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Full Details

Surname
SMITH
Forename
Clifford
Day
09
Month
11
Year
1948
Age
45
Occupation
Mine/Quarry Name
Goldthorpe
Mineral Worked
Coal
Owner
National Coal Board
Location
Goldthorpe
County
Yorkshire WR
Details of Event
Yorkshire Post & Leeds Intelligencer, 10/11/1948. Killed at New Job: Clifford Smith (45), of Barnsley Road, Goldthorpe, near Mexborough, closed his own business as an electrician a few months ago to become a miner at Goldthorpe Colliery. Yesterday, after finishing his shift, he was struck by a run of tubs while leaving the pit by the main travelling road and sustained injuries from which he died later at Mexborough Hospital. He was a married man with three children. Goldthorpe pit, which was a drift mine; that is it had no shaft, the way to the pit bottom was down a tunnel which was on a gradient which the miners walked down and left the pit by same way by walking up the gradient. Coal was brought to the surface by a conveyor belt and the waste came out in a small wagon called a tub, these ran on rails like railway lines and held about one ton of slate and rubbish, the tub itself weighed about a ton these were pulled up to the surface by wrapping a chain around a wire rope the wire rope was a continuous loop around a motor driven pulley at the pit top and around a free pulley at the pit bottom these were sent down to the pit bottom by taking off the chain and putting a metal bar in the wheels to lock the wheels (these were called lockers) one was put in every third tub and the tubs skidded down to the pit bottom. For some reason some of these lockers were missing or had not been put in wheels, and they came down too fast the tubs left the rails and were bouncing all over the tunnel. Uncle Cliff was caught in these and had many bones broken and many cuts in fact had just about severed one arm and one leg and had severe internal injuries he lived for about 4 hours after the accident, he was buried in Bolton cemetery.