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	Individual Details		Individual Details

Age:	15
Died:	6th Feb 1861
Accident:	6th Feb 1861
Year Born:	abt. 1846
Colliery:	Brereton
Company:	Earl of Shrewsbury
Occupation:	Collier
Notes:	Explosion of firedamp in the shaft
Buried:	[not known]
Category:

Explosions.

Thirteen deaths were caused by explosions in 1861, which was slightly below the average of the last six years, but was greatly augmented by a lamentable occurrence at the Brereton collieries, near Rugeley, No. 20 in the list, which resulted in the loss of seven lives. This accident illustrates the necessity of employing competent men to supervise the working of mines, and of carefully maintaining a complete and uninterrupted ventilation in every part of the workings by artificial means. The presence of gas in this mine had only been detected in a few instances previous to, and some considerable time before the accident. Owing to a fault having been struck, water had inundated the lower seams, and was known to be gradually rising higher. A few days before the explosion occurred, the water had cut off all communication between the shaft in which the accident happened and the adjoining shaft, by means of which the sump had previously been ventilated. The managers were all aware of the interruption of the ventilation, but no steps were taken for the purpose of restoring it, nor were safety lamps used even to examine the workings, as directed by special rule 17, although the manager who had the general oversight of this and other pits had intimated, on the water rising so as to cut off the communication, that "gas might accumulate underneath the scaffold which covered the sump, and that it would be necessary to be careful." The underground manager of the pit stated at the inquest that he had never employed a "safety lamp," and did not even understand its use. The explosion took place shortly after the workings had been visited by the latter. The scaffold was blown completely out and shattered to pieces ; two bodies were found in the sump and the others in the workings near the shaft. Only one body showed any signs of having been burnt, that of the man employed on the scaffold, and it was evident that explosive gas had accumulated underneath in the sump, as the manager had apprehended might be the case, that it escaped through the scaffold as the dirt was being removed from it, and fired at the workman's candle. The after-damp had suffocated the five persons found dead in the headways. This explanation of the cause of the accident was assented to by all connected with the mine. No artificial means of ventilation whatever had been provided.

At the inquest I strongly condemned the too prevalent practice of depending alone on natural ventilation, which in my judgment was, not only in this case but in many others, inadequate and not to be relied upon. At the conclusion of the inquiry I took the opportunity to urge the general adoption of furnace or other artificial means of ventilation.

The jury, in returning a verdict of "accidental death," added, "that the deceased persons met with their death through an explosion of firedamp occasioned by an accumulation of gas under the stage or scaffold, which would have been prevented by having the pits properly ventilated."

Subsequently the general mine agent and the underground manager were summoned before the magistrates and fined — the former for a violation of the 1st general rule, in the sum of £10, and the latter, for infringement of special rules 3 and 17, £20, and one shilling, with the addition of the costs in each case. These fines were, by the direction of the then Secretary of State for the Home Department (Sir G. C. Lewis), distributed among the families of those persons who had lost their lives by the explosion, in which distribution I was kindly assisted by J. Whitgreave, Esq., one oЈ the justices who adjudicated on the cases.

Pub. Date	Article (Newspaper)
1861	Fatal Colliery Accidents (Annual Register for 1861)

• 1861 Mines Inspectors Report, by James P. Baker, H.M. Inspector of Mines, Page: 88
• 1861 Mines Inspectors Report, by James P. Baker, H.M. Inspector of Mines, Page: 97, Accident Number: 20

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