The pit went up li shook houses for 361 men, boys an
children o’t dark. Lord Ashton tried to change things but t’owners bullied Parliament to pull report’s teeth.
“The 1842 Act would’ve saved only 10 kids that terrible day.
“There were only one inspector to enforce it so it was worth t’owners’ while to ignore it. There were always families desperate for money and women and children left weeping and starving.”
Modern-day ex-miners explain the dangers. Paul Darlow says: “Methane gas is in little fissures and it escapes all the time. In a confined place like a coal mine it’d be like being in the barrel of a gun.”
Fellow ex-miner Paul Hardman adds: “When it explodes, it produces other gases. The main one is carbon monoxide, which will kill you pretty rapidly.”
At 1.20pm that Wednesday, with only an hour of the shift to go, a massive explosion ripped through the workings. The earth shook and dense columns of smoke and debris flew into the air.
Victoria Munro speaks: “When t’pit went up it were like a volcano. It shook all t’houses for miles around. Houses emptied and we ran – wives, mothers, babes in arms, toddlers dragged to t’pit top with smoke, flames and charred wood rising, cages blown away.”
She adds: “Some poor wretch were brought up burned black, hair singed off his head, body blistered, hands and arms skinned. His cries when t’cold air reached his skin were excruciating. And I saw my friend Kitty, when she heard his voice, her horror, her agony, screaming, ‘Oh me poor lad. Me poor dear Tommy’.”
Kitty wails: “Please, not mine. My Tom! Is he in heaven or hell? Or is he a bro twisted, half-melted man that’ll n walk again?” Taking up the narrative adds: “I were at home wi’ t’youngest of my eight when t’Oaks exploded.
“It blasted coal from deep in t’earth up to t’sky, turning clouds ghastly grey and dropping its terrible death-laden soot on to t’farmers in Cudworth as they stood terrified in their frozen fields, as far as five miles away, they said.
“Black snow. Strange, silky soft, bloody, a touch of hell to make thee tremble. A black-hearted, deathly day.”
As the tragedy moved into its sec day, rescuers such as William Ward KIT WAS
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