Digging deep into Winton's past.
Local Geology
If you are interested in the local geology, just click on the headings below.
Coal
Coal seams are scattered beneath the ground like ham in
a multiple sandwich, varying from a few centimetres deep
to almost two meters thick. The miners channelled for coal
between 30m and 300m below ground. The shallowest
was often dug by the monks in the 15th century. The
names of the coal seams are: Ball, Smithy, Five Foot,
Beggar, Upper Diamond, Lower iamond, Andrews and
Little Haughielin.
Limestone
Local geology is officially the Limestone coal measure
group of the Lower Carboniferous (Dinantian) geological
series. Limestone is rich in calcium and was extensively
kilned for spreading as fertiliser on farmland, as well as for
building purposes. There were quarries at Spilmersford
and Jerusalem, each subsequently having been filled in.
Sandstone
The Dean Bridge Quarry and another at Wintonhill
produced some very attractive brown and white sandstone,
some of which can be seen in the old walls around
Pencaitland including the War Memorial at the east end
of the village.
Mudstone & Fireclay
The trees and vegetation which formed the coal seams
developed in a wet, muddy, clay-type soil in what was then
a tropical climate. This became solidified into a soft rich
mudstone, useful for lining water structures. Finer clay
was used in furnaces and kilns as a refractory lining or as
the base material for brick making.
Ironstone
If a lump of dark grey mudstone seems extraordinarily hard
and heavy, it is likely to be full of iron oxide. Often in large
round nodules, this ironstone was sometimes mined along
with the coal which was then used to heat it in a furnace to
produce raw iron. There is a “black band” or ironstone
named after Penston above New Winton; this marks the
eastern extremity of the Lothians coalfield.
Volcanic Rock
There is volcanic rock beneath Pencaitland, but it is necessary
to dig more than the length of a football pitch to find it.
There are 16 layers of lava evident from the Spilmersford
borehole.
Sand & Gravel
As one would expect in a river valley, there was large
scale deposition of alluvial sand and gravel as well as the
washing away of any glacial till below the flood plain. The
gravel would have been eroded from older rock, probably
far upstream.
Water
Water is a key constituent beneath the ground. Spring
water was a source of drinking water collected in wells in
the past and was referred to as being “held in high estimation by the common people for scorbutic disorders”. An
artesian aquifer had a recorded pressure of 560 gallons
per hour in 1967, although the best liquid to come from the
area, and also offered for curing disorders is likely to have
its origins linked to the amber nectar from Glenkinchie.
Fossils
Often plant fossils can be seen in the rock with imprints of
roots and tree trunk bark. Other fossils refer to sea covering
at what is known as the Saltoun Marine band and display
bivalves (the earliest and most primitive marine life
forms), ostracods, crinoid & collumnals. They date from
350 million years old – long before the dinosaurs!
