Gypsum and Salt Mining in Central Hupeh, China

G YPSUM deposits occur in a number of places in China, but most of the country's supply has long been derived from mines in the Yincheng district in central eastern Hupeh, some distance northwest of Hankow (Figure 1). The present manner of working these mines presents several interesting features. The Yincheng district has produced gypsum for about four hundred years and the mining field has narrowed to a compact area lying just northwest of the county town of Yincheng. Salt also is produced by the same mines that produce gypsum, but salt production dates only from the 1860's. The country about Yincheng is rolling in surface, with but slight relief and no marked physical features. Shallow valleys and small dales alternate with rounded hills and crest divides. Many of the valleys and dales are rather completely terraced by rice fields, while dry crop acreage, villages or scattered homesteads fringe the divides, the crests of which are often left in natural pasture or covered with grave mounds. Near the city of Yincheng a wide bench borders a small stream, with alluvial soils of considerably better quality than are found on the uplands. The country rock mainly is gray to dull red shales and finegrained sandstones which are probably Mesozoic in age. The rocks to the depth of the deepest mines, some seven hundred feet, appear similar to the gray surface strata, are quite free from water, and are impregnated with various salts. It is somewhat surprising that the mines almost completely should be dry in view of the irrigated lands scattered over the mining area, and considering the rather heavy rainfall of the district

Archaeology · China · Geography · Gypsum · Mining engineering · Salt (chemistry) · Chemistry · Geology · Geomechanics and Mining Engineering · Paleontology

• State finance, merchant stake, and foreign interests

  Xiaoqun Xu, Yin Xu•Business History•2024

  Add to list