Mr. Buddle on Mining Records. 331 



the back overman, one hewer, and four trappers, and another boy died soon 

 afterwards of the burning, and other injuries which he had received. 



This accident was occasioned by Forster, the overman, drawing the props 

 out of a board in the back pillar, when a fall of the roof took place, which 

 brought down a blower, the discharge of gas from which overpowered the 

 ventilation, and fired at the barrow-way lamps, or candles of some of the 

 people. 



The cause of this accident being clearly understood, it did not long de- 

 lay the working of the colliery, particularly as from its happening in a 

 circumscribed district of the workings, it did little injury underground. 



After this accident no more props were allowed to be drawn while the 

 pits were working, and the colliery was worked with great success, parti- 

 cularly after the C and D Pits came into operation, in 1790. 



No more lives were lost by explosions, until the 3d of Sept., 1803, when 

 13 men and boys were killed, and nearly 20 were burnt and injured, by a 

 heavy fire in the C Pit. 



This explosion was occasioned by a bag of foulness breaking down from 

 the roof in the back pillars of one of the sheihs behind the men, and the gas 

 fired at a lamp in the going headways' course. The working boards were 

 just turned away out of this headway's course, and the fire from the explo- 

 sion sweeping along it, struck all the people who were working in its 

 range. The workings were very dry and dusty, and the survivors, who 

 were the most distant from the point of explosion, were burnt by the 

 shower of red-hot sparks of the ignited dust, which were driven along by 

 the force of the explosion. The greater number of the sufferers perished 

 by suffocation. The overman who was in charge at the time, and who 

 survived the accident, stated that shortly before the accident happened, he 

 heard a heavy rumble, like distant thunder, but thought it was a fall in 

 the waste, and did not apprehend any danger from it. 



No more fatal accidents by fire happened after this, until the 5th Au- 

 gust, 1818, although the working of pillars commenced in 1810, and seve- 

 ral extensive creeps took place subsequently, and steel mills were very 

 extensively used from that time, till the invention of the safety lamp, by 

 Sir H. Davy, in 1815. 



