April 24, 1914.

THE COLLIERY GUARDIAN.

905

lie tafo

AND

Journal of the Coal and Iron Trades.

Joint Editors—

J. V. ELSDEN, D.Sc. (Loud.), F.G.S.

HUBERT GREENWELL, F.S.S., Assoc.M.I.M.E.

LONDON, FRIDAY, APRIL 24, 1914.

The pits in the Yorkshire area have now resumed
their normal aspect, as, despite slight hitches, the
whole of the men returned to work during the week.
The complete county strike extended over a period of
three weeks, whilst the stoppage at the pits in South
Yorkshire, where the dispute was first raised, con-
tinued for 10 weeks. . One estimate of the probable
loss to the miners and to-the industry has been given
at £5,000,000.

The reports of Mr. R. A. S. Redmayne, Chief
Inspector of Mines, as Commissioner, and Messrs.
Evan Williams- and Robert Smillie, as assessors, in
the enquiry instituted by the Home Office into the
explosion which occurred at the Senghenydd Colliery
on October 14 last, have been published in a Blue
Book [Cd. 7346"], Mr. Redmayne expresses the
belief that the explosion originated probably on the
Mafeking incline, and states that the only apparent
means of ignition would be sparks from the electric
signalling apparatus or from rocks brought down by
heavy falls. Mr. Redmayne regrets that the plan of
-excluding sparking altogether was not adopted, and
-expressed astonishment that the management should
have faced the risk that the sparks produced by the
-electric signalling apparatus might have ignited gas
in view of the Bed was explosion of March 27, 1912.
Mr. Williams’s report disagrees with that of Mr.
Redmayne on several material points, whilst Mr.
Smillie, though agreeing in the main with the
Commissioner, gives reasons for thinking that more
lives might have been saved.

An unfortunate feature of the past few days has
been the serious damage done to colliery property by
fires. One fire in Northumberland broke out in the
workings, but two others—one at Tamworth, in
which the estimated damage was £4,000, and the
second in Lanarkshire, estimated to have cost £3,000
—occurred at the pithead.

A conference of representatives of the Midland
Counties Coalowners’ Association and of the Notts
Miners’ Association was held at Nottingham, on
Wednesday. The proceedings were ultimately
adj ourned.

The North Wales coal dispute was settled on
Saturday. At a conference of owners and men held
at Wrexham the men agreed to withdraw their
notices, to accept the masters’ terms, and to abandon
their appeal to the House of Lords respecting fillers’
wages under the Minimum Wage Act.

Lord Balfour of Burleigh presided as neutral
-chairman at a meeting in Glasgow, on Friday, of the
Scottish Coal Trade Conciliation Board, to consider
the claim by the coalmasters for a reduction of 25 per
-cent, on the miners’ wages on the 1888 basis. His
lordship reserved his decision.

The important conference of the joint executives
of the Miners’ Federation of Great Britain, the
National Union of Railwaymen and the Transport
Workers’ Federation was held in London yesterday
ito consider the possibility of a working agreement in
'trade union affairs. Such an agreement the meeting
-considered desirable, and a committee was appointed
to go into the matter.

A new Central School of Science and Technology
for the Potteries was opened at Stoke on Monday
by Mr. J. A. Pease, President of the Board of
.Education.

The Court of Appeal on Tuesday dismissed the
.-appeal of the. General Mercantile Shipping Com-
pany Limited from a judgment of Mr. Justice
Scrutton on a point in the interpretation of a charter-
party. His lordship had held that on the evidence
the defendants’ vessel was “ ready to load ” a cargo,
notwithstanding that when tendered to the charterers
she had a large quantity of coal stored on deck.
The coal had formed part of the outward cargo and
was bought by the shipowner as. bunker coal for the
homeward voyage.

The Railway and Canal Commission on Monday
and Tuesday heard proceedings in connection with
an action brought by a number of well-known
trading companies against several of the principal
railway companies with regard to the legality and
validity of increased traffic rates. The court reserved
its decision.

In another column of this issue will be found the
text of the new Safety Lamp Order.

The Home Office has issued an advance proof of
the tables relating to the output of coal and other
minerals in the United Kingdom during 1913. The
output of coal, which was 260,398,578 tons in 1912,
rose last year to 287,411,869 tons, the highest total
on record. There were 1,127,890 persons employed
at mines under the Coal Mines Act, an increase of
38,800 on the previous year. The increase in the
output of coal is at the rate of 10*37 per cent., the
increase in the number persons employed at the rate
of 3*56 per cent.

The Lydney and Crump Meadow Colliery Company,
Dean Forest, were fined £10 and costs on Friday for
contraventions of the Coal Mines Act. The summons
was a sequel to a recent fatal accident at the colliery.

■ In the course of a paper read before the South
Staffordshire and Warwickshire Institute of Mining
Engineers at Birmingham on Monday, Mr. N.
Forrest gave an interesting description of the
methods adopted in proving the western boundary
fault at the Holly Bank Colliery.

The London coal trade during the week has been
unusually slow. Merchants and factors are distinctly
refraining from buying. The warm weather checks
consumption. Public prices have been reduced.

The settlement of the Yorkshire minimum wage
dispute, the very warm weather, and the re-starting
of pits after the Easter holidays, were the chief
factors affecting the provincial markets during the
past week. The prompt market on the Tyne and
Wear has again been quiet, though in the former
case business was more animated towards the end of
the week. Throughout Lancashire and Yorkshire
business is on the quiet side, and prices have returned
to normal figures. In Derbyshire, however, a brisk
demand has been maintained. The Cardiff market
has been rather featureless, but prices have been
maintained. Business in Scotland can be termed
satisfactory.^

The second reading of the Coal Mines Bill has
been deferred until Monday. The same stage of the
Coal Mines (Surface Eight Hours) Bill will be taken
on Thursday next.

A Bill to make better provision for carrying into
effect the Railway and Canal Traffic Acts, 1854 to
1913, has been introduced by Mr. Barnston.

The paper read by Mr. Forrest
Th© Slew before the South Staffordshire and
Developments Warwickshire Institute'of Mining
at Engineerswill be read with interest
Holly Bank, by all who are following the ques-
tion of the development of our
concealed coalfields. The work recently carried out
at Holly Bank is important, both from a geological
and technical standpoint. Geologically, it furnishes
a direct proof of the amount of throw of the western
boundary fault. Technically, it establishes the
soundness of judgment which led to the adoption of
the course pursued in the penetration of the fault.
A drift was cut along the Eight-feet seam in the
direction of the dip on the upthrow side of the
boundary fault. This drift penetrated a considerable
thickness (80 yards) of barren ground or fault rock
before the downthrow side of the fault was reached.
Driving ahead into the Etruria marls to a distance of
250 yards a vertical shaft was sunk, and the Eight-feet
seam was recovered 327 yards below. This methodis
clearly more certain than a steep drift, and although
two sides of a triangle are greater than the third, the
longer route, in such cases as this, must prove more
economical in the end, for reasons which the author
sufficiently explains in his paper, and also because
a steep drift would run a considerable chance of
missing its objective.

The author states that the downthrow of the
Western Boundary Fault increases in a southerly

direction from 350 yards at Holly Bank to 750 yards
at Ashmore Park Colliery. This fact is important to
bear in mind with regard .to future developments.
The sub-triassic area to the west of the South
Staffordshire coalfield is gradually being explored.
We have already the Claverley boring 5| miles
beyond the boundary fault, where productive coal
measures have been found and coal has also been
proved at Four Ashes. But it must not be
assumed that a continuous coalfield extends over all
this area. There is some possibility that the coal
proved at Claverley belongs to the Forest of Wyre
area, or it may form part of a detached area of its
own. Upon this point Dr. Newell Arber has lately
advanced a theory to which we may be able to refer
at greater length on a future occasion. In the mean-
time it is interesting to note that another deep bore-
hole is in contemplation in the Severn Valley, and the
information that will thus be afforded cannot fail to
throw light upon this interesting point.

It is to the Prussian Firedamp Com-
Coaldust mission that credit must be given for
Treatment the earliest recognition of the power
In Germany, of coaldust and air to form an
explosive mixture even in the
absence of firedamp. This was in the year 1884,
and since that time experimental work has been
persistently carried out at testing stations at Neun-
kirchen in the Saarbriicken district, at Gelsenkirchen
in Westphalia, andatBeuthen in Upper Silesia. Asa
practical result of these investigations, precautionary
measures of various kinds have long been adopted
in German mines:—with encouraging results to this
extent at least that, despite the presence of conditions
particularly favourable to the formation of dust of a
dangerous kind, true coaldust explosions have been
comparatively rare. This result has been achieved
in part by official regulations designed to limit the
production of dust, and in part by legislative and
voluntary efforts to deal effectively with this evil.
There seems, in fact, to have been a conspicuous
desire in Germany for co-operation between the
authorities on the one hand and the mineowners on
the other hand, and this tendency appears to have
been mutually encouraged by some obscure and
esoteric process.

It would be worth while endeavouring to discover
the inner reasons for the existence of this spirit of
co-operation in a country in which it is generally
believed that officialdom and State regulation are
characteristic and prominent features of industrial
life. Perhaps one circumstance which has contributed
to this harmonious spirit may be found in the
liberality with which special dispensations are given
in cases where rules' prove to be onerous, imprac-
ticable, or technically inadvisable.

Notwithstanding a multiplicity of legal restrictions,
these are in practice less rigid than they seem. Thus
although the sprinkling method of allaying dust is,
with few exceptions, enforced over the whole of
Germany as a general rule, the installation of
sprinkling plants is not rendered compulsory in cases
where circumstances point to its being either unneces-
sary or undesirable for technical reasons. There is
thus a considerable amount of freedom in German
mines, contributing to the desirable result that
friction is greatly diminished.

It has long been recognised, however, that
sprinkling with' water is not always effective, partly
because of the high temperatures prevailing in many
mines and partly on account of the rock troubles
that sometimes arise from the use of this method.
The German mineowners have therefore followed with
keen interest the researches carried out in recent years
in other countries, and especially the results obtained
at Rossitz in Austria, at Lievin in France, and at
Altofts and Eskmeals in this country. This interest
has not been by any means of a passive kind. Colliery
owners have been eager to experiment with zone
systems, both simple and concentrated, with water
curtains and with specially constructed extinguishers
of various types. Thus solutions of hygroscopic
salts have been extensively tried, with rather contra-
dictory results, and several mines have experimented
with the spray nozzle system. In the latter case it-