There are traces of early mining activity all over the landscape, but the early coal pits were of purely local importance. Transport problems prevented the export of any surplus to other parts of the country, for until the late eighteenth century, when improved roads and canals reached the area, the pack horse was the main means of conveyance for heavy goods. Until the technical innovations of the eighteenth century the demand for coal was small, and there was no incentive for inland pits like those of West Yorkshire to develop markets in other parts of England.
Two developments which stimulated demand were made in the early eighteenth century. One was the discovery that iron could be smelted using coal rather than charcoal, the second was the invention of a workable steam engine. The first recorded use of a Newcomen engine in Yorkshire was in 1714 and during the next fifty years many Yorkshire collieries installed them. The new pumping engines made it possible to cope with the problem of drainage in deep mines and so to extend the area in which coal could be worked.

The nearest colliery was Emroyd Colliery, just half a mile north of the town. There were two short-lived collieries just to the north of Smithy Brook: New Delight and Edge End. New Delight (aka Hostingley Pit) was close to the canal and linked to it by an inclined plane railway. Edge End Colliery was linked by road to coke ovens at Smithy Brook. The processed material was transported from Smithy Brook via another small industrial railway line which linked up with the canal at Horbury Bridge. Both Edge End and New Delight are shown as disused on the 1892/3 O.S. map.

James Milnes leased coal at Emroyd Common in the north of Middlestown not far from the Smithy Brook from Sir George Armitage of Kirklees Park in 1796. Here Milnes developed Emroyd Colliery. His 31-year lease included the right to make railways. He leased the ironstone rights for 29 years in 1798, and a year later he leased the land at Emroyd until 1827. A plan from 1801 shows nine ironstone pits and a furnace. Despite being well run, the company suffered from not having a connection to the growing railway network. The Leeds and Manchester Railway opened through Horbury Bridge in the 1840 but was separated from the waggonway by the River Calder and navigation. Production declined towards the 1880s and Emroyd was nearly worked out. The company asked the Lancashire and Yorkshire railway to provide a connection to the line through Horbury, but circumstances conspired to prevent it.

The 1841 Census enables us to see for the first time how much the local economy was dominated by coal mining. The Census of that year records for the first time the occupations of everyone (including children) who was in employment. The most numerous were: coal miner (103), labourer (87), hurrier (48), farmer (15) and servant (15).
A ‘hurrier’ was a young boy or girl employed in a coal mine to drag baskets or small wagons full of coal from the coal face where it was mined, up to the surface. Some of them were as young as five or six. The data in the table below were extracted from the 1841 Census.

Not surprisingly, many of the hurriers were the children of miners. Eight of them were living away from the family home.
The Mines and Collieries Bill of 1842 made it illegal for all females and boys under ten to work underground in coal mines, but many of the colliery owners ignored the new legislation. By 1861, the number of hurriers in Middlestown had dropped to eighteen and they were all male and over nine years of age.

If we look just at the heads of household, this is the full list of occupations in 1841:

The presence of four clothiers in the village suggests that hand-loom weaving was still being carried out, though it was obviously a part-time occupation, since only one weaver is listed.

Coal mining still dominated the economy in 1861. 50% of households had someone who worked at the mines. The Jarvis family’s Albion Foundry on the outskirts of the town provided an alternative for the men. Christopher Mitchell’s worsted factory employed a number of the girls and women.

Fifteen farmers are listed in the 1861 Census. Three of them had additional occupations. The farms ranged in size from 5 acres to 61 acres, with the average being 26 acres.

Two labourers were employed at the largest farm, but on the rest there was only one. Most of the labourers listed in the Census were employed at the mines, with some also working on the roads.