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History and Uses
144. Gypsum has been mined for plaster making since the latter part of the 18th century, although extraction was done for agricultural purposes much earlier and the mineral is known to have been worked in the form of alabaster since the 11th century for ecclesiastical ornament.
145. The rapid growth of the industry in the present century is due to the expansion of building works calling for special plasters and wall board, as well as for portland cement (in which the mineral is incorporated as a retarder). The following table shows the U.K. consumption of raw gypsum in 1947:
TABLE XIII
CONSUMPTION OF GYPSUM IN THE UNITED KINGDOM
Use
ሮ.
Plaster
Portland Cement
Wall Board Other Uses (Export)
Tons
per centon daw
351,512
41.4
332,786
39.2
132,549
*15.6
29,760
3.5
(1,093)
negligible
847,710
Resources
146. The estimate of reserves furnished to us by the main concerns in the gypsum mining industry may be taken as a near indication of the total quantity of unworked mineral so far established in this country. Proved reserves are stated to be 35 million tons and further reserves indicated by boring, mining, and geological evidence, amount to at least 65 million tons. Broadly, one half of the total reserves is in the Midlands area, and one quarter each in Cumberland and Westmorland, and Sussex.
147. Nottinghamshire. All the mines now working in this county are found south of Nottingham between that city and Loughborough about 10 miles away, the mining country stretching in a narrow east-west belt for 15 miles from Kingston-on-the-Soar eastwards to Cropwell Bishop.
The Geological Survey Memoir* defines two districts for the purpose of computing resources of the mineral:-
(i) From the Yorkshire border to Cropwell Bishop
(ii) Cropwell Bishop to the Leicestershire boundary.
In the former no workable gypsum is said to be likely to exist north of Newark and that south of the town there may be as much as some 44 square miles of mineral of variable thickness in isolated "cakes" of up to 20 ft. across and 7-8 ft. thick as well as in three 1 ft. bands. In this area are situated the Hawton and Jericho quarries of B.P.B. Ltd. and the Kilvington property of Nottinghamshire Gypsum Products, Ltd. Southwards of Cropwell Bishop there is a proved area of 2 square miles with an average thickness of 8 ft. of gypsum. It is reported that there are possibilities of gypsum occurring on the southern margin of the Cropwell Bishop to Kingston area in a narrow east-west strip of country lying within a mile to the north of East Leake, but nothing positive is as yet known of this area.
Special Reports on the Mineral Resources of Great Britain: Vol. III, Gypsum and Anhydrite, 398f6M.S.O. Price 2s. 6d.)