Not Your Grandfathers Mining Industry, Nova Scotia, Canada

Gowrie Mine

The Archibald family and their Gowrie coal mine played a key role in the growth of Port Morien, but they also had other positive impacts on Nova Scotia that are still being felt today.

Port Morien’s original French name was Baye de Mordienne but it was changed to Cow Bay in the 1800s. The legend is that a cow escaped from a ship and was found there. The name was changed to Port Morien in 1895.

Located in northeastern Cape Breton, the town has an amazing history of coal mining. The first commercial coal mine in North America started there three centuries ago when, in 1720, the French started it to supply Fortress Louisbourg. Canada’s first international trade of minerals took place in 1724 when coal from Port Morien was shipped to Boston in exchange for bricks, lumber and provisions.

Thomas Dixon (T. D.) Archibald, born in 1813 in Onslow, Colchester County, worked for the General Mining Association, which had a monopoly on most Nova Scotian minerals from 1827-57. He took that experience to Sydney Mines in 1832 and had business interests in mining, merchandising and shipbuilding. He later joined Archibald and Company, which was co-founded by his brother, Samuel George Archibald. Archibald and Company served as merchants, ship-brokers and builders, agents for the sale of coal mined around Sydney, and agents for the North Sydney Marine Railway.

The company also founded the Gowrie coal mine in Port Morien in 1862 with a slope (decline tunnel) near the shoreline on the Gowrie coal seam.

This activity was the first official record of mining on the Gowrie seam, but coal is believed to have been extracted from the seam’s outcrop on the shore in the 1700s. Mining engineer and coal mine manager Colin Ochiltree MacDonald wrote in his 1909 book, “The Coal and Iron Industries of Nova Scotia,” that Archibald and Company had reopened a mine that had been established by “Franco-British pioneers, about a mile further up Morien roadstead….”

MacDonald’s book offers a summary of the Gowrie mine’s history: “These operators, who rank high among the ‘Fathers of the Canadian Coal Trade,’ sunk a shaft 20 feet deep near the shore, a second 80 feet deep further inland, a third—the Odiore Pit—205 feet deep, 900 yards from the shore, and a fourth, one and a half miles inland, and erected a breakwater for the protection of shipping, which has been purchased by the Government of Canada. The coal proved popular for steam purposes, and coked suitably for the treatment of copper ore in Newfoundland. Twelve ‘Beehive’ ovens were therefore erected at the ‘Odiorne’ Pit, and the product was shipped to Newfoundland.”

A Yeadon Briquette machine was also installed to turn slack coal (small pieces) into briquettes for burning. MacDonald wrote that the machine “had a capacity of 54 tons per ten hours. The weight of each briquette was about 11 1-2 pounds and 195 were allowed to the long ton. They were found suitable for steam raising, but the plant fell into disuse.”

MacDonald concluded, “Under Archibald & Co., assisted by their managers, the Andersons, this mine steadily became one of the most important in Canada, and its operations created the thriving town and marine coaling station of Port Morien.”

After three decades of steady production, the Archibalds sold the Gowrie mine to the Dominion Coal Company in 1893. The sale was part of Henry Melville Whitney’s effort to

consolidate under his ownership practically all the coal mines operating in the Sydney coalfield east of Sydney Harbour. Whitney also built the Sydney steel mill.

Steel is mainly iron and carbon, and the carbon is derived from metallurgical coal, which contains more carbon, less ash and less moisture than thermal coal, the kind burned to produce electricity. Nova Scotia’s long history of steelmaking was based on the province’s extensive metallurgical coal deposits and iron from Nova Scotia and, later, Newfoundland.

Unfortunately for Port Morien, Whitney and his Dominion Coal Company closed the Gowrie mine in 1897. In fact, Whitney closed all but three of Dominion’s mines because he believed he needed to focus on running the best mines more efficiently, not continuing to operate all of them. Consolidation of mines also reduced the price wars among coal companies that often ended up hurting all operators.

While the Gowrie mine never reopened, the Gowrie seam was worked again. In 1899, a new sub-sea mine was started by the Gowrie & Blockhouse Mining Company to work the Gowrie and Blockhouse seams under the ocean’s floor. The mine’s main shafts were adjacent to the site of the present-day Port Morien Legion. The project was spearheaded by Colin Ochiltree MacDonald.

North Atlantic Collieries Ltd. took over the mine in 1907 and sank a shaft on the shore at Long Beach to work both the Blockhouse and Gowrie seams offshore. By 1912, when the sub-sea mine closed, its working extended almost three kilometres under Morien Bay.

In addition to his business interests, T. D. Archibald also had prominent positions in government. He served on Nova Scotia’s Legislative Council before Confederation, and was a member of Joseph Howe’s Executive Council from 1860 to 1863. In 1867, he was appointed to the Senate by Prime Minster John A. MacDonald. He passed away in Sydney Mines in 1890.

One of T. D.’s seven children was Charles Archibald, manager and co-owner of the Gowrie mine.

As retired Port Morien educator Ken MacDonald wrote in the Cape Breton Post, Charles and his wife Edith lived on Morien Bay in a mansion called Seaview. The property boasted orchards, a tennis court, croquet grounds and an ice house. Ballast from ships was used to build a rock garden on the extensive grounds.

Charles represented the United States Consulate in Port Morien, an indication of how important the town’s coal was during the Archibalds’ day.

After the Gowrie mine was sold to the Dominion Coal Company, Charles and Edith moved to Halifax and lived on Inglis Street. Seaview was torn down and some of its finer pieces, such as the marble mantlepiece and hand carved stair railing, were shipped to Halifax for inclusion in the family’s new home.

Charles became president of the Bank of Nova Scotia and was actively involved in the community, including serving on Dalhousie University’s board of governors and as director of the Halifax School for the Blind.

Edith was a woman ahead of her time. For more than thirty years, she championed the right of women to vote in Nova Scotia, a goal that was finally achieved in 1918. She also worked tirelessly to improve health and education services as president of the Maritime Woman’s Christian Temperance Union, the Halifax Local Council of Women and the Halifax Victorian Order of Nurses. She was also vice-president of the NS Red Cross. Her efforts contributed to the founding of the IWK children’s hospital. She also published articles, pamphlets, songs, plays and several books.

Charles wrote that he and Edith regretted leaving Port Morien and that his three decades there were the happiest years of his life.

Charles died in 1920 at the age of 84 and Edith passed away in 1936 at the age of 82. They were well known and highly respected for their contributions to the province.

The Archibald family immigrated to Nova Scotia from Londonderry, Ireland, in the 1700s and there are a number of other noteworthy family members. For example, Samuel George William Archibald (1777-1846) became chief justice of Prince Edward Island.

Charles Dickson Archibald (1802-1868) lived most of his life in England but was born in Truro and kept close connections to Nova Scotia. He was the first Nova Scotian accepted into the prestigious scientific organization, the Royal Society of London, and he helped raise funds in the 1850s for the development of iron ore mines at Acadia Mines (aka Londonderry), Colchester County.

Sir Adam George Archibald, who was born in Truro in 1814, was a delegate to the Charlottetown, Quebec and London conferences that created Canada in 1867. Later he was Lieutenant-Governor of Manitoba and then succeeded Joseph Howe as Lieutenant-Governor of Nova Scotia.

In more recent history, Gordon Archibald was President of Maritime Telephone and Telegraph Corporation, and his son, George Archibald, represented the riding of Kings North in the Nova Scotia legislature from 1984 to 1999 and served in cabinet.