553.28 109 
III 
Natural Gas in Sussex ! 
N introducing my subject, I do not think it necessary to make 
any elaborate references to instances of discoveries of Natural 
Gas in England and abroad. Suffice it to say, that manifestations 
of natural inflammable gas have occurred in almost every country 
and geological formation throughout the world, and have frequently 
been put to practical use. 
I will, however, mention what seems to have been one instance 
of its appearance in London, quaintly recorded by one, Mathew 
Paris, about the year 1256. Under the head of ‘A Sudden 
Subterranean Explosion, the chronicler says, “About this time, 
as some workmen were digging out the bed of an aqueduct in 
London, to -clear the bed of mud (for the water had ceased to 
flow) a sudden explosion burst forth from the ground accompanied 
by a flame similar to the fire of hell, which, in the twinkling of 
an eye suffocated several of the workmen, killing one of them 
on the spot, and so burning, maiming and disfiguring others that 
they were entirely useless to themselves ever afterwards. There 
were some who said that this explosion occurred as by a miracle, 
because those men were engaged in servile work at an improper 
hour in the evening.” (It quite sounds as if the Factory Acts had 
been anticipated in these days.) 
This interesting record has a somewhat similar parallel in the 
County of Sussex, and I may quote it for the benefit of well-sinkers 
personally, and master well-sinkers who may come within the pro- 
visions of the Employers’ Liability Acts. 
I am indebted for the account to Mr Henry Nicholls of Deal, an 
owner of property at Hawkhurst in West Sussex. He states that 
between the years 1836 and 1840 a well was sunk at Hawkhurst 
to a depth of 98 feet. After passing through a certain amount of 
heavy sand, a blue clay of a very oily flaky nature was met with, 
mixed with yellow and red streaky clay. This continued to the 
bottom of the 98 feet. An artesian boring was then commenced, 
the workmen working by candle-light. Having bored some 50 feet 
more, or 148 feet from the surface, the augur struck a rock and fell 
1 A paper read at the Conference of the South-Eastern Union of Scientific Societies, 
Town Hall, Croydon, June 3, 1898. 
