Durham Mining Museum - Local Records Extracts (original) (raw)

1860

A boiler explosion occurred this morning, at Seaton Burn Colliery, situated on the Morpeth road, about six miles from Newcastle, and the property of Mr. Bowes and Partners, by which four men lost their lives, and several others were seriously mutilated. When it took place two stokers, named Robert Ewing and John Turner, were standing with the engineman, Younger, at the fire-hole, and all three were overwhelmed in the storm of rubbish. William Chevil, who was running small coals, received a blow on the head from a stone, and died the same evening. A great many others were struck by portions of the falling fragments and seriously injured. [_LRS_]

March 2. — An awful explosion of gas took place at Burradon Colliery this afternoon, by which the large number of seventy six men and boys met with an untimely end. Immediately on the alarm being given instant steps were taken by those in authority to lessen, as far as possible, the effects of choke damp. Mr. Kirkley, the fore-overman, descended the mine with a view to rescue those who might have escaped with their lives, in which praiseworthy and humane effort he was happily successful, as several of the workmen and boys engaged on the Seghill division were brought to the surface alive, and, after the usual restoratives were applied, recovered from the effects of the choke damp. Burradon Colliery, the scene of the calamity, is the property of Joshua Bower, esq., of Hunslet, near Leeds, who had only recently purchased it. A long and searching inquiry took place as to the cause of the accident, but without any satisfactory result. [_LRF_]

March 27. — A fatal boiler explosion occurred at the Shildon Pit, Blaydon Main, belonging to G. H. Ramsay, esq., of Derwent Villa, by which four lives were lost. Towards six o'clock in the morning, the hour for the night-shift coming off, Joseph Gray, the man in charge of the pumping-engine, on turning out to examine his boilers previous to going home, met William Holmes, the brakesman of the winding-machine, who had just come out for a similar purpose. Holmes tried the safety-valves and floats, pronounced them all right, and was turning away when the boiler exploded with tremendous force. The unfortunate Homes was hurled to a distance of a hundred yards, and killed on the spot. Daniel Johnson, a fireman, was blown about the same distance and also killed. Gray was likewise carried off his feet a considerable distance, but strange to relate, escaped with some scalds and bruises. William Huddard and John Laverick were crushed to death under the falling rubbish. [_LRF_]

April 2. — A boiler explosion occurred this morning, at Seaton Burn Colliery, situated on the Morpeth road, about six miles from Newcastle, and the property of Mr. Bowes and Partners, by which four men lost their lives, and several others were seriously mutilated. When it took place two stokers, named Robert Ewing and John Turner, were standing with the engineman, Younger, at the fire-hole, and all three were overwhelmed in the storm of rubbish. William Chevil, who was running small coals, received a blow on the head from a stone, and died the same evening. A great many others were struck by portions of the falling fragments and seriously injured. [_LRF_]

June 13. — Died, at his residence, Whitehall Gardens, in the 77th year of his age, Cuthbert Ellison, esq., of Hebburn Hall, in the county of Durham. Mr. Ellison was educated at Harrow and the University of Cambridge. He married Isabella, one of the two daughters and co-heiresses of Henry Ibbotson, esq., whom he survived only a few months. Of six children, all daughters, two only survived him, Mrs. Lambton and Lady James. One of his daughters died unmarried. His eldest daughter was married to Lord Vernon, another to Lord Mansfield, another to William Henry Lambton, esq., the head of the great banking house of Lambton and Co., Newcastle, another to Sir Walter Charles James, bart., and the fifth to Lord Kensington. Mr. Ellison was succeeded in the Hebburn Estate by his nephew, Lieutenant Colonel Ellison of the Grenadier Guards. Mr. Ellison represented Newcastle, in Parliament, for twenty years. In politics he was a Liberal Conservative, in religion a sound Protestant, attached to the Established Church, but free from all feeling of exclusiveness, and treating with respect christians of every denomination. His funeral, which was strictly private, took place at Kingsbury, in the county of Middlesex, on the 19th, when his mortal remains were deposited by the side of the faithful companion of his married life. [_LRF_]

July 1. — This evening, an accident occurred on the Bishop Auckland Branch Railway, by which an engine-driver and fireman were killed instantly. A train left Bishop Auckland for Sunderland, at eight o�clock, and when about to enter the Red Hills Cut, about half-a-mile to the west of Durham, the engine suddenly became detached from the tender, and fell over on one side of the line, the tender detaching itself from the carriages, falling over on the other. The carriages ran for a short distance between the two, but, being off the line, soon came to a dead stand. The engine driver John Hall, and the fireman John Henry David French, were killed on the spot, none of the passengers were injured. [_LRF_]

December 20. — This evening another of those lamentable explosions, so frequent in this district, took place in one of the workings of the far famed Hetton Colliery ; and unfortunately, twenty two persons fell victims, not improbably, to the recklessness or carelessness of some of themselves, or, it may be to hidden causes which are inexplicable. The whole of the horses and ponies in the pit were destroyed by fire, which had seized on the hay in the stables, and the way in which they met their deaths was horrible in the extreme. [_LRF_]

• LRF — Local Records or Historical Register of Remarkable Events by T. Fordyce, Published in 1867
• LRS — Local Records or Historical Register of Remarkable Events by John Sykes, Published in 1833 in two volumes