History man digs up a tale of tragedy from pit
‘I feel like I don’t want to leave house’
ALOCAL historian has uncovered a mining disaster which killed three young boys in Rochdale.
Clive Seal, 57, has discovered that three young boys drowned at the old Clapgate colliery in Norden, on July 4, 1838.
On the day, a thunderstorm passed over parts of Yorkshire and Lancashire - the storm was the also cause of an accident at Huskar Colliery in Silkstone, near Barnsley which killed 26 children.
The same storm also caused the deaths of Abraham Grindrod, 11, Samuel Dearden, 9, and Abraham Shepherd, 11, as they became trapped underground by the rising waters.
After a public outcry over the Huskar Pit disaster an inquiry was set up which led to the Mines and Collieries Act 1842, which banned women from working underground and raised the minimum age of work for boys to 10.
Clive, who worked as a miner for 24 years starting in 1980, said that the local three boys had been lost to history compared to the Yorkshire children who have been commemorated with a memorial.
He said: “There was only one paper that even named them and there was no mention of the rescue.
“Surely the lives of three children are worth more than a paragraph so I just tried to dig a bit deeper.
“I only found out little snippets and we know very little about the lads themselves. There’s no record of the graveyard anymore so there’s not even a gravestone to look at so these three boys have been lost to history.
“Considering that 26 children died in Yorkshire and there’s a massive obelisk in a graveyard and mining legislation came out of it, you think why did they forget the three kids that came out of Norden?
“It’s sad really that they’ve died without a trace so it’s just a case of trying to get some recognition for them.”
Clive found out that the colliery was owned by William and Ralph Turner, who also owned the adjacent Black Pits Mill, and that the boys were buried in St Chad’s Church.
He speculates that the boys’ fate may have been swept under the carpet to protect the Turners reputation or simply that the boys were too insignificant to mention.
“You can’t really prove anything,” said Clive, who is originally from Rawtenstall but who now lives in Penrith, Cumbria.
“You can surmise that it was swept under the carpet because it was embarrassing. There was a massive public outcry in Yorkshire so they probably didn’t want any repercussions for themselves.
“Either that or they were local working class kids, so who cares?”
Despite there being a passing mention in only one newspaper to the boys’ fate, the damage to the mill, 700 looms destroyed and £10,000 worth of damage, is reported.
Clive, a keen mining historian since he was 14 who regularly researches mining history in Rossendale and the surrounding areas, added that he would like to see the boys commemorated in some way in Norden.
He said: “It would be nice to get some recognition for the three young lads, even if it was just a brass plate on a park bench.
“These boys died on the same day as the others which led to the 1842 Miners Regulation Act that forbade all women from working and raised the age of boys to ten.
“These young lads in Rochdale died in the same flood but they’re not remembered so it would be nice to get them recognised that they existed.” »
RESIDENTS in a quiet Rochdale neighbourhood have been left terrified after their street was the scene of a sickening machete attack.
Neighbours who saw police officers swarm their street ‘within a minute’ of the attack have been left fearing ‘retaliation’.
A 73-year-old woman told the Observer: “It’s really left me feeling like I don’t want to leave the house.
“I’m sure someone willing to attack a 21-year-old man with machetes wouldn’t think twice about knocking someone like me over to get to them.”
Another young man, who lives nearby and wished not to be named, said: “Things like this never happen in this part of Rochdale, we get the odd car crash here because it’s a busy road, but that’s it.
“There were cops here within a minute of it happening.”