REDDING. Falkirk, Stirlingshire. 25th. September, 1923.

Old plans that were produced at the inquiry into the disaster showed that mining had been carried on at Redding for over 100 years and there were sites of many old shafts. The newest shaft that was sunk was the No.23 which implied this fact. The colliery was the property of Messrs. James Nimmo and Company Limited and was in the Parish of Grangemouth, about a mile west of Polmont Station and was held under a lease granted by the Duke of Hamilton. Possession was granted to the Company in 1894 after the previous tenants Messrs. Salveson who traded under the name of the Redding Coal Company. Messrs. James Nimmo and Co. Ltd. took over certain pit as a going concern and two years later proceeded to develop the unworked areas by sinking two shafts which were known as the Redding No.23 with the objective of working the Ball Coal and the Main Coal seams. The Union Canal and the London and Eastern Railway from Glasgow to Edinburgh ran close together and the shafts lay between them. The two shafts were fifty feet apart, rectangular and both equipped with winding engines. No.1 was 14 feet by 6 feet and No.2, 12 feet six inches by 5 feet six inches, both sunk to the Main Coal at 209 feet deep and passed through the Ball Coal at 171 feet.

The shafts passed through the wastes of old workings in the Coxrod Seam 33 feet from the surface and, being to the dip, drained this waste and the area of Ball Coal and Main Coal were worked to the rise as far south as 1,500 yards where there was downthrow fault known as the Universal Dyke. To the rise of the shafts on the dipside of this Dyke, which was an ordinary fault and not an intrusive one of granite, there was known to be a large accumulation of water in the waste of the Coxrod coal working that had been abandoned many years before. This Dyke was regarded by the Redding management as a natural barrier against water and the workings of the Main and Ball Coal were in the course of time extended right up to the Dyke towards which the seams rose from 23 pit at an average gradient of 1 in 18, though owing to a series of shallow troughs, the actual gradients varied from nearly level to 1 in 9.

At the time of the disaster, the working of the Main Coal workings known as the Dublin Section was stripping the dyke and it was in these workings that the accumulated water broke through the Dyke and caused the disaster. During the working of the Main Coal from the No.23, the waste workings from an old circular shaft called the Gutterhole had been stripped. This old shaft was 650 yards from the main shafts at the colliery and about 100 years before about eight acres of Main Coal were worked from the shaft but the Ball Coal above was left untouched. In the course of the years the shaft became filled with rubbish from the Main and Ball Coal. This was proved in 1917 when a small district of workings known as the Spion Kop was opened out in the Ball Coal seam from No.23 colliery and a road was made from there to the Gutterhole shaft. Towards the end of 1919, one of the roads in the Ball Coal became a return airway and in order to prevent interference with the ventilation of No. 23 Colliery. The only road to the Gutterhole shaft and the No.23 colliery was closed by a stopping made of boards nailed to props behind which a quantity of dirt was stowed. In this way, the Gutterhole Shaft at the time of the inrush of water into the No.23 workings was neither an air shaft nor an escape shaft, though as events proved, it was the only way by which entry could be obtained to No.23 workings after the inrush and it was the shaft by which the 26 men who survived made their escape.

The colliery was under the general management of Mr. George Gibb, the Agent and he was also the agent for five other collieries belonging to James Nimmo & Co. Ltd. Mr. John Purdie was the certificated manager and also the manager of an entirely separate mine which was known as the Redding No.16 colliery and he had an undermanager at each colliery. Mr. William Donaldson was the undermanager at the Redding No.23. The colliery was generally free from firedamp and naked lights were used throughout the workings. Electricity at 500 volts was used for hauling, pumping and coal cutting. At the time of the accident there were four sections of workings in the Ball Coal and two in the Main Coal. Each were worked on the longwall system by disc coal cutters, one cutter to each section. There were also three small sections being worked or prepared for work by hand. The roof in both seams was a good strong sandstone. The holing and undercutting was done in the bottom of the seam and carried out during the night shift.

The output from the three Ball Coal Sections and one Main Coal Section was wound from the Ball Coal Level in No.1 shaft by means of one cage while the output from one Ball Coal Section and the other Main Coal Section was wound from the Main Coal Level 38 feet below the Ball Coal Bottom by the other cage. The winding engine had drums of different diameters in order to allow this to be done. In order to enable the coal from one of the Main Coal Sections, the Dublin Section, to be sent to the Ball Coal Level and so reduce the amount of haulage road to be made and maintained, a dipping mine or stone drift had been driven from the Ball Coal to connect with the Main Coal at a distance of 600 yards out from the shaft.

The day shift descended between 6.25 and 7 a.m. and came up 2 to 2 35 p.m., the afternoon shift went down 2,45 to 3 p.m. and ascended 10 to 10.15 p.m. and the night shift descended 10.45 to 11 p.m. and came up 6 to 6.15 a.m. There were usually 170 on the day shift, 92 on the afternoon shift and 73 on the night shift. In addition, there were 7 shotfirers whose shifts were taken from 6 a.m. to 1 p.m. In the evening the machinemen, runmen and gummers of whom there were normally about 30 descended at irregular times from 8 to 11 p.m. The firemen’s shifts were arranged with 5 on the day shift, 3 on the afternoon shift and 3 on the night shift. During the shift in which the disaster occurred, there were 93 men underground including, two strippers, one of whom came up early, nine runner men who came out before the event, two onsetters, a youth who was sent by the fireman with a message, two bricklayers and a boy who fled before the water, ten men who came out of the lower level through the water, twenty-six who were later saved in the Gutterhole shaft and 40 men who lost their lives.

Small feeders of water had been encountered as the workings developed in the Dublin Section of Main Coal. This water flowed out of the side of the roads into a shallow “gauton” or ditch to run by gravity to the pumps. There was nothing to cause alarm in the Dublin Section until 4.30 a.m. on the morning of the 25th September. According to the account of the sole survivor from the Dublin Section, a youth named Henry Thompson, a coal cutting machineman, William Donaldson, came out on to the main road early that morning to look for the fireman, Thomas Aitken whom he found and took him back to the Dublin Section. Thompson followed them and saw three machinemen trying to get rid of some water by letting it through the pack walls on the low side of the drawing road. He heard these men tell Aitken that they intended to continue cutting with the machine so as to get to a higher place. Apparently, even then there was no alarm felt.

The fireman took Thompson out with him down the main road and wrote two notes, one to the undermanager and one to the fireman in the Bar Run Section of the workings. As he was handing the notes to Thompson a slight “thump” was heard and the air started to reverse. This was probably the moment when the water broke in, in volumes. The fireman merely told the youth to deliver the note and then went back towards the workings. Thompson took one note to the Main Coal onsetter, asking him to take it to the Bar Run fireman and then went up the pit to the undermanager’s house. The message to the undermanager read:

Mr. Wm. Donaldson, Under-Manager.

Dear Sir,

The water has broken into Dublin No.1 Branch and it is knee deep on the slope and there is more going to Bar Run haulage road than the pumps are able to manage. You might come by and see it and I will be at No.3 Bench. If not there I will be in Dublin.

— There is a very great danger of flooding out Bar Run haulage.

Yours,

T. Aitken.

I have sent word to J, Jarvie.

The reversal of the air was felt by the bricklayers working in the Main haulage road in the Ball Coal leading to the Dublin Section, Main Coal and about 15 minutes later at approximately 5.10 a.m. a rush of water came down the road. The bricklayers ran before it and got to the shaft just as the water reached the same point. This water had swept down the road in the Main Coal from the Dublin Section and up the stone drift connecting that seam to the Ball Coal and the had continued down the main road in the latter seam. When the water reached the shaft it poured down it in tremendous volume to the lower landing.

At this time there were several men in the lower or “dook” workings of the Main Coal who had finished their shift and were on their way out when they met the water. James Jarvie, the fireman, who had received the note sent by Aitken encouraged some of the men to push forward through the water and ordered two men to go round by the return airway to warn the men in the Bar Run, Main Coal. These men lost their lights in the water and were unable to carry out the order. Jarvie himself, knowing that Dobbie’s Mine Section was the lowest and would be flooded first, went back into that part to warn the men and was never seen alive again.

Eleven men managed to fight their way against the water to reach the pit bottom in the Main Coal. They found that the quantity of water coming down the shaft was too great to permit escape by the cage but there was a small shaft or blind pit, fitted with stairs from the Main Coal to the Ball Coal. Water was coming down the stair pit but not in great quantities and they succeeded in getting to the Ball Coal and from there to the surface by the ordinary winding cage.

By 5.45 a.m. the water had filled practically all the lower dook workings and by 6.30 a.m., the upper seam was sealed at both shafts and no access could be obtained to the workings. At this time there were 66 men missing. Seventeen from the Ball Coal Nos.1 and 2 sections, 16 from the No.3 section, 10 from Dobbie’s Mine Section, 11 from the Main Coal, Dublin Section and 12 from the Main Coal Bar Run section. None of the men from the last three sections was recovered alive. The men from the Nos.1, 2 and 3 sections of the Ball Coal and found their exits cut off and had travelled the airways and had gathered together. One man managed to get a message by telephone to the surface from the station on the Nos.1 and 2 Districts at about 6 a.m. and was told that they should try to escape by the old Gutterhole shaft.

At the surface of this shaft a windlass was erected but the shaft was found to contain blackdamp. Men in rescue apparatus went into the foul atmosphere and reported that nothing but water could be seen. The attempt to gain access was given up as hopeless at 8.30 a.m. Meanwhile 26 men out of the 33 from the Ball Coal Nos.1, 2 and 3 had in fact succeeded in reaching the Gutterhole shaft. The remaining seven failed to get there. This party expecting the shaft to be dry from past experience had been making a road by pulling put material and throwing it back but they soon found that water was coming in on them. They persisted but a wall of water 2 to 3 feet was rushing down the middle of the road. In addition they were subjected to blackdamp which had been forced out of the old wastes by the water. As a result, several of them lost consciousness and were rescued by their comrades but seven were swept away as they fell. Five of these were drowned and two were later recovered unconscious.

To judge by the height of the water in the main shafts, there should have been no water in the Gutterhole shaft but it was afterwards discovered that a block had occurred in the Main Coal airway which passed the foot of this old pit. The water was thus dammed back, rose to a greater height than in the remainder of the mine and came through the old filling of the bottom portion of the shaft. At 10.15 a.m., the water level in the main shafts was 113 feet above Ordnance Datum, and the men underground gathered at a place 129 feet above the datum. A measurement of the depth of water in the Gutterhole shaft taken at that time showed that its level was approximately 137 feet above the Ordnance Datum. Eventually the block in the main coal airway must have given way, since the water subsided 9 feet below the level of the hole which the men had made in the shaft. When the block did give way all the dirt filling the bottom of the Gutterhole shaft ran out, leaving 30 feet of clear shaft which was afterwards used in the pumping operations. When the water subsided underground the men shouted up the shaft and were heard at the surface. All efforts were them made to get them out and by 12.40 p.m. 21 survivors had been rescued. The heavy rush of water stopped at 12 noon but a considerable stream continued to pour into the pit for many weeks.

The task remained to drain the water from the colliery and recover the bodies of the victims. There were large areas of the working that were above the water and there was a possibility that some of the men who had failed to get to the Gutterhole shaft were above the water and alive. The main shaft was useless for rescue purposes as there was 60 feet of water above the highest working landing so only the Gutterhole shaft would be of any use.

Offers of assistance came from all quarters with offers of men and materials, in particular, Messrs G. and W. Brunton, Riggers of Grangemouth, The Fife Coal Company Limited, The Kinneil Cannel and Coking Company Limited, The Shotts Iron Company, Limited, The United Collieries and Mr Waddell, Fire Master of the Glasgow Corporation, gave valuable assistance in the operations. Help was also offered to the officials of the mine by numerous agents, managers and engineers and by H.M. Inspectors of Mines, who with the workmen from the mine and from the area generally gave unremitting service so long as there was hope for any of the men trapped below.

Pumps were pulled from their positions in other collieries and rushed to the rescue attempts. Electrical equipment that would have taken months to manufacture appeared as if by magic. No pains were spared and no trouble that was encountered too great. In 36 hours from the time of the disaster the Gutterhole shaft had been fitted with a headgear, steam winding engine and an electric fan. The blackdamp was cleared and relays of men started to make a road into the workings while others erected a turbine pump in the shaft.

In the main winding shaft of the No.23 pit, chests were at work dealing with 350 gallons of water per minute, while in the upcast a turbine pump was sending out 550 gallons per minute. In spite of this the water continued to rise and it was not until noon of the 28th September that mastery over the situation was obtained. Progress was at first slow, owing to the large quantities of water still draining into the pit. The water was only lowered 18 inches in four days, but after that progress was 2 feet a day since more pumps had been brought into action. As small freshwater fish had been brought into the tanks, showing that a surface stream was finding its way directly into the pit, the surface were searched and the likely places puddled. This was successful and the feeders were reduced.

The first efforts of the rescue parties were directed to clearing road from the Gutterhole shaft to give access to the Spion Kop Section where they expected to find some of the men who had not reached the Gutterhole shaft. The rescue party worked very hard and cleared out the stowing from 165 feet of old road in 36 hours. This was a rate of 4.5 feet per hour. The Spion Kop was reached and explored but no one was found. The rescuers suspected that the men might have lost their way to the shaft and gone into the No.3 section and been cut off by the rising water and efforts were then concentrated on reaching the No.3 section.

It had been anticipated that the road that already been cleared would give access to a large portion of the mine but a trough occurred in the workings and the road was found to be below the level of the water. Had there been a plan that was marked with contour lines this would have been known but no such plan was available. To overcome the difficulty the roof was blasted down into the water and a road made above the water level. An air compressor was erected to supply the drills used in making the road. A 4-inch diamond drill borehole was started from the surface to reach a rise part of No.3 Ball Coal Section with the hope that light and food might be lowered to any men imprisoned. The hole was not completed before the necessity of it had disappeared because on the 4th. October the road which was being made above the water level had passed beyond the water and five men were found in the No.3 section who had been imprisoned 9 days without food. They were all in remarkably good health and walked out of the pit. They stated that they did not feel hungry after the first few hours and they had no sense of time. They had been living in a very damp space in which an oil lamp would not burn and they had difficulty in maintaining the circulation in their legs and as a result they developed rheumatic and bronchial troubles.

There were four or five men still unaccounted for in the Ball Coal workings and in the hope of finding them alive an attempt was made to drive 400 feet of coal heading in order to gain access to Nos.1 and 2 sections. This effort was outstripped by the lowering of the water level. In the meantime, an attempt was made by divers to communicate with the imprisoned men. The divers had to travel 800 feet and at least 20 feet head of water, they were unsuccessful, not through lack of zeal or courage but through lack of mining knowledge. The task was not considered as an impossible one and the results that were achieved demonstrated that there were possibilities in recovery work for men with both diving and mining experience.

As the unwatering operations continued a series of heartrending breakdowns of the pumps occurred and it was not until the 18th October, 23 days after the disaster that the rescue party penetrated into the No.1 section of the Ball Coal and found the bodies of two men. After, as of by an irony of fate, there was no further trouble with the pumps and the water was steadily lowered until the 21st November when it was possible to examine almost all the workings in the mine.

Twelve bodies were yet unrecovered and it was expected that eleven of them would be in Dobbie’s Mine Section which was the lowest district of the colliery. The bodies were not to be found there and it became necessary to go into the old workings. After an arduous search, eleven were discovered in the old Main Coal workings which had been abandoned for fourteen years. These eleven, who were led by the fireman, had managed to make a way through over 1,500 yards of old roads some of which had very badly fallen in. at one place they had made a passage 10 yards long through the waste from one road to the other, entirely without tools. Having reached this remote place they stayed there, near a small supply of water and ultimately they died of cardiac failure due to exhaustion.

Up to the day they were found it was believed that the men had been caught in Dobbie’s Mine section “like rats in a trap” and could not possibly have escaped drowning. It was never explained how they all contrived to get out of the dip side of the pit to the rise workings.

The order of the list is the order in which the victims were brought from the pit. All the victims died from drowning unless stated to the contrary:

  • Thomas Brown recovered on the 25th September 1923, 30 yards from the Gutterhole shaft to the dip.
  • John Forrester recovered on the 25th September 1923, 10 yards from the Gutterhole shaft to the dip.
  • David Porteous recovered on the 25th September 1923, 30 yards from the Gutterhole shaft to the dip.
  • Frank McGarvie recovered on the 4th October 1923, against the motor house, top Main Coal Mine.
  • Michael McKenna recovered on the 4th October 1923, at the corner of Easton’s Mine, Main Coal haulage.
  • Andrew Anderson recovered on the 4th October 1923, in the Main Coal haulage road between McGarvie and McKenna.
  • William Anderson recovered 10th October 1923, in Easton’s Mine, Main Coal.
  • Patrick Shields recovered 13th October 1923, in Easton’s Mine, Main Coal.
  • James Hannah recovered 10th October 1923, in Easton’s Mine, Main Coal.
  • Thomas Aitken recovered 10th October 1923, in Easton’s Mine, Main Coal.
  • Thomas Thomason jnr. recovered 14th October 1923, in Slant off Spion Kop main road, Ball Coal.
  • David Brown recovered 18th October 1923, at the entrance to Slant off Spion Kop main road. Died from the effects of blackdamp.
  • Thomas Brown recovered 18th October 1923, in No.2 Section Main road, Ball Coal. Died from the effects of blackdamp.
  • John Lennie Wright recovered 20th October 1923 in the Main Coal airway, 20 yards to the rise of the Gutterhole.
  • Thomas Thomason (2) recovered 6th November 1923 in the Bar Run Airway, Pick Section. Main Coal.
  • James Marrs recovered 6th November 1923 in the Bar Run Airway, Pick Section, Main Coal.
  • Laurence T. Scobbie recovered 6th November 1923 in the Bar Run Airway, Pick Section, Main Coal.
  • David Thomason recovered 6th November 1923 in the Bar Run Airway. Pick Section, Main Coal
  • James Scott Irving recovered 6th November 1923 in the Bar Run Airway, Pick Section. Main Coal.
  • Alexander Hamilton recovered 6th November 1923 in the Bar Run Airway, Pick Section, Main Coal.
  • Laurence Thomason recovered 8th November 1923 in the Bar Run Airway, Pick Section, Main Coal.
  • William Donaldson recovered 12th November 1923 to the dip of Gutterhole Shaft in the Main Coal.
  • Colin Maxwell snr. recovered 20th November 1923 at 92 refuge hole, Bar Run Road, Main Coal.
  • Thomas Bonar recovered 15th November 1923 at 93 refuge hole, Bar Run Road, Main Coal.
  • John Baxter recovered 15th November 1923 at 105 refuge hole, Bar Run Road, Main Coal.
  • Walter Maxwell recovered 20th November 1923 in Dublin Return Airway, near the top.
  • Archibald McNee recovered 21st November 1923 in the Old No.1 Section, off Hen Farm Section, Main Coal, under Middlerig Farm.

Those recovered 21st November 1923 in the Old No.1 Section, off Hen Farm Section, Main Coal, under Middlerig Farm, all the following victims died from cardiac failure and exhaustion:

  • David Bennie,
  • Robert Thomason,
  • Andrew Brown,
  • Henry Thomason,
  • Robert Beveridge,
  • John Beekman,
  • Thomas Thomason (1),
  • James Adam,
  • Colin Maxwell jnr.,
  • Michael McLaughlin,
  • James Jarvie
  • James Cochrane recovered 3rd December 1923 to the top of the Bar Run Return Airway, Main Coal. He died by drowning.

The inquiry into the causes and circumstances attending the inrush of water which occurred at Redding Colliery, Falkirk, Stirlingshire on the 25th September 1932, was conducted by Sir Thomas H. Mottram, C.B.E., H.M. Chief Inspector of Mines, in the Justiciary Buildings, Jail Square, Glasgow, from 5th February and lasted for nine days when all interested parties were represented.

An inspection of the pit after the disaster showed that the flooding was caused by water breaking through the Universal Dyke at No.12 Branch in the Dublin Section, Main Coal seam. The fireman’s message refers to water breaking in at the No.1 Branch but as there were 11 disused breaches to the left of the haulage road, No.12 branch was the first that was actually working and was commonly called the “No.1”. The water came from the old workings in the Coxrod and Splint seams of a number of old collieries to the rise or south side of the Redding No.23 Colliery and the inrush came form a part of the Coxrod seam worked from Redding No.4 pit about 1842.

The old workings of Redding Pits Nos.4, 5, 6, 10, 12, 14 and 18 were inter-connected and there were also connections to Standrig, Blackraes and Shieldhill Collieries. Redding No.4 was sunk almost at the deepest part of the coalfield south of the Universal Dyke. It ceased to work about 1854 and a portion of the workings filled up with water to the level of the pumps at No.10, further to the east and to the rise. No.10 Pit continued to work the seams until it was abandoned in 1873. After that the water gradually rose in the Coxrod seam and in a part of the Splint Coal until it found its way out of a day level from No.10 Pit at a height of about 346 feet above the Ordnance Datum. Consequently in 1873 the old workings to the south of the Universal Dyke had been standing partially filled with water. The level of this water could be and had been measured at Redding No.4 Old Shaft. A plan in the Colliery Office at No.23, showed the water to be 346.9 feet above Ordnance Datum.

At the place in the Main Coal workings where the inrush occurred, it was calculated that the head of water above the working face in No.12 branch was equivalent to a pressure of 50 lbs. per. square inch. After the disaster it was discovered that the Coxrod Seam floor opposite the point of the inrush was only eight feet above the Main Coal floor and that the old workings in the Coxrod had stripped the main fault of the Dyke bare at this place. An excavation eight yards long, had been cut down to the pavement of these old workings to a depth of 4 feet 6 inches. The purpose of this excavation can only be surmised. Drains or “gautons” from the east and west had been formed towards it and it may have been placed where water was taken in chests to a storage chamber for the suction of a siphon or it may have been to allow the water to go through the strata. Whatever the object, the result was that the bottom of the excavation was brought within a foot vertically of the top of the Main Coal being worked by Messrs. Nimmo on the other side of the Dyke. The natural subsidence arising from the working of the Main Coal in the Dublin Section evidently caused the frail barrier to give way until finally an opening, approximately eight yards long, was left through which the water rushed.

In 1898, at the request of the late Mr. Thomas Nimmo of Messrs. James Nimmo & Co. Ltd., Messrs. McCreath & Stevenson, Mining Engineers of Glasgow, who had the old plans on Redding on loan from the Duke of Hamilton’s Estate Office, marked and put a line of the old Coxrod workings south of the Universal Dyke on the Main Coal plan of No. 23 Redding. These plans showed that between 1841 and 1853 the Universal Dyke had been stripped in the Coxrod Coal a very considerable distance by workings from the old Nos. 4 and 5 pits on the south side of the dyke. A road was also shown on the plan that crossed the dyke west of the point where the inrush occurred. Whether this road existed or whether it was just projected there was no evidence to show. It was discovered after the disaster that the old plans were incomplete as the coal shown to have been left in 1853 against the dyke had been removed without its removal having been shown on the plans.

With the information that the Coxrod had been worked on the far side of the dyke, the management in 1898 continued to push on their Main Coal and Ball Coal workings which at that time was a considerable distance fro the dyke. They continued to extend the Main Coal workings until 1909 when a working face, 300 yards long was stopped at a point where a portion of it was 150 feet from the dyke. Two other faces, one of which was the Dublin section advancing almost parallel were stopped in 1914-15 due to war conditions when the shortage of workers necessitated the coal to be worked nearer the bottom. This statement was confirmed at Alexander Robertson who was the manager of the mine in 1909 and was confirmed by James Watson who was manager of the No.23 Pit in 1910 and remained in charge until 3rd October 1922 when he was succeeded by John Purdie.

In 1917 the Agent instructed George Park who had been the Company’s certified surveyor since 1911 to take a section correlating the seams on the North and the Southside of the Universal Dyke and the position of the water in the Nos. 4 and 5 pits. This section was called the 1917 section. The position of the Universal Dyke was taken from the Main Coal working plan to which it had been transferred from the old Coxrod plans in 1898. North of the Dyke the levels in the Main and Ball Coal were apparently not taken at the time because levels were already on the working plans up to a point 600 feet back from the dyke. From these figures a line of level was assumed and transferred to the line of the section. From there to the Dyke the levels were entirely assumed.

South of the Dyke the water level was plumbed in No. 4 and 5 shafts and was taken from the working plans one which they had been marked in 1898 from the old plans. These levels could not be verified since both seams were underwater and the old “benchmark” was unknown. The fault shown on the section as a downthrow of 15 fathoms was marked on the plan as five fathoms but was taken by Mr. Park as 15 fathoms on the instructions of Mr. Watson who stated in evidence that he was fully satisfied on this point of the information of two old miners who had worked in the old pits. This information was that in the No.5 Shaft the Splint and Coxrod seams used to be worked from opposite sides of that shaft to the same drawing level. The dip of the seam from Nos.4 and 5 shafts towards the dyke on the south side was assumed to be the same as the average rise on the north side.

The 1917 section showed the Coxrod waste at the Universal dyke, at a point about 300 yards from the inrush, to be 66 feet above the position of the Main Coal but it was found to be only five feet measured from the top of one seam to the bottom of the other at the point where the inrush took place. The idea of driving through the Dyke was abandoned because of information from an adjoining colliery indicated that it might not be profitable. The 1917 section was put aside and no action was taken on it until two years later when the question of reopening the Dublin Section come up for consideration. According to the evidence of Mr. Gibb and, Mr. Watson they proceeded to get all the information they could with regard to the displacement of the seams at the Dyke and the thickness of the Dyke itself which they were looked at as a possible barrier against an inrush of water. They found, examining the geological plan that it showed the Universal Dyke to be 20 fathoms downthrow at Wallacetown 300 to 400 yards east of the point where their workings would and did strike the dyke. They also found on inquiring at the Callender Colliery, one a quarter miles to the west. That the dyke there had a downthrow of 13 or 14 fathoms and they had the section of 1917 which showed a downthrow of 19 fathoms.

With regard to the faulted ground at or near the dyke they found that at the Callender Colliery it had been driven into for a distance of 60 feet without being pierced entirely and that at Manuelrigg, about a mile to the east of Redding, a road had been driven for 80 feet with the same result. They also observed in a burn on the surface at Redding that the dyke was 60 feet wide with layers of sandstone all the way across. They concluded from this information that the fault was a big sandstone dyke between the two collieries. They then considered it safe and proper to proceed with the workings in the Main and Ball Coal and to strip the Universal Dyke. In October 1922 when Mr. Watson retired, the workings had approached close to the dyke in the Main Coal and had reached it in the Ball Coal which according to the 1917 section was 38 feet vertically nearer the Coxrod waste that the Main Coal. The dyke was stuck by the Main Coal in late November 1922. Mr. Purdie had been informed of the position by his predecessor and he inspected the 1871 section and saw no reason to see danger in stripping the dyke. This carried on and at the time of the disaster the dyke had been stripped in the Main Coal and Ball Coal for a distance of 900 and 500 feet respectively.

There was a great deal of evidence at the inquiry which led to the question whether, when they were stripping the dyke in the Dublin section the danger was indicated by the feeders of water that were encountered. Sir Thomas Mottram came to the following conclusions:

  1. that the cause of the disaster was the reliance of the management on plans and calculations that were inaccurate.
  2. that the management made an unfortunate mistake in omitting to examine the plans of the old workings.
  3. that, in view of the uncertainty inherent in the position, the management was at fault in omitting to take the precaution either of leaving a substantial barrier of coal on the dyke or of definitely ascertaining the location of the water by boring from the surface.
  4. that the amount of water finding its way into the Dublin Section cannot reasonably be held to have afforded, in itself, an indication that the workings were approaching danger.
  5. that it would be impracticable to teat Section 68 of the Coal Mines Act as applicable to cases in which the workings and the water are known not to be in the same plane.

Sir Thomas went on to make the following recommendations:

1. That Section 68, which is generally understood by mining men to deal with dangers from accumulations of water lying in the same plane as the workings that are approaching them, should be amplified and strengthened, as far as it is possible to do so, to cover the various other circumstances in which danger from water may arise in mining operations.

This being a matter which you have already remitted to the Water Dangers Committee of which I am a member, I prefer not to express my views with regard to the exact form such amplification should take. But as it is practically impossible to cover by general legislation or general regulation all the multifarious circumstances in which danger from water may arise, it seems to me there is a need for some machinery for considering cases individually is that provided by No.29 of the General Regulations of the 30th July 1920, for determining the precautions to be taken in respect of workings under moss and quicksand etc.

2. that notice should be given to the Divisional Inspector of Mines of owner’s intention to approach within 100 yards of workings, in any direction, containing or likely to contain an accumulation of water or other liquid matter.

At the end of the inquiry Sir Thomas recorded that:

It was pleasing to hear from Mr. Aitchison that the relatives and dependents of those who lost their lives in the disaster were satisfied that nothing was left to undone that skill and ingenuity or energy could suggest or devise in order to effect the rescue of the entombed men. These remarks must have been gratifying to the owners, officials and workmen of the colliery and indeed to all who rendered all the assistance they could after the calamity had occurred.

 

REFERENCES
The report on the causes and circumstances attending the inrush of water which occurred at Redding Colliery, Falkirk, Stirlingshire on the 25th September 1932 by Sir Thomas H. Mottram, C.B.E., H.M. Chief Inspector of Mines.

Information supplied by Ian Winstanley and the Coal Mining History Resource Centre.

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