BRANDLING MAIN. Jarrow, Durham. 25th. May, 1812.

The colliery was the property of Messrs. John and William Brandling, Henderson and Grace each of whom had a quarter share and was in the Parish of Jarrow and Heworth of which the Reverend J. Hodgson was the Vicar.

The Low Main Seam was reached in 1810 and at the time of the accident, about twenty-five acres had been extracted. The High Main Seam had been won in 1811 when it had been tubbed off by solid cribbing. The colliery was as equipped with the most modern machinery and used the approved materials and practices of the day. It was worked by two shafts, the John Pit which was the working downcast shaft, 603 feet deep and another shaft about 550 yards away which was known as the William Pit. The ventilation was arranged by the air current passing along two bords and down another through the whole of the workings. There was a furnace at the surface of the William Pit which had a lofty chimney. This provided the power for the ventilation.

There had been no accidents at the colliery with the exception of a small explosion that slightly burned three workmen. Candles were allowed in the mine and smoking was permitted. The blasting of the roof in the rolleyway bord was in operation and the mine was considered by the workmen “a model of perfection in the purity of its air and orderly arrangements.”

The pit exploded with great violence and the loss of ninety-two lives and was one of the most appalling explosions that had occurred in the area. The disaster occurred at 7.30 a.m. when the fore shift was being relieved by the back shift hence, two shifts of men and boys were in the pit. When the pit was opened the barrow-way dust was burnt to a cinder and was said to have felt “like frozen snow under the feet.”

By twelve o’clock, by means of the John Pit gin, which was worked by men in the absence of the horses, thirty persons, all that survived, were brought into daylight. At a quarter past twelve, nine individuals descended the John Pit, lighting their way by steel mills, as the firedamp would have instantly ignited at candles but finding themselves unable to penetrate the workings any distance on account of meeting chokedamp, they determined to return to the surface. At two o’clock, after five had descended and when two were in the shaft, a second explosion occurred, though much less severe than the first and fortunately not attended by any serious consequences. The men in the shaft felt an unusual heat but the uniformity of their ascent was not affected. The underground threw themselves on their faces and kept a firm hold of a strong prop and experienced no other inconvenience from the blast than its lighting up their legs and posing their bodies in various directions, in the manner that waves heave and toss a buoy at sea.

After one or two ineffectual attempts to enter the workings, the coal had evidently been set on fire, it was determined to close up both shafts in order to extinguish it, which was accordingly done on May 27th. The recovery of the bodies of the unfortunate victims did not begin until 8th July, the operation being affected by the light of steel mills. On September 19th, the pit was visited by candlelight, which had not been used in it for 117 days. The furnace was re-lighted the same day.

A contemporary account of the disaster has survived in a pamphlet of “The Liverpool Religious Tract Society”, entitled, “Narrative of a Dreadful Occurrence at Felling Colliery (Nr. Durham) 25th May 1812”:

Felling is situated about a mile and a half from Gateshead in the county of Durham. It contains several seams of coal. The present colliery is in the seam called the Lower Main. There are two shafts at the pit. One is called the John pit and is situated on the north side of the Sunderland Road, between felling Hall and the Toll Bar. It was about 200 yards deep. It is used for drawing up coal by means of a fire engine and is furnished with a whim worked by horses, which is useful when the fire engine is unemployed. The other shaft is called the William Pit. It is 350 yards from the John Pit and about 230 yards deep.

The mine was considered by the workmen as a model of perfection in the purity of its air and orderly arrangements. the concern wore the features of the greatest prosperity and, except for two other there workmen being slightly burned, no accident had before occurred. Two shifts or sets of men were employed. Twenty-five acres of coal having been got. The establishment under the ground consisted of about 128 persons.

The subterraneous fire broke forth with two heavy discharges from the John Pit which was almost instantly followed by one from the William Pit. a slight trembling as if from an earthquake was felt for about half a mile around the workings and the noise of the explosion, though dull, was heard three or four miles distant and much resembled the unsteady fire of infantry. Immense quantities of dust and small coal accompanied these blasts and rose high into the air to form an inverted cone. The heaviest part of the matter ejected, such as corves, pieces of wood and small coal, fell near the pits but the dust, borne away on a strong west wind, fell in a continued shower from the pit to a distance of a mile and a half. In the village of Heworth, it caused darkness like that of early twilight and covered the roads so thickly that the footsteps of the passengers were strongly imprinted in it. The heads of both the shaft frames were blown off, their sides set on fire and their pulleys shattered into pieces but the pulleys of the John Pit gin, being on a crane not within the influence of the blast, were fortunately preserved. The coal dust ejected from the William Pit into the drift or horizontal part of the tube (i.e. the passage between the pit and the chimney stalk) was about three inches thick and soon burnt to a light cinder.

As soon as the explosion was heard, the wives and children of the men ran to the working pit. Wildness and terror were pictured on every countenance. The crowds from all sides collected to the number of several thousand, some crying out for a husband, a parent or a son and all deeply afflicted with a mixture of grief and horror.

The machine being rendered useless by the eruption, the rope of a gin was sent down the pit with all expedition. A number of men seemed to supply strength proportionate to the urgency of the occasion, put their shoulders to the shaft of the gin and wrought it with astonishing expedition. By twelve o’clock, thirty-two persons, all that survived of this dreadful calamity, were brought up. The dead bodies of two boys, who were miserable scorched and shattered, were also brought put of the pit at this time. Three boys out of the thirty-two who escaped alive, died within a few hours of the accident so that twenty-nine persons remained to relate what they had observed of the appearances and effects of the subterraneous thundering. One hundred and twenty-one were in the mine when it happened, and eighty-seven remained in the workings. Eight persons had come up on different occasions within a short time before the explosion.

They who had their friends restored hastened with them from the dismal scene and seemed to suffer as much from an excess of joy as they lately had done from grief and they who were yet held in doubt concerning the fate of their relations and friends, filled the air with shrieks and howlings, went about wringing their hands and threw their bodies into the most extravagant gestures.

Great apprehension being entertained for the safety of the workmen who remained in the mine, nine persons descended the John Pit, expecting to meet with some of them alive but their progress towards the place where the men had been working, was very soon stopped by the prevalence of choak damp. Firedamp will take fire at a candle, in choak one will not burn at all. In order to prevent the former steel mills were used to give light by turning a thin cylinder of steel against a piece of flint but on coming into choak damp, the sparks fell like dark drops of blood so that the mill became useless and breathing extremely difficult. The probability of their getting to those they were in search for, or finding any of them alive in case they should reach them, was now despaired of. The certainty of the mine being on fire and the probability of a second explosion burying them in its ruins rendered the case altogether hopeless.

At two o’clock five persons who had gone down having ascended, two being in the shaft coming up and the other two at the bottom, another explosion, much less severe than the first, excited more frightful expressions of grief amongst the relations of the persons still in the mine.

As each party came up, he was surrounded by a group of anxious enquirers. Their reports were equally hopeless and their account of the impure state of the mine was corroborated by the second explosion that, for the present, their assertions appeared to obtain credit. But this was only a momentary impression. It was recollected that persons had survived similar accidents and when the mine was opened, had been found alive. That in a pit near Byker, three had subsisted on horse beans and candles for forty days. Persons not wanting to excite disbelief in the accounts given by the persons who had explored the mine, it was suggested that the relations of the sufferers, that they might be induced by bribery or want of courage to magnify the danger and represent the reaching of the bodies as impossible. Thus the grief of the neighbourhood began to assume an aspect not only too gloomy but irritable. The proposition to endeavour to extinguish the fire excluding the air from the nine was received with cries of “murder” and with determination to oppose them proceeding.

Many of the widows and other relatives of the sufferers continued about the mouth of the John Pit during the whole night, hoping to hear the voice of a husband, a son or a brother calling for assistance.

On the following day, an immense concourse of colliers assembled from various other collieries. they were profuse in reproaching the persons concerned in the mine with want of exertions to recover the men, each one having some example of successful attempts in cases of this kind to relate, and all professing their readiness to assist but with their profession, none were found that would enter the mine. The mixture of conceits and prejudices common with workmen whose experience has only furnished them with partial knowledge of the nature and peculiarities of their profession, without being acquainted with the connection between causes and effects, appeared to be the ground for their reasonings and assertions. As soon as those who led the outcry could be induced to listen patiently to the relation of the appearances attending this accident and the assigned reasons for concluding that the mine was on fire and that the persons in it were dead, they seemed to allow that to reach the bodies of the sufferers till the fire should be extinguished was practicable.

The proprietors of the mine gave the strongest assurances to the crowd, that if any project could be framed for the recovery of the men, no expense should be spared in expecting it and if any person could be found who was willing to enter the mine, every facility and help should be afforded him but as they were assured by several of the most eminent viewers in the neighbourhood that the workings of the mine were in an unapproachable state and that any further attempt to explore it would hold out in reward for the undertaking, they would not be an accessory to any man’s death by the persuasion of a bribe.

On the 27th of May, at the clamorous solicitation of the people, two persons again descended the John pit, in order to ascertain the state of the air in the workings. Immediately under the shaft, they found a mangled horse in which they supposed they perceived signs of life but they had advanced about six or eight yards before the sparks of the flint were extinguished in the choak damp and the men who played the mill began to show the effects of the poison by faltering in his steps. The other therefore laid hold of him and supported him to the shaft. As the baneful vapours had now taken possession of the whole of the mine and they found it difficult to breathe, even in the course of the atmospheric air, they immediately ascended but the afflicted creatures to whom they told their tale, still clinging to hope, disbelieved their report.

Wishful, therefore, to give as ample satisfaction as possible to the unhappy women, two other persons again went down. At thirty fathoms from the bottom, they found the air exceedingly warm. To exist without apoplectic symptoms for more than a few yards around the bottom of the shaft was found impossible and even there, the air was so contaminated as to be unfit for breathing. When they ascended, their clothes emitted a smell somewhat resembling the waters of Gilsand and Harrowgate but more practically allied to that of the turpentine distilled from coal tar.

The report of these last adventures partially succeeded in convincing the people that there was no probability of any sign of their friends being found alive. Some, indeed went away silent but not satisfied. Others, with pitiable opportunity, besought that measures to recover their friends might even yet be adopted and persevered in and many as if in grief and rage had some necessary connection, went away loading the conductors of the mine with execrations and threatening revenge. Some were even heard to say, that they could have borne their loss with fortitude, had none of the workmen survived the calamity. They could have been consoled if all their neighbours had been rendered as miserable and destitute as themselves.

For such a multitude, unanimity of sentiment could not be expected. No scheme of proceedings could be invented to meet with the approbation of the men all. In the evening of this day, it was therefore resolved to exclude the air from then entering the workings in order to extinguish the fire which the explosion had kindled in the mine and of which the smoke ascending the William Pit was a sure indication. Measures for effecting it were accordingly taken and after experiencing various disappointments from sundry accidents, they ultimately succeeded.

When the preparations were being made for the reopening of the mine, many idle tales circulated through the country concerning several of the men finding their way to the shafts and being recovered. Their number was circumstantially told, how they subsisted on candles, pats and beans, how they heard the persons who visited the mine on the day following the accident and the Wednesday following but were too feeble to speak sufficiently loud to make themselves heard. Some conjurer to, it is said, had set spells and divinations to work and penetrated the whole secrets of the mine. It was reported he had discovered one famishing group receiving drops of water from the roof of the mine, another eating their shoes and clothes and other such tales of misery. These inventions were carefully related to the widows and answered the purpose of every day harrowing up their sorrows afresh. Indeed, it seemed the chief employment of some to make a kind of insane sport of their own and their neighbour’s calamity.

On the morning appointed for the entering of the workings, (the mine having been previously opened) the distress of the neighbourhood was again renewed at an early hour. a great concourse of people collected, some out of curiosity, some to stir up revenge and aggravate the sorrows of relatives of the sufferers by calumnies and reproaches, published for the sole purpose of mischief but the greater part came with broken hearts and streaming eyes in expectation of seeing a father, a husband or son, brought out of the horrible pit.

As the weather was warm, and it was desirable that as much air as possible might pass down the shaft, constables were placed at proper distances to keep off the crowd. Two surgeons were also in attendance in case of accidents.

At six o’clock in the morning, eight persons decided the William Pit and began to explore the workings. as a current of water had been constantly diverted down this shaft for the space of ten hours, the air was found to be perfectly cool and wholesome. Light was now procured from steel mills. As the explosions had occasioned several falls of large masses of stone from the roof, the removing of them caused considerable delay. They found, however, one of the bodies.

When this corpse was to be lifted into a coffin, the men stood over it in speechless horror. They imagined it was in so putrid a state that it would fall asunder by lifting. At length, they encouraged each other to begin and after several hesitations and resolutions, they laid it ion a coffin which was conveyed to the shaft in a bier made for the purpose and drawn to the bank in a net made of strong cords.

The shifts of men employed in this doleful and unwholesome work were generally about eight in number. They were four hours in and eight hours out of the mine, each individual, therefore, wrought two shifts every twenty-four hours.

When the first of the men came up at ten o’clock, a message was sent for a number of coffins to be in readiness at the point. These, to the number of ninety-two (a most gloomy sight) being at the joiners shop, piled in a heap, had to pass by the village of Low Felling. as soon as the cartload of them was seen, the shrieks of the women, who hitherto continued n their houses but now began to assemble about their doors, came on the breeze in slow fitful gusts which presaged a scene of much distress and confusion being soon exhibited near the pit but happily by preventing to them the shocking appearance of a body that had been found, and the ill effects on their own bodies and minds likely to ensue from sufferings themselves, to be hurried away by such violent convulsions of grief, they either returned to their own houses or continued in silence in the neighbourhood of the pit.

Every family had made provision for the entertainment of their neighbours on the day the bodies of their friends were received and it had been generally given out that they intended to take the bodies to their own houses but Dr. Ramsey, having given his opinion that if such a proceeding, if carried into effect, might spread a putrid fever through the neighbourhood, and the first body when exposed to observation having a most horrid and corrupt appearance, they readily agreed to have them interred immediately after they were found. Permission, therefore, was s given to let the hearse, on its way to the chapel yard, pass by the door of the deceased.

From 8th July to the 19th September, the heart-rending scene of mothers and widows examining the putrid bodies of their sons and husbands, for marks by which to identify them, was almost daily renewed but very few of them were known by any personal mark. They were too much mangled and scorched to retain any of their features. Their clothes, tobacco boxes, shoes and the like were, therefore, the only marks by which they could be recognised. all the bodies except one were found.

Except for four, whoever were buried in single graves, the remains were interred in Heworth Chapel yard in a trench side by side, two coffins deep with a partition of brick and lime between every four coffins. Those entered as unknown in the burial register have had their names added to them since the search was discontinued.

The Reverend Hodgson offered consolation to the relatives of the victims and conducted the burial services. being close to the pitmen and their families, he knew the dangers of coal mining, The papers of the time were reluctant to pint accounts of colliery disasters and Hodgson, against the feelings of the coal owners, set out to make the Felling Disaster a widely known as possible with the hope of getting expert help in preventing similar disasters. He wrote for many weeks on the “Newcastle Courant” with an account of the disaster and plans to show how the mine was ventilated. This was published on 4th January 1813 and was widely circulated. Unknown to Hodgson it was printed in “Dr. Thompson’s Annals of Philosophy” and read by Mr. J.J. Wilkinson, a barrister of the Temple who, during his long vacation in 1813, he went to the north of England and consulted with is friends on the matter of safety in mines.

Those who lost their lives were:-

  • P Salt
  • John Knox was buried May 27 trapper
  • Robert Harrison waggon driver
  • John Harrison
  • George Ridley
  • Robert Hutchinson
  • Thomas Robson was buried July 8 putter
  • John Pearson [m] shifter
  • Philip Allan
  • Geo. Bainbridge, unknown
  • Isaac Greener was buried July 9 hewer
  • James Craigs was buried July 13
  • Edward Bell was buried July 15 horse-keeper
  • Ralph Harrison [m]
  • Matthew Brown [m] was buried July 16
  • James Kay
  • George Bell
  • Thomas Richardson
  • Henry Haswell
  • Joseph Anderson
  • Joseph Pringle
  • Dobson, unknown a boy
  • George Pearson
  • Robert Hall Gregory
  • Galley Benjamin Thompson was buried July 17 craneman
  • George Mitcheson
  • Matthew Pringle
  • Nicholas Urwin [m] braking inclined plane
  • John Wilson [m]
  • Thomas Young [m]
  • John Jacques, unknown
  • Edward Pearson
  • William Richardson
  • Christopher Culley
  • William Boutland crane on-setter
  • Jacob Allan Isaac Greener [m]
  • Thos. Bainbridge, unknown buried July 18
  • Matthew Bainbridge John Surtees
  • Ralph Hall
  • Paul Fletcher
  • William Galley
  • John Hunter
  • Thomas Bainbridge [m] was buried July 22
  • John Wood [m]
  • Jeremiah Turnbull [m]
  • John Haswell [m]
  • John Burnitt
  • George Culley
  • Joseph Wilson [m] July 23
  • John Boutland [m]
  • George Reay July 24
  • William Gardiner
  • Thomas Craggs [m]
  • Thomas Craggs
  • John Greener
  • Edward Richardson [m]
  • Robert Dobson
  • William Dixon [m] July 25
  • George Robson
  • Andrew Allan
  • John Thompson [m]
  • Thomas Bears [m]
  • Charles Wilson
  • Michael Gardiner [m]
  • James Comby [m]
  • Joseph Gordon
  • Robert Haswell [m]
  • Joseph Wood [m] was buried July 27
  • John Wilkinson [m]
  • John Turnbull [m]
  • Matthew Sanderson [m]
  • Robert Gordon [m]
  • Thomas Gordon
  • Christopher Mason [m]
  • Robert Gray Leck July 28
  • William Jacques [m]
  • William Hunter was buried July 29 deputy
  • Thomas Ridley
  • William Sanderson [m] July 30
  • George Lawton lamp-keeper
  • Michael Hunter
  • Edward Haswell buried Aug 1
  • Joseph Young buried Aug 3
  • George Kay buried Aug 26
  • Robert Pearson buried Sept 1
  • John Archibald Dobson Sept 19

On 1st September 1813, he published proposals for a “Society for the Prevention of Accidents in Coal Mines”. The proposals came to the notice of the Bishop of Durham who wrote to the Revered Dr. Gray who was Rector of Bishopsweirmouth, giving him permission to form such a society. a meeting was held at Sunderland on the 1st October 1813 when the Society was instituted and Committee appointed to carry out its objectives. The work of the Committee led to Davy developing his safety lamp.

 

REFERENCES
Annals of Coal Mining. Galloway, Vol. 1, p. 401.
A History of Coal Mining in Great Britain. Galloway, p. 157-8.
The account of the Branding Main Explosion. Rev. J. Hodgson.
Narrative of the Dreadful Occurrence at Felling Colliery (Nr. Durham) 15th May 1812. The Liverpool Religious Tract Society.
Great Pit Disasters Great Britain. 1700 to the present day. Helen and Baron Duckham.

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

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