longer walk in and out to the mine.

Silver was discovered on lands at Hilderston in June 1606. The find was attributed to a collier called Sandy Maund (recorded by another prospector, Stephen Atkinson in his Historie of the Gold Mines in Scotland wrtten 1616). At the time the ground and mineral rights were held separately andland owners did not like miners on their property. James Ross, the owner of Tartravan was particularly unenthusiastic. The mine-owner was the King's Advocate, Sir Thomas Hamilton of Binny and Monkland [aka Tam O the Cowgate, later Lord President of the Court of Session, Earl of Melrose and Earl of Haddington], who managed the initial mining works for a while. He took a lease on the mineral rights of Tartravan (and several other properties in the area) from the Crown in March 1607.

Initial results for silver production were promising with Cornish and other English miners employed and by May 1608, Hilderston was taken over by the Crown and put under the management of Sir Bevis Bulmer. Thomas Hamilton was paid £5000 for his rights. . At that point 26 pick-men were at work, seven working the day shift and seven at night on a single shaft. The remaining 12 men were employed opening new shafts. 33 oncostmen were employed on the surface, hauling ore and water. In 1608, the King imported seven expert miners from Saxony who worked under the supervision of Henry Starchy (or Starkie). 35 Englishmen arrived at the mine in September 1608 but there was no accomodation for them and they had to lodge in Linlithgow with a long walk up to the mine in the early hours of the morning and back down at night.

The open mine adit is not necessarily associated with the 17th century silver mine which might be limited to the infilled bell pits west of the road. THe mine was let to a partnership between Sir William Alexander of Menstrie, Thomas Foulis (an Edinburgh goldsmith) and a Portugese mine, Paolo Pinto in March 1613 but they made little profit. The first phase of mining with seven open shafts stopped c. 1614. Excavation restarted in 1766 when the mineral rights were acquired by the Earl of Hopetoun. The miners found the Silver vein had been exhausted but continued mining Lead until 1772.

In 1870, Henry Aitken of Falkirk reopened the mine obtaining leases from the Earl of Hopetoun and Andrew Gillon of Wallhouse. No silver was found but some niccolite (red-mettle) was excavated from the old workings. Niccolite is poisonous and some chickens apparently died after scratching at the mine entrances. In 1873, a shaft was sunk to a depth of 220 ft but found noeither silver or nickel. In 1896, the Blessings shaft was cleared out and the ancient workings exposed. In 1925, Henry M. Cadell in his book The Rocks of Midlothian records a visit to the mine in 1898 just before the mine was closed.

'During this last exploration, Mr Aitken invited me to go down with him to look at the vein. The vein was in a fissure alongside of or near a small basalt dyke, apparently a branch eastwards from the well-known dyke of the Knock ... The reef was at places 6 ft wide and the gangue was heavy spar or barytes. It did not retain this thickness very far from the shaft and pinched out until the walls were less than 1 ft apart. I [Henry Caddell] got stuck hard and had to be pulled out by Mr Aitken. The walls are all minutely grooved, showing that hammers and picks had been skillfully used.'

The locations of the seven earliest shafts (God's Blessing (called either 'Blissing' or 'Grace and Benison'), Germans's West Shaft, Germans' East Shaft, Harlie's Shaft, Serve Them All, Long Shaft and Black Shaft) have been found and have been infilled for a long time (since the 19th century) but with the exception of God's Blessing (the first shaft), it is not clear which shaft is which as later plans use different names (White hole, Ginn sink, Lounny's hole, Blessing, Malcom's Shaft, West Shaft and Old Shaft). The accessible section of the mine (probably the 1766 Lead Mine) is reached via a possible drainage adit near the waterline of the small flooded opencast limestone quarry.

In dry periods, the partially blocked entrance by the pond can be entered from the west bank of the pond near the south end (a second adit was recorded in the west bank by the BGS but this may be lost or hidden by vegetation). When wet, the water in the quarry can flood this entrance. From earlier plans of the workings it has been suggested that the adit once ran to an entrance east of the quarry pond. If so this adit has been quarried away. A possible third entrance at the north end of the quarry pond also appear to be completely infilled.

The current entrance is a masonry arch supporting friable bedrock. The stub of a pit prop is visible at ground level [13/9/2025]. Mortar on the arch above the entrance was probably exposed when the facing stones (or the continuation of the adit) collapsed. A short initial crawl trending left immediately enters stooping height passage with ponding on the floor. 5 m in the floor rises briefly to where the remains of a bird's nest (possibly swans' as pair frequent the quarry) is perched on a ledge, then at 10 m drops back into the first 'canal', waist deep water where the roof is supported by some timber propping (unstable) [A second prop is lying in the deeper water beyond. Care needed to avoid disturbing the remainig prop]. The roof height of the canal varies from the crawls over rubble at either end to about 3 m at its highest. The deeper water at the entrance canal continues about 15-20 m curving gently to the left (southwes?) before the floor rises (on the rubble of a roof collapse?) to a T-junction forming a small chamber (roughly oval 2m x 5m, 3-4m high from floor of canal to roof but part filled by a mound of rubble).

The open passage to the left (southeast?) of the T-junction climbs over rubble which may be may be collapse or deliberate infill to a low triangular crawl in the upper part of the original passage (the deliberately cut adit may originally have been 1-5-2m lower but the shaly beds above have either been cut back or fallen to expose another 1m, almost all now filled with mud and loose rock). The passage may have been deliberately infilled either to form a dam or just as a convenient place to dump rock rather than removing it from the mine. The rubble infill in the upper part of this passage (in the narrowing triangular upper section of self-supporting but friable rock) was dug 13/9/2025. Small sections of rotted timber were found which suggest the roof originally may have been propped. At about 6 m from the T-junction the rubble fill drops to about the level of the original adit roof (in more solid rock). This passage is also blocked with mud and rock but a small void is visible (with a layer of silt covering loose rock) and it may continue towards the blocked adit at the feeder burn. This would require more digging to gain access with no indication of how far the blockage continues).

The passage to the right (westnorthwest?) of the T-junction drops into another flooded section and gets gradually lower until there is too little air space to proceed and in wet weather this is completely flooded. Niches in the walls of this passage may have originally been used to hold candles or oil lamps. This passage was investigated in 1964 and 1968 by GSG members using breathing tubes in the limited air space [details will be added soon] and the flooded passage continues reaching a junction a further 30 m or so to the northwest. A small chamber just short of this junction may have a side passage but is completely blocked by rubble. Joseph Udney's plan of 1772 suggests the junction is the site of the 13 fathom shaft from the surface (approximately located by the spoil heap in the field above). This passage will need to be more accurately surveyed to prove if this is the case. Udny's plan also shows the Croft Shaft on or near the line of the 18th century level just north of the 13 fathom shaft but does not indicate if the shaft connects to the levels.

The left hand passage from the flooded junction runs approximately northeast for approximately 50 m before it is blocked by rubble. This passage may once have continued perhaps another 100 m along what Udny called either the Croft Vein or Cross Vein to where an adit is shown on his plan at the north end of the quarry pond. No trace of this adit has as yet been found.

The right hand passage from the flooded junction heads west-northwest in what has been described as 18th century levels. About 5 m in, the air space is very limited (50-75 mm in dry conditions) and forms a 2 m long sump in moderately wet weather (in very wet weather the passage may be completely flooded). This was the limit of the GSG's exploration in 1965. Beyond this is a further 10 m of restricted air space (125-150 mm in dry weather) before the roof height rises again. The 1.2 m deep water continues for about another 50-60 m with the passage varying in width from 1 m down to about 300 mm in places. The flooded passage gradually rises and an area of deep silt eventually gives way to a shingleslope ending about 100 m from the junction at a boulder choke. [If the dimensions given are correct, the boulder choke could possibly be close to the road past Cairnpapple and the 16 fathom shaft supposedly located in the trees west of the road]

At low level near the T-junction (close to the entrance), a short slide down loose rubble enters a partially flooded stooping height side passage heading 20 m left (west?). This passage snakes along presumably following the mineral vein bending four or five time before reaching a slight widening at a 90 degree turn to the left. This leftward passage almost immediately dead ends 4 m on at a solid rock wall. In dryish weather there is sufficient air space to reach the solid rock at the end.

The footings of stone built buildings (a lang raw or row of workers' houses) can be seen in the field next to the fence along the access to the quarry and the footings of Baird's House are closer to the Cairnpapple road. No evidence was found (13/9/25) of either Lounny's Hole or the old 'west mouth' of the 18th century levels and nothing remains of the supposed enclosure and barn north of the workers' housing. On the hillsde above the site of the bell pits the remains of Windy Wa (Windy Walls) or Silvermine farm can still be picked out but there is no visible sign of the smelter house or furnace which were located further north.

The remains of a small masonry arch in a spoil heap south of the quarry seem to be the blocked outlet of a lime kiln.

The remains of another more substantial lime kiln are located on the east side of the pond. There is a buildup of talus at the foot of the kiln. but an opening at the base of the exposed masonry leads to a void within the lime kiln outfall. Approximately 0.5 m of rubble may be sitting on the floor of the outfal l reducing it to a low crawl with the inner arch to the firing chamber completely blocked.

South of the larger kiln, risings in a small gulley were possibly the now blocked outfalls from the quarry pond but in 1772, Joseph Udney suggested this was the original mouth of the drainage level. The larger of the two risings seemes to be within to parallel walls infilled with loose stones with a light covering of turf. This is aligned with the open entrane to the mine on the west side of the quarry pond and a rough inlet (with no visible entance) on the east bank of the pond.

Up the hill to the southeast of the quarry is another masonry arch with what appears to be a tunnel leading into the hill. This is another lime kiln and only goes about 2m into the outfall chamber of the kiln before it is blocked with rubble.

Alternate Names: Hilderston Silver Mine, Wester Tartravan Lead Mine, Sir William Home Lyme Works, South Mine Lime Works

Notes: The farm at Wester Tartravan was previously called Silvermine although this seems to have taken its name from the older farm to the SW at Windy Wa. Atkinson said Sandy Maund had described the location as 'at the Silver bourne [silver burn], under the hill called Kerne-Popple' so it may be that some small quantities of silver had been found earlier.

Original coordinates [NS 89700 70500] innacurate (approx. 10 km W of actual position). Corrected coordinates for adit off lead/zinc quarry adjacent to 16th century silver mine [NS 98040 71530]. Presumed original site of SIlver mine (infilled pot shafts) in valley to the west of road [NS 98955 71540].

The site was surveyed by Joseph Udney 14 July 1772.

In 1898, Henry Caddell was unterested in the use of blastng with limeshell. Holes were drilled and filled with lime to split the rock.

Hydrographic Feeds: Surface water seepage and possible seepage from burn south of Radio Station.

Hydrographic Resurgences: Quarry Pond