Durham Mining Museum - Newspaper Articles (original) (raw)

Whitehaven Herald

Article from the Whitehaven Herald, 22nd November 1831

The Widows

An honest man called on us one day this week and asked us if we had not stated in our paper that "Turney Hodgson" had said, that Lord Lonsdale allowed the widows of the men who were killed in his collieries; eight shillings a month and a cottage and coals rent free? We told him that Mr. Hodgson had said so. He said then that he had come to tell us that it was a mistake, (he used a shorter and more expressive word, but that does not matter.) That Lord Lonsdalemight order it, but they did not get it. He told us that he knew Jane Scott, who was left a widow many years ago with three children; that she had eight shillings a month allowed her for three years; then she got four shillings a month for two years; and then two shillings a month for one year, and then her pay was stopped altogether; and that with respect to coals, she was only allowed one cart load in the year. She made several applications to the agents but all in vain. He added that he believed that the pensions were totally taken form the widows on the Whingill side, but that the Howgill widows had some trifle continued to them yet.

We have to record the death of an additional victim to the explosion of Saturday week. On Friday, Alexander Garraway died of his injuries he had received; making the number of lives lost twenty-three in all. An inquest was impannelled, in which of course we were not included, and the usual verdict returned.