North Pennines Archaeology Ltd carried out a rescue excavation on behalf of the Ministry of Defence and English Heritage at the site of the former lead mine at Hilton, Scordale, Cumbria. The mining remains extend for several kilometres along both sides of the steep-sided valley and is recognised as being of national archaeological significance and is a Scheduled Monument (Scheduled Monument 27842, centred on grid ref: NY 76123 22540). This work was required because the Scordale Beck which flows down the valley is causing major damage to the remains of the ore dressing floor and crushing plant. The nature of the site prevent any realistic methods of safeguarding the remains in any other method than by record.

The Scordale area was worked for lead from at least the 14th century right up the mid twentieth century with the focus shifting from lead mining at the end of the 19th century initially to witherite extraction and finally to barytes. It was hoped that this work could identify evidence for this shift in mineral extraction surviving in the archaeological record. A ten day excavation was carried out in the beginning of July 2007 in atrocious weather conditions. In summary the work centred on three distinct areas, the crushing plant, the dressing floor and a small building adjacent to wheel pit all dating to the late 19th century and early twentieth century.

The fieldwork adjacent to the crushing plant revealed the remains of a number of timber chutes exiting the crushing plant that are likely to have once carried sediment across the beck to the main dressing floor. The location of a substantial bridge abutment was also recorded along the main erosion scar adjacent to the crushing plant. A single trench was excavated across the projected line of three large buddles. The trench proved that the exterior structure of the buddles had survived remarkably well although the interior structure had been largely lost.

The interior of a small stone structure was also excavated, preliminary results point towards this building once housing a jigging table to reprocess fine sediment from the buddles. The excavation of this structure proved extremely difficult as much of the interior had been washed away by the Scordale Beck and much of the site being under water for much of the excavation! Once the post excavation research has been completed a full report of these findings will be submitted for inclusion in the Transactions of the Cumberland and Westmorland Antiquarian Society.