All the victims of the Maypole were buried beneath a specially commissioned monument in Abram Parish Churchyard. He also said Ludovic loved the old engine and Onions believed he had sacrificed his life trying to save it. The scientific witnesses and Her Majesty’s Inspectors were unanimous as to the exact spot where the ignition took place, and in my opinion, the jury might well have come to the conclusion that the gas was ignited by a properly locked lamp of a boy named Baines, who had noticed the presence of the gas in the air and was making his way as quickly as possible for the downcast shaft. The twisted wreckage and the body of the driver remained as they were and the shaft was covered over, sealing forever one of the greatest mysteries in local mining history. Ambulance workers at Hindley and Wigan broke their strike to take the injured to hospitals. That the lamps were not perfectly safe, though in common use in the district, was known to the owners, as is provided by the fact that very shortly before the explosion they were in correspondence with Mr. Hall, Her Majesty’s Inspector on the subject. Mr. Taylor, the certificated manager, admitted that a new collier coming into the pit was never asked whether he could read or not.

Led by Mr. Greenwall the consulting engineer and Mr. Peace, solicitor for the Company, the evidence presented to the Coroner had been slanted in their favour. Immediately after the disaster their Superintendent of the Manchester District sent a telegram of condolence with a promise to pay up on all claims as soon as they were submitted. It was five o'clock on the afternoon of Tuesday, August 18, 1908 when an explosion ripped the heart out of the Cannel Mine (No 1 Pit) at Abram's Maypole Colliery.

Relatives of deceased single men: Funeral grant of £20. A Wigan miner kneeling down in a wash day alley, 1891. The explosion brought into focus all the elements of a mining disaster the appalling risks of the workforce below the surface and the dependence of the relatives on relief the uncertainties as to the cause of the explosion and the clear interest between the workers and the management with fear and suspicion the foundation of working conditions. Dolly and her courageous driver disappeared. } else if ( query != "pintix=1" ) { Having hear the whole evidence I feel I am bound to state that in  my opinion a similar explosion may occur again at any time and will occur almost certainly if another outburst of gas takes place when the men are at work. He had always had to show it to West or Morgan before he went back to work. Just seven bodies were brought up before the water was released. A total of £30,000 was raised. It had been opened in 1885 and saw its last tub of coal in 1919. var url = document.URL; The coal was worked on the longwall system with the men using safety lamps and blasting was forbidden. One great objection to the special rules in question is that they are not especially adapted to the “particular state and circumstances” of this mine, but are merely a common form in use in the district. I enclose herewith a copy of the Special Rules in force at the Abram Colliery. She testified that her husband wore red flannel drawers, clogs and stockings which she knew to be his. As Dolly pushed her trucks into No 8 siding, brakeman John Ward walked alongside. The work of cleaning up the rubble continued all that week until the last body was discovered on Sunday 31st December. I have the honour to forward herewith the shorthand writer’s notes of the evidence given at the inquest at the Abram Colliery, and also of the evidence taken at the Wigan borough coroner on the bodies of the men injured by the explosion, who subsequently died in the Wigan Hospital. Following the explosion, Energy Secretary, Tony Benn, MP, visited the scene with the local Labour MP, John Evans. Miraculously a man was brought out of the Yard Mine alive; thirteen hours after the explosion but all those found after this were dead. News. Relatives of the deceased married men funeral grant of £5, 5/- a week for a widow and 2/6 for each child. One hundred and fifty feet below an empty field between Abram and Platt Bridge lies a monument to the victim of Wigan's strangest mining disaster. But all too soon, the reporters went off to other stories and the people of Abram and Wigan were left in their grief.


We consider that there is sufficient air passing through the workings, but that it is considerably impeded in several places by gobbing up the dirt behind the brattice. Mining agent Oswald Onions said he had examined the shaft only the day before and nothing appeared to be wrong. Evidently the rescue parties worked to 10 o’clock in the evening, reaching some 2500’ down into the mine before they were stopped by lethal gas. The explosion in the coal mine on the border of Westhoughton and Atherton, near Bolton, on December 21, 1910 claimed the lives of 345 men and boys – England’s worst mining disaster. A few minutes after five in the afternoon on 24 August 1908, a terrific fire engulfed parts of the Cannell Mine of the Maypole Pit (of Pearson and Knowles Coal and Iron Company) just outside (famous1) Wigan at Abram.
Surface worker at the Douglas Bank Colliery, Wigan, c1890. The jury returned a special verdict in writing, a copy of which I enclose herewith. Perhaps the scene was just too gruesome, though not so for the Liverpool Mercury (22 August 1908), which reported the situation with more full detail, with less of an eye, perhaps, to ensuring that the mine could re-open, which may have been part of the reason for the ILN’s less detailed storyline. Welsh Coal Mining Disasters . Over eighty witnesses were heard comprising miners who testified as to the state of the mine before the explosion and scientific witnesses giving evidence on the result and probable causes of the explosion. I think, proved, and the greater the ventilation the greater the risk of an explosion when gas breaks out. The disaster left 25 widows and 73 children fatherless. It was an unprecedented mining tragedy for the area. They called for an amendment of the latter to ease the burdens of the bereaved. The workings in the seam were not very extensive and had been reached about three years before the disaster. }, Bookstore (for the Sciences, Technology, and the History of Ideas), Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License, « Unusual-Classic Design: Carto-graph of Aachen, Germany, 1932, Blank & Empty Things #50: Empty German Soldiers, 1908 », Cutaway View of the Cockpits of the Hawker Hurricaine and Messerschmidt (1942). Another witness, Mr. Speakman, who was near Westhead at the time of the explosion confirms what he had to say and he said that two colliers, for whom he was drawer, at left their workings for some reason which he could not explain. "Three electricians were reconnecting an electrical supply. After a lengthy two and a half hours of deliberation the jury brought in the following verdict: We are of the opinion that a sudden outburst of gas took place in the westerly wideworks and was ignited between the entrances of the top cut through of the westerly upbrow and the pace where Baines and Armstrong were working viz., in the most easterly of the westerly upbrows, but how ignited we have not sufficient evidence to show.

1967: Supertanker Torrey Canyon hits rocks, 1974: Violent border clashes at Golan Heights, 1950: Government falls as Belgians vote for king. An eye witness said: "It looked as if the earth had yawned.". Wigan, Lancashire. Apart from the lack of light when the explosion had blown most of the lamps out and some concussion from being thrown against the sides, most of the men were non the worse for the experience. 25 killed. The inquests started three days after the explosion and concluded on July 8 the following year. The great majority of the colliers examined at the inquest were illiterate, and it appears that no steps whatever are taken to bring the Rules to their notice. The lamp was not locked. There were two seams worked at the colliery, the Yard Seam and the Lower Arley Seam. The Yard Seam, in which the explosion took place, was divided into an east and a west district.

It was established that there were one hundred and fifty in the Lower Arley Mine at a depth of 650 yards and seventy in the Yard Mine at a depth 530 yards.

Week after week, edition after edition, the pages are full of the tragedy and its many offshoots, including the setting up of the Fund to help the widows and orphans. The enormity of the explosion was realised immediately and while some people were utterly distraught, others waited in the rain, stunned and motionless. A. Accidental death verdicts were recorded on all 76 victims. I watched the proceedings in concert with Mr. Henry hall; Her Majesty’s Inspector of Mines for the district and took part in the examination and cross-examination of 46 witnesses with the view of eliciting the real facts of the case and the true cause of the accident. I further that in a colliery such as this is, where gas is known to exist, the use of locked safety lamps should be compulsory, and should not be in the direction of the manager, as it is by the Special Rule 12. The mine was considered safe and the proprietors had done everything they could for the safety of the men. His brother, Peter Grainey, 41, died the day after that. Up to about 4 o’clock, it was not definitely known whether the one hundred and fifty men in the Arley Mine were safe or not. They were Brian Sherman, 23, Bernard Trimble, 34, Raymond Hill, 33 and Mr Walter McPherson, 45. The Certificated Manager of the colliery, Mr. Thomas Taylor, had only just returned from a routine underground inspection of the workings which had revealed nothing amiss. A most tragic case was that of the death of the underlooker, Mr. R.J. Cronshaw, son of the Vicar of St Thomas’s, Wigan.,and he was a most promising young man. he told the court that the ventilation was so good that he had difficulty in keeping him self warm and he had been visited four of five times each day by the underlooker of fireman. Her Majesty’s Secretary of State for the Home Department As Joe and John approached the edge of the hole, the last rumble subsided and a cloud of steam rose and hung over the open tomb. December, 1881. The lucky trio, brought out hours after the explosion, had been working in a part of the pit shielded from the main blast. A railway engine known as Dolly with 13 loaded wagons and the driver, Ludovic Berry, disappeared when an enormous chasm suddenly opened under the railway line. A lamp key was hung by a chain at the bottom of the downcast shaft, and it was made clear by the evidence that a miner whose lamp had been extinguished could unlock, relight, and relock his lamp if he were so minded. There was, however, a body of evidence to the effect that, in a well-ventilated colliery such as this was, the gas would be carried along with the air, and the air playing upon an ordinary unprotected Davy lamp and would blow the flame upon the gauze raise it to white heat in a few seconds and thereby at once ignite the gas.

The work of bringing the men out of the Yard Mine was slow and difficult. She little knew that it was the last time she would see her father alive. The evidence of the colliers refuted this. I think the jury were averse to adopting this theory as to the cause of the ignition for two reasons: (1) their thorough belief in the efficiency of the Davy lamp which is in general use in the district, and (2) a desire to say nothing that might tend to lessen the amount of ventilation in a colliery. Acting on the instructions of Her Majesty’s Treasury, I attended the adjourned inquest in the above matter upon the 7th, 8th, and 9th, and again on the 15th, 16th, and 17th days of this month. One man, James Shovelton was reported missing but no trace was found of him in the workings. One hundred and fifty feet below an empty field between Abram and Platt Bridge lies a monument to the victim of Wigan's strangest mining disaster. Recovery of the bodies was delayed because the pit had to be flooded to quell the underground fire started by the explosion. The mine was worked with locked lamps with the exception of the bottom of the downcast shaft where there were a few gas lights in the main intake.


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