[1] Cleworth Hall Colliery exploited the Middle Coal Measures of the Lancashire Coalfield which were laid down in the Carboniferous period and where coal is mined from seams between the Worsley Four Foot and Arley mines.
[nb 1] The seams generally dip towards the south and west and are affected by small faults.
Cleworth Hall, the largest and longest lasting of the collieries owned by the Tyldesley Coal Company[2] was sunk under the Cleworth Hall estate to the east of Yew Tree Colliery in 1874.
[3] Cleworth Hall colliery was modernised before 1914 and the shaft to the Arley mine equipped with steel headgear and a washery and coal preparation plant were built near the pit head.
In 1896 Cleworth Hall employed 304 men underground and 46 surface workers.