Harston, Leicestershire

The Church

The church is dedicated to St Michael.The oldest part appears to be the tower which probably dates from the first half of the 14th Century.The chancel dates from 1871 and the nave from 1888.

Iron Ore Quarrying

Iron ore was quarried extensively to the north, east and south of the village from 1889 to 1972. It was the last place in Leicestershire where iron ore was quarried. The Stanton Ironworks Company had started quarrying at Woolsthorpe-by-Belvoir just over the border in Lincolnshire to the north of Harston in 1883 and that company opened its first quarry in Harston, north of the Denton Road, to the east of the village in 1889. The ore was taken by a short narrow gauge tramway to a standard gauge mineral branch of the Great Northern Railway just over the Lincolnshire border in the parish of Denton. The GNR then took it to the Stanton Company's ironworks in Derbyshire. They opened another quarry to the south of the road in 1888 and the tramway was extended to serve it. From 1901 the company was quarrying to the north of the village on either side of the Woolsthorpe Road. At first the ore from here was taken by another tramway leading to the GNR branch further down the line near the Grantham Canal. This tramway passed the original Woolsthorpe quarries and the last part of it was a rope worked incline. However later on when quarrying west of Woolsthorpe Road was finished the quarries east of the road used an extension of the other tramway. The Harston quarries north of the Denton Road were worked out by 1923 but the quarries had already been extended into the parish of Denton. South of the Denton Road the active quarries were all in Denton, just to the east of Sewstern Lane between 1918 and 1930.

However new quarries were opened to the south of the village in that year which were later extended into Knipton.The tramway was extended to serve these. In 1947/8 it was converted to standard gauge. Quarrying ceased at Harston in 1972 but the tramway was still used by trains to and from the quarries at Denton which continued for another two years. Until 1948 the ore was tipped from the narrow gauge wagons into standard gauge ones at the terminus of the standard gauge branch. After that the standard gauge wagons from the quarries were left at that point for a British Railways locomotive to take them away. Between 1951 and 1955 there was a quarry to the north west of the village which was not served by the tramway. Ore from it was loaded into lorries which took it to a tipping dock at the start of the BR branch. In the early part of the 1960s a small part of the quarry to the south of the village was worked in that way.

Until 1967 the tramway was worked by steam locomotives. A diesel locomotive replaced the remaining two steam loconotives in that year.

The quarrying was done by hand (with the aid of explosives) at first. Steam quarry machines were introduced from 1917 onwards and diesel machines replaced them from 1936. There were also some electric machines used from 1940.

The quarries were owned by Stewarts and Lloyds Minerals Ltd from 1950 and British Steel from 1970. In latter years the ore was taken to Scunthorpe for smelting.

Traces of the railway and tramways remain. Some of the fields quarried are now at a lower level than the roads but few traces of the quarries remain other than that. There are some company built cottages near the Denton Road. The engine shed has been removed and re-erected at Cottesmore,Rutland. The last two steam locomotives are used on preserved railways.