Tweet

September 3. — The owners of Percy Main colliery, accompanied by a great number of the neighbouring gentlemen, and the workmen belonging to the colliery, walked in procession with the first wagon load of coals from the winning to the staith at Whitehill point upon the river Tyne. On their arrival at the staith, the wagon was taken to the spout, where a ship was in readiness to receive the coal, into which they were immediately discharged. At the instant of the coal being delivered, a salute of artillery was fired, and the band played "The Keel Row." The company then formed a circle, when "Success to Percy Main" was drunk with three times three cheers. The procession then returned to the winning, where a plentiful dinner was prepared, which the company, consisting of 150 gentlemen, sat down to, at one table, under a covering erected for the purpose. The workmen were also plentifully regaled with beef and plum pudding, and they amused themselves with music and dancing till a late hour. [LHTB]

November 15. — About eleven o'clock at night, an alarming fire was discovered to have broken out in the steam-engine and boring mill, at the extensive iron works of Messrs. Hawks and Co., near Gateshead. From the violence of the flames, great fears were entertained that the whole premises would have been consumed, but from the calmness of the evening, and the strenuous exertions of the firemen, aided by the public, their ravages wre confined to the building first attacked. [LRS]

 

 

 

• LHTB — Local Historian's Table Book of Remarkable Occurrences Connected with the Counties of Newcastle-Upon-Tyne, Northumberland and Durham by M.A. Richardson. Published in five volumes in 1844.
• LRS — Local Records or Historical Register of Remarkable Events by John Sykes, Published in 1833 in two volumes