DEVON. Clackmannan. 26th. March, 1897.

The colliery was the property of Alloa Coal Company and was one of four collieries owned by the Company. Six lives were lost when there was a rupture of a door or valve in a dam and the men were drowned. Mr. A. Roxburgh, a partner in the Company, was the General Manager for all the collieries, a position he had held for the previous twenty-three years. He held a certificate of competency as a mine manager but had never acted in this capacity. Mr. James Fyfe was the certificated manager of the Devon Colliery and had held the post since March, 1896. Before this Mr. H. Nisbet was the manager and he was then the manager of the Leven Colliery in Fife. Mr. Roxborough’s assistant was Mr. John Orr who acted a surveyor to all the collieries owned by the Company.

The winding shaft was sunk to the Lower Five Feet Sea, at 104 fathoms, passing through the Upper Five Feet Seam which lay 55 fathoms higher. The Upper Five Feet Seam was not worked directly form the shaft but was won from the level of the Lower Seam at the shaft by a level stone mine cross-cutting the metals of the dip. Both seams were worked on the stoop and room system. Pillars of coal were formed in the Upper Five Feet and they extended for some distance on the other side of the workings. Water was encountered in these workings and the mains of dealing with it were not effective, it was decided to abandon the mine for a time. The feeder of water was not great and amounted to about 33 gallons per minute.

Before the Upper Five Feet workings were abandoned, a bore was put down to the Lower Five Feet, not from the lowest point i the seam since this had already filled with water, but from the face of a level stone mine driven forward above the level of the water as far as the workings had extended in the coal seam. The intention was to drain the water from the Upper to the Lower seam where the pumps were to be provided. The bore was three and a quarter inches in diameter and 230 feet deep but was not tubbed. When the bore was put down the workings in the lower seam had not reached the point where it penetrated the seam but when the dook or main dip road in the Lower Five Feet reached the vicinity of the bore, its approximate location was determined by surveys and preparations were made for tapping it.

A level in the coal was driven to the right from the dook in the direction of the bore. This level was about 6 feet wide and 4 feet 6 inches high and when it had been driven 12 yards, a dam was built. It was constructed of bricks and cement and was let into the sides, roof and the floor. It was arched, the convex side towards the bore. The dam was 3 feet 3 inches thick and it had three openings, one a 4-inch iron pipe near the top right-hand corner. This was continued as a 5-inch pipe to a Moore’s hydraulic pump, 92 yards from the dam by the side of the dook and about 53 feet above its level. It was intended to act as a conduit for the water behind the dam to the pump. This pump was capable of delivering 2 to 300 gallons per minute. A valve was fixed to the 4-inch pipe, close to the dam on the outside and a similar valve, with a short length of pipe, was lying at the pump ready to be fixed to the end of the 5-inch pipe.

Another iron pipe of 14 inches diameter was placed near the bottom left-hand corner. this pipe was to allow water to escape after the bore had been reached and while the door was being placed in a position and screwed up. The third pipe came through an opening in the centre of the dam, 2 feet 6 inches square tapering to 2 feet 3 inches square next to the dook. This opening was strengthened with wood. When in position, there was an iron plate next to the water, and then 3 inches of wood made up of three planks placed horizontally and three placed vertically and held in place by nails through the iron plate. There was an eye-bolt was fixed near the centre of the door to which a chain was attached and two handles on the outside of the door to place it in position.

When Mr. Nisbet left the colliery, the Upper Five Feet near the borehole had been abandoned, the borehole was completed and the workings in the Lower Five Feet had advanced towards it. The level from the dook had been driven for 12 yards, the dam was built, and the small pipe fixed in it and the door was provided from closing the manhole. Mr. Nisbet stated that he would have preferred to drive a level stone mine from the pump to the bore or to move the pump down the dook to the level of the bottom of the bore. The advantage of either of these plans was that the water flowing fro the bore would run direct to the pump without the need for a dam.

When he left the colliery it was his intention stopping the vertical bore inside the dam by a horizontal bore. The horizontal bore was plugged and hole bored through and a pipe inserted. A cock on this pipe would have controlled the flow of water so that the pump could deal with it. If this operation had been successful the dam would not have been used. Had the plan failed and the horizontal bore failed to be plugged, then the dam was to be used with the exception of a small water pipe which would deliver the water to the pump. Mr. Nisbet stated that he did not intend to put the full pressure of the water on the dam. He did not think the door was strong enough to resist the water.

When Mr. Fyfe took over the management, Mr. Nisbet remained at the colliery for a fortnight to acquaint him with the job. There was no satisfactory exchange of ideas as to how to the water fro the upper to the lower seams and Mr. Fyfe seemed to have considered the dam and its appliances in a different light to Mr. Nisbet.

Mr. Fyfe continued the level in the Lower Five Feet looking for the borehole but without success. There was some doubt that the borehole had reached the Lower Five feet and a stone mine was driven into a seam called the Mosie which lay 23 feet above the Lower Five Feet and the search for the borehole continued. Horizontal bores were put out in the vicinity of the vertical borehole and then the coal was removed. The waste was brought in hutches through the large opening in the dam.

While the search was going on, shots were fired inside the dam, some a great as three and a half pounds of gunpowder. When these shots were fired, as was the custom to place the dam in such a position i the large opening of the dam, that it could be easily be drawn forward from the outside, in the event of the shot liberating water. On one or two occasions the shot wedged the door firmly in the hole and force had to be used to displace it.

In searching for the bore inside the dam, 9,000 cubic feet of mineral was extracted. Part of this space was occupied by buildings put in to support the roof but the free space was calculated at 6,000 cubic feet. Part of this lay below the level of the small pipe in the dam but the greater part was above this level.

The miners, John Nichol and John Hunter were employed in looking for the borehole on the day of the accident. Hunter was the only survivor of the disaster. They started their shift at 10 p.m. on the previous day and about 4.15 a.m., the bore struck by a pick at the highest point in the excavation. Water started to flow, at first just a little and then quite freely. Hunter and Nichol retired, drawing the door into position. Peter Allen, the oversman, was sent for and four other men, Charles Taylor, roadsman, David Allen, roadsman, George Blair, fireman and William Grant, haulageman came to help. The door was foxed in place and screwed up tight. The work was completed about 4.45 a.m., and the large pipe was closed by screwing up a blind flange, which was already in position but not screwed up, outside the dam. This work was completed at 5.15 a.m.

During these operations, the small pipe remained open and after the door was in position and the large pipe closed, it delivered water up to the pump where it was seen flowing by Thomas Dawson, foreman. A few minutes before the accident, Peter Allen closed this pipe by shutting the valve on it at the dam. At about the same time, he instructed John Hunter to look at the end of the pipe near the pump to see if any water was being delivered. Hunter went to the pipe and found no water coming from it. He was returning to the dam and was near the entrance to the level when the door collapsed. He was knocked down by the rush of water and had great difficulty in escaping.

The flow of water continued for 74 hours and the whole body of eater was transferred from the Upper Five Feet to the Lower Five Feet. No one was able to approach the dam for some weeks and the pump was drowned on the day of the accident. Attempts were made by divers to recover the bodies but this task proved too difficult and dangerous. The bodies were recovered on 9th April and 1st May. Five were found in the level between the dam and the dook and one in the door, 25 yards below the level.

Those who lost their lives were:

  • John Nicol aged 45 years, miner,
  • Peter Allan aged 42 years, overman,
  • David Allan aged 29 years, drawer,
  • George Blair aged 46 years, fireman,
  • Charles Taylor aged 57 years, roadsman,
  • William Grant aged 22 years, haulageman.

Although Moore’s pump was drowned on the day of the accident, it continued to work underwater for three or four weeks but eventually stopped as the pipes were crushed. After it broke down, water chests were used and the mine was cleared by the 30th April.

Water chests used for taking water out of the dook had been left standing in the dook opposite the level leading to the dam had it was thought possible that some of the men might have escaped if there had not been for this obstruction. Mr. Atkinson, the Inspector made a full inspection of the mine after it had been drained and found that the brickwork of the dam was practically intact but the wooden framework into which the door fitted, was damaged. The top portions was torn off and found clear of the dam, the side portions were partly torn away. The bolts were bent forward. The door had been forced through the opening and was found in the level near the dook. The outside planks of the layer of three and tone of the handles had been torn off. It was bent out of shape from the pressure to which it had been subjected. The top had been forced out which allowed it to move outwards without from top to bottom.

A public inquiry into the disaster under the fatal Accident (Scotland) Act, was held before Tyndall Bruce Johnstone, Esq., Sheriff Substitute of Clackmannanshire in the Court House at Alloa on the 17th May, when all interested parties were represented.

Mr. Atkinson told the inquiry that when the pipe was closed the air pressure behind the dam would build up as the water came in. The Inspector thought the responsibility for the accident rested with Mr. Fyfe for not satisfying himself that the strength of the door was sufficient for the use to which it was to be put.

After hearing all the evidence the jury returned the following verdict:

That John Nicol, Peter Allan, David Allan, George Blair, Charles Taylor and William Grant met their death on the 26th day of March 1897, in the Lower Five Feet seam of the Furnacebank Pit, Devon belonging to Alloa Coal Company and that the accident was caused by the bursting out of the manhole door of the dam there, owing to undue pressure of water from the Upper Five Feet seam and that this pressure was caused by the closing of the valve on the four-inch discharge pipe leading from the dam to the pump.

Mr. Atkinson commented:

The degree of blame attaching to Mr. Roxborough in connection with the accident was somewhat difficult to determine. I have always found Mr. Roxborough most painstaking in his general direction of the Collieries and anxious to prevent an accident, and for a gentleman in his position giving much attention to minute details, but it is probable that this misled Mr. Fyfe, who, looked upon him as a mining expert, did not exercise his own judgement to the extent that he would otherwise have done. On full consideration I do not think Mr. Roxborough’s judgement can be considered sufficient in a matter of this kind, and he should have made this plain to this managers, and if he had any reason to doubt their competency to deal with the matter he should have called in an expert.

 

REFERENCES
Mines Inspectors Report.
Reports to Her Majesty’s Secretary of State for the Home Department on the circumstances attending the accident which occurred at Furnacebank, No.1 Pit, Devon Colliery, Clackmannanshire of the 26th March 1897; by Robert T. Younger, Esq., Advocate and by J.B. Atkinson, Esq., one of Her Majesty’s Inspectors of Mines.
The Colliery Guardian, 2nd April, p.629.

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

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