Basic Information
- Horse Gin Pit
Contexts
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Context: JNP_1001
- Horse gin pit
- Manda Forster
- 17-4-2018
Narrative
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- Feature recorded during site assessment originally published in the landscape survey report (Quartermaine, H. 2016 Jane pit, Workington, Cumbria; Desk-Based Assessment and Landscape Survey Report, Report No. 2016-17/1770. Oxford Archaeology North). To the south of the Engine House is an elliptical enclosure, open to the north facing towards the engine house. Survives as an earthwork with a sharply defined interior edge and a flat base. As shown on historic mapping, the gin circle (or gin pit), where horses provided rotational power for winding, and which was linked, and probably in contemporary use with, the steam engine in the engine house. The 1949 aerial photograph shows this as being a sunken, sub-circular pit edged by a 2m high retaining wall, into the surrounding spoil heap. Now that the spoil heap has been removed, it is evident that the outer, embanked edge of the present gin pit, is a product of the recent landscaping and was not an original feature. The walling of the gin pit probably survives as a buried feature.
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- Manda Forster
- 17-4-2018
Dating Narrative
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- Part of original site, 1844
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- Manda Forster
- 17-4-2018
Matrix
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- [not set]
- [not set]