North Island Coal Mining at Suquash

This article originally appeared in the North Island Gazette February 8, 2006.
How to best exploit the coal deposits at Suquash have been a burning question on the North Island for over 175 years.
Suquash is located midway between Port Hardy and Port McNeill, on the banks of Queen Charlotte Strait.  It takes its name from the Kwakwala language, meaning "the place where seal meat is cut into strips."  It is believed, therefore, that this area was once used as a harvesting station for seals by local First Nations.
In 1835 the Husdon's Bay Company became aware of coal deposits on Northern Vancouver Island when First Nations visiting Fort McLaughlin at Bella Bella saw the white people burning coal. Coal was referred to in Chinook as "khale-stone," meaning black stone. They told the Hudson's Bay Company employees that they knew of a place where they could find more black stone, at a place known to them as Suquash.
With the advent of the steamship the HBC required additional coal for their fleet of trading vessels.  For a period of time coal was brought from England as ballast in ships, but it soon became obvious with the advent of additional trading in the Pacific and the start of the California gold rush that stocks of coal would be in high demand on the Pacific Coast.
In the 1840s the HBC began to explore local coal reserves, and the first mine developed on Vancouver Island was at Suquash, starting as early as 1846. In its first days surface coal was collected by First Nations and brought out to HBC ships by the canoe-full.
By 1849 the HBC's Fort Rupert had been constructed in what is today known as Beaver Harbour.  In 1850, 32 miners, mostly experienced Scottish miners, were brought in from the coal fields in England and Scotland.
Coal was visible on the surface at Suquash, and the HBC thought that an underground mine would yield large deposits.  Unfortunately when the miners began to sink shafts they  found coal which was of poor quality, mixed heavily with sandstone and shale.
The HBC also had difficulty with their miners.  Frustrated with serving as indentured labour for a number of years, and without the promise of earning the expected commissions based on the output of their coal production, many HBC labourers deserted to pursue their fortunes in the California gold rush.  Some felt that the company did not provide adequate protection against the hostile First Nations people.  The British and Scottish miners were also not used to surface mining, which they found beneath their station as experienced colliers.

Suquash in the 1920s.

Between 1849 and 1850 approximately 11,000 tonnes of coal were extracted from the Suquash coal field. When a better quality deposit was found at Nanaimo in the 1850s, the HBC abandoned its coal mining efforts at Suquash and moved its equipment and miners further South.
From 1908 to 1914, and then again from 1920 to 1922, another venture, Pacific Coast Coal Mines Ltd., commercially mined coal at Suquash. The total production during these years was 23,600 tonnes.
Tunnels were drilled under the ocean, and community sprang up, including bunkhouses for miners and a beautiful mine manager's house with a two story river rock fireplace.  By 1932 the mine was abandoned, and the remaining equipment was auctioned off.  The remaining shafts were filled with water, a common practice in coal mining, to prevent the explosion of gasses which naturally accumulate underground.
Suquash Collieries Ltd. dewatered some of the shafts and workings at the site in 1952.  They opted not to proceed with production.
In 1974 BC Hydro continued exploratory drilling in the area, however they determined that it would not be economical to proceed with an underground mine.
Recent re-analysis indicates that the site does not hold promise as a potential coal mine, due to the dirty nature of the coal and the thinness of the seams.  However, coal bed methane reserves at the site have been examined by some energy companies, and could once again generate interest in industrial development at this historic site, now in the form of fracking for methane gas.