Newbottle Colliery Dolly Pit Explosion – Newbottle – 1824

NEWBOTTLE. Dolly Pit. 19th. November, 1824.

The explosion caused the deaths of eleven men, including eight overmen and wastemen. Three others, out of the five who descended in search of the bodies, became victims of the afterdamp and lost their lives. The shaft was divided by brattice which was blown out by the force of the explosion and fell to the bottom of the pit.

Those who died were:

• William Farley.
• Matthew Armstrong.
• John Scott.
• Thomas Watchman.
• Henry Thornton.
• Thomas Charlton.
• John Anderson.
• William Smith.
• George Johnson.
• Edward Hodgson.
• Benjamin Moody.

They left ten widows and about fifty children fatherless.

REFERENCES
Annals of Coal Mining. Galloway, Vol.1, p.496.
Sykes’ Local Records.
Durham County Advertiser.

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