Just out of interest, while searching the National Archives catalogue I came across
this reference
Elizabeth I - George IV
Exchequer: Pipe Office: Particulars, Warrants and Transcripts for Crown Leases
Bee, Edward: Lands and tenements in Bywell, Bromley, Mickley, Shotley, Newbiggin, Slaley, Ridinge, and Le Ley; the site of the manor of Amble, a salt-pit in Amble, a coalmine in Amble and Anyley and a tenement in Le Castlegarth in Newcastle.
1618 wow - Is that our earliest reference to mining in Amble? (and perhaps Anyley is Hauxley too?)
The challenge now is to get back to 15xx something! then next stop Anglo-Saxon coal mining in Amble!
