Page 143 - The_story_of_the_C._W._S._The_jubilee_history_of_the_cooperative_wholesale_society,_limited._1863-1913_(IA_storyofcwsjubill00redf) (1)_Neat

Spring Vale and Bugle Horn.
Mr. E. 0. Greening, made applications which fortunately were
declined. In a " Main Coal and Cannel Company "
the Wholesale
lost comparatively Kttle. An " Eccleshill Coal Company "
began
as a purely private business, and afterwards induced the Darwen
Co-operative Society to enter. The company obtained overdrafts
from the CW.S. up to £7,500, and eventually mortgaged properties
jointly to the Wholesale and the Rawtenstall Societies.
Further
losses occurring, in August, 1878, the CW.S. engaged a mming
engineer to report upon the possibiUty of the mines being worked
by the chief mortgagee. The report was that the property never
could be profitable under the royalties it had to bear;
and, after
some unfortunate litigation with the royalty owners, the assets
were realised, and the best made of a £10,000 loss to the CW.S. A
" Spring Vale CoUiery Company " also had its mine and brickworks
at Darwen. The company was promoted about the beginning of
1874 by a then prominent CW.S. buyer and others. Like the
Eccleshill mine, this concern fell entirely into the hands of the
CW.S. in March, 1880. During the following three years it was
worked by the Wholesale Society, with results that varied in their
degrees of disappointment. Here the colliery was very small and
merely fed the fires of the brickworks. The business left the CW.S.
poorer by some £9,000. A special committee of 1879 made close
inquiries into the relations of the CW.S. and the Eccleshill Company.
While reserving opinion as to the wisdom of certain actions, the
committee reported that " we have no evidence of any undue
influence having been used by any person or number of persons."
The Wholesale's sohcitors, while regretting the " extraordinary
losses," declared them due to " no fault of the Society."
The last on the fist is the sadly-remembered Bugle Horn Colliery.
On August 2nd, 1873, a conference of co-operative societies around
Manchester was held to consider the production of coal, and out of
this a " United Coal Mining Society " issued. It was a federation
of societies and individuals, characteristically designed to pay 10
per cent to capital first of all, and to divide the remaining profits
between capital and shareholders' custom. The new society
secured its promised gold mine at Hindley Green, near Manchester,
and began raising coal (and more capital) and incidentally producing
losses and explaining them away. In September, 1876, the CW.S.
Committee decHned to honour any further cheques presented by the
mining society; but two months later the Wholesale joined the
Bolton Co-operative Society in lending equal sums of £10,500 each on
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