December 24, 1915.

THE COLLIERY GUARDIAN

1303

although miners’ wages had advanced, that advance had
been more than swallowed up by the rise in the cost of
living.

At Blyth, on Tuesday, Robert Ornsby, agent to the Seaton
Delaval Coal Company, and John Tweddell, colliery
manager, were charged, at the instance of the Home Office,
with having infringed the Coal Mines Act by failing to keep
a sufficient supply of timber in the main coal seam of the
Relief pit, Seaton Delaval; with having allowed workmen
to go to parts of the pit which had not been reported safe,
or examined ; and with having failed to withdraw workmen
from a part of the mine found to be dangerous. The offences
were alleged to have been committed on various dates in
September. Mr. Edward Clark, appearing on behalf of the
Director of Public Prosecutions, said that the Home Office
regarded the offence as a very serious one. It was the duty
of some under official to take the necessary quantity of
timber and place it within 10 yds. of the working places.
It was virtually a continuous offence, and 80 summonses
might have been taken out. In time of war, there might be
great difficulty -in getting the necessary timber or other
material to carry on the work of the mine, admitted Mr.
Clark, but, if Mr. Ornsby could not get it, -it was the duty
of the owners to close the mine until they could. They
worked a mine when they were not in a position to comply
with the Act. The .authorities had received a letter from
the Seaton Delaval Coal Company, signed by Mr. Ornsby,
explaining that, shortly after the outbreak of war, they
bought some timber near Morpeth, and otherwise secured
for themselves a supply of home-grown timber, as foreign
props could only be obtained occasionally. Up to
September 30 they had three sources of supply and, as a
matter of fact, trees were at that time lying at Morpeth
station, and these had ultimately to be cut up by their
joiners and carried away by their own lorry.—Mr. J. R. R.
Wilson, chief inspector of mines, gave evidence, and
admitted that, owing to the absence of -a quarter of a million
men from the mines, a decrease in the output of three
million tons of coal per month had occurred, and that owners
were asked by the Government to increase the output. Mr.
Holmes, for defendants, suggested to witness that there was
sufficient timber at Delaval, except in 7 ft. and 9ft. pieces,
and witness eaid there might be sufficient at other pits, but
apparently there was not sufficient at this pit. He agreed
with Mr. Holmes, however, that colliery managements were
in a difficult position in having to keep up the output and
at the same time contend with the timber shortage.—Mr.
J. H. B. Forster, managing director of the Weardale Steel,
Coal and Coke Company Limited, and general manager of
the Easington and Wingate collieries, was called to prove
the difficulty experienced in securing timber supplies.—Mr.
Holmes asked the Bench not to convict, in view of the
exceptional circumstances, and the magistrates found that
Mr. Ornsby was not liable, and dismissed the case against
him.—Mr. Tweddell gave evidence, and said he was satisfied
that there was no actual want of safety.—The Bench, how-
ever, decided to convict him on three charges, and imposed
a fine of £10 in one case, and Is. each in the other two
cases. The remaining charges were adjourned sine die.

Yorkshire.

Wharncliffe War Relief Fund.

The Wharnecliffe Silkstone Colliery War Relief Fund
shows that the amount deducted from the workmen’s wages
has been £1,312, and the colliery company have added £1,077,
making £2,390. Dependants have received £2,312, and there
is a balance of £77. At the present time the committee have
on the list for payment 59 wives, 128 children, and 12 other
dependants. Altogether they have dealt with 87 cases.

Lancashire and Cheshire.

Mysterious Colliery Fire—Accident Caused by Carelessness
Lamps in Mines: Home Office Prosecution—Another
Colliery Subsidence Case.

More pit brow lasses, to replace the young men who have
enlisted, are to be engaged at various collieries in the South,
South-East, and South-West Lancashire coal fields. It is
stated that there are some 2,000 females working on the
pit brows in Lancashire.

Considerable damage was caused by a mysterious outbreak
of fire at the Wigan Junction Colliery, belonging to the Moss
Hall Collieries Limited, Abram, on Saturday night, the
whole of a large surface engine house being gutted, and the
machinery inside rendered useless. Only one man, a fireman,
named Dodd, was in the pit at the time. The Hindley
Council fire brigade, with hose and apparatus, arrived, and
worked strenuously to save the headgear and surrounding
buildings and coal tips, there being plenty of water available
from the colliery lodge. The Wigan Junction Colliery
employs some 250 men, and these will be found immediate
employment at neighbouring collieries belonging to the same
firm.

In the presence of many miners and their leaders and
colliery officials, last Saturday afternoon at Bolton, the
Earl of Derby inspected the fleet of 20 well-equipped motor
ambulance carriages, part of the convoy which the Lanca-
shire and Cheshire Coal Owners’ Association, in conjunction
with the Lancashire and Cheshire Miners’ Federation, are
presenting to the Red Cross Society and St. John Association,
for service at the front. Mr. Thomas Greenall, J.P.,
president of the Lancashire and Cheshire Miners’ Federation,
who presided, in a short address, observed that the co-al
owners and miners had undertaken to subscribe £18,000
each towards the convoy, which would comprise 50 motor
ambulances, four motor lorries, four staff cars-, six motor-
cycles, etc. On Sunday the ambulances split up into
sections, and made -a tour of the various mining districts of
Lancashire and Cheshire. The other ambulance cars will
be completed early in the new year.

A Golborne coroner’s jury enquired last week into the
death of Thomas Atkinson, a belt chargeman, who had been
employed at the Golborne Colliery of Messrs. Richard Evans
and Company.—Margaret Unsworth, lever attendant at the
Golborne Colliery screens, said that on the previous Friday
the clutch was slipping, and she could not lower the belt.
Deceased, who was near, got on the machinery guard fence,
and threw dust on the clutch. The clutch still slipped, how-
ever, and deceased bent down under the revolving shafting,
apparently to get more dust. When witness looked again,
she saw deceased lying across the revolving shaft. — John
McGann, surface foreman, in answer to Mr. F. N. Siddall.
H.M. inspector of mines, said he was aware that deceased
put dust into the clutch, but he did not know he stood on
the top of the fence. He ought not to have done that, and
was taking a risk, especially with clothing hanging about

him. Witness stated, in answer to the coroner, that less oil
might be used by the man who oiled the machinery. When
the clutch was slipping, the thing to do was to stop the
machinery, and wipe the clutch, and he had given instruc-
tions for that to be done.—Mr. Siddall said the shaft in this
case was well fenced, and put in a position as inaccessible
as possible. Nobody could have even touched the shaft,
and the accident would not have happened if the deceased
had not stood on the fence, and even then it would not have
happened if he had not put his head between the fence and
the wall.—A verdict of “Accidental death ’’ was returned.

At the Darwen Police Court last week, William Ashworth,
manager of the Top-o’-th’-Mcadow Colliery, Hoddlesden, was
summoned for having permitted a light other than a locked
safety lamp of an approved type to be used for the inspection
of a mine in which inflammable gas had been known to exist,
and for permitting a light other than a locked safety lamp
to be used in a place in which there was likely to be such a
quantity of inflammable gas as would render a naked light
dangerous. James Wolfenden, fireman at the colliery, was
summoned for negligently committing an act likely to
endanger life and limb in that, having found a quantity of
inflammable gas in a certain workplace, he allowed a dataller,
named Sandham, to approach the place with a naked light,
and instructed him to repair the brattice, without personally
clearing and superintending the clearance of the inflammable
gas.—Mr. A. D. Nicholson, H.M. inspector of mines, prose-
cuted on behalf of the Home Office, and said that on
October 8 last, inflammable gas was reported in a section of
the working at the colliery. Wolfenden saw Sandham going
to his work with a naked light, and warned him to put it
out when he reached a certain point 25 yds. away from the
place where the gas was discovered. Sandham, however,
had disregarded this warning, and he had gone to the place
with his naked light, and, as a result, there was an explo-
sion, in which Sandham was so badly injured that he died.
—Mr. Fielding, for Wolfenden, contended that the accident
was not caused by any wilful negligence on the part of the
fireman. If Sandham had carried out the instructions given
to him by Wolfenden, there would have been no accident.
Wolfenden had been employed by Messrs. J. Place and Sons,
the colliery owners, for over 30 years.—In the cases against
Mr. Ashworth (the manager), defendant said that since the
accident the approved type of lamp had been used. The mine
was not regarded as a dangerous one, and no gas had been
found since the accident, and very little previously.—
Ashworth was fined 20s. in each case, and Wolfenden 20s. ’

In the Chancery Court for the County Palatine of
Lancaster, sitting at Liverpool on Tuesday and Wednesday,
December 14 and 15, the vice-chancellor, Mr. Stewiart
Smith, K.C., tried an action brought by John Henry
Andrew, the owner of two plots of land and 21 houses in
Providence-street, Little Hulton, near Bolton, against the
Earl of Ellesmere for an injunction and damages -in respect
of injury caused by mining subsidence. The defendant is
the executor of the third Earl of Ellesmere, the owner of
the minerals beneath the plaintiff’s property. Prior to 1902
the Cannel mine was worked by the Bridgewater Trustees,
and in 1907 it was leased to Roscoe and Sons, who have
since worked it. At different periods damage due to the
sinking of the ground has showm itself on the plaintiff’s
buildings, and in 1891 and 1910 the cost of repairs was
borne by the Earl of Ellesmere. The claim in the present
proceedings related to further damages for subsidence, which
has been observed since the end of 1912, which plaintiff’s
mining advisers attributed partly to the workings by Messrs.
Roscoe, who have been dismissed from the action on pay-
ment of £150, and partly to the workings by the Bridgewater
Trustees. The defendant has undertaken to be responsible
for the Trustees if the Court should decide that they are
liable, but the case put forward on his behalf was that the
effect of the Bridgewater workings had ceased before the
period covered by the claim, and that the plaintiff had no
cause of action aga-inst them.—Mr. James Tonge, mining
engineer and surveyor, giving evidence, said he was called
in by the plaintiff in December 1912, and -inspected the
property, and in February 1913 he made a report. The main
cracks and breakages appeared to be comparatively recent,
within the past two or three years, but there were some of
very old date. The walls must have been bolted many years
previously, because the movement had brought the brickwork
almost in a line with the nuts at the ends of the bolts.
There was considerable lowering of the ground due to the
removal of coal below. At the Bridgewater offices he saw
the plan of the Roscoe workings in the Cannel, and also
plans of the Plodder and the Yard seams below it, and he
came to the conclusion that the Roscoe workings were the
cause of the dam-age he saw. He was told at the time by
Mr. Jesse Wallwork that there were old workings by the
Bridgewater Trustees in the Cannel, but he did not pay
as much attention to that fact as it deserved, and he was
also influenced by a mistaken belief that the dip of the seam
was 1 in 10. The correct figure was 1 in 5J. He after-
wards learned t-hat the old Bridgewater workings in the
Cannel were more extensive than he had supposed, and this
caused him to modify his views. The discovery that the dip
was 1 in 5| was another reason why he came to the con-
clusion that the Roscoe workings could not have affected
the property before May 1912, and possibly not until 1914.
It was impossible to fix the time definitely within one or
two years. The damage prior to May 1912 he attributed
to the old workings in the Cannel, the dates of which shown
on the plan ranged from 1895 to 1901; they brought about
the movement of the strata which upset the stability of the
pillars left in the upper mines, the Trencherbone and the
Five Quarters, and the effects would be showm on the surface
several years later. Since 1913 other damage had appeared,
and he understood Messrs. Roscoe had pa-id for it. Asked
how long it took for land to settle down after a subsidence
due to the removal of coal, Mr. Tonge replied that in the
case of one seam, 3 ft. or 4 ft. thick, it w-ould usually be
well over four or five years, but he had known cases in the
neighbourhood of Little Hulton and Westhoughton where
the period of disturbance was longer, even as much as 15
or 20 years. It was well established that 10 years was
quite possible, although unusual. Pillars had been left in
the various mines in order to support the surface, and he
agreed that the area left in the Cannel was of fair pro-
portions, but, having regard to the conditions in the two
upper mines, the Trencherbone and Five Quarters, he
thought it was impossible to solve the problem in a satis-
factory way by pillars; the best plan would have been to
sweep out the whole of the coal, and the surface would
then subside more uniformly than was actually the case.
The working of the Trencherbone and Five Quarters took
place before 1883, and pillars were left. Witness agreed
that the mining all round was bound to seriously affect the
plaintiff’s property, and the effect of leaving small pillars

was to make a kind of hump. In both mines, he said,
pillars were absolutely insufficient to support the property.
Because of their insufficiency they would be crushed by
the weight of the roof, and the superincumbent strata. But
it did not follow that the strata would become solid. The
Trencherbone rock was exceedingly strong and tenacious,
and was known to withstand very great stress. Therefore,
it was quite possible that the pillars did not completely fill
in the goaf, but for a time the movement of the strata would
cease. Apparently the surface had come to res-t before 1900,
but it did not follow that it was solid. Then the workings
in 1900 and 1901 again disturbed the upper mines, produced
further movement there, and were responsible for the sinking
of the ground which was observed from 1909 onwards. In
witness’s opinion the effect of the 1901 workings, began to
show itself in 1910 in the back portion of the plaintiff’s
premises.—Mr. George Crowther, mining engineer and
surveyor, said he had been going down mines in this neigh-
bourhood for over 50 years. He had seen the plans of the
Five Quarters, Trencherbone, Cannel, Plodder, and Yard.
The Cannel -seam was 210 yds. below the surface at the
point in question, and having regard to the slope of the
seam, 1 in 5J, he was of opinion that in January 1913 the
Roscoe workings could not have had the slightest effect upon
the plaintiff’s buildings. He was confirmed in his opinion
by noticing the pillar which the defendant’s plan showed
as being intended for the support of the buildings. The
workings prior to 1900 would affect the buildings by a side
pull, and no doubt disturb the intervening strata. This
would tend to augment the effect of the Cannel workings
in 1900 and 1901, because the strata had already been
broken up. The Trencherbone and Five-quarters had been
cleared out previously. In the case of the latter, the pillars
would follow the ordinary rule in subsidence; the upper
crust would settle round the pillars. That was not a very
material factor to take into account. A very different state
of things existed in the Trencherbone. In the whole of this
neighbourhood the Trencherbone rock was of a considerable
thickness, 11yds. to 14 yds., and what was much more
important, it was of a very tenacious character. It would
bend and not break, and would maintain enormous weights.
It was most difficult to decide when it would subside. After
bearing the first thrust .it would probably stand for a
very long time, but a comparatively slight thing might upset
the balance .and cause the whole of at to subside. Asked
whether he thought the Trencherbone pillars were a source
of strength or of weakness, the witness replied that they
were most disastrous, because no one could estimate them
correctly. Reasonable subsidence could be provided for by
a pillar, and he -agreed with the pillar of support defined
on the plan by the defendant’s mining advisers, except that
he would have placed it 10 yds. higher. But no size of
pillar would have met the circumstances of this case. It was
not a normal condition of things that subsidence should
take place in 1902 and again in 1909, and onwards, in
consequence of workings in 1891 to 1895, and then in 1900
and 1901, but in this case the circumstances were abnormal.
He formed his conclusions after an examination of the
plans on the assumption that some mine was causing
damage to the property in the years 1910, 1911, and 1912,
and that it could not possibly be the Roscoe workings. The
earliest date he fixed for the latter to become effective was
May 1913. The trial was adjourned until January 13.

Notts and Derbyshire.

At Mansfield last week, Albert Williamson and Charles
Grumbley, lads, were charged with taking the insulator off
an electric light cable and connecting it with two signal
wires in the Bolsover Colliery. It was said to have been
done for a lark, but the magistrates were reminded what a
serious and dangerous thing it was to do. The lads’ idea was
to give the men who used the signals a shock. When one
of the men connected the wires to give the signal for the
tubs to be hauled away, he received a nasty shock. The lads
had scraped off the insulation to the extent of an inch, leaving
the wire naked, had then connected with it a piece of thin
wire, attached to which was a horseshoe, and let this hang
down until it connected with signal wires at the side of the
roadway. Each defendant was fined three guineas, and
ordered to pay 5s. costs, or go to prison for six weeks.

As the result of an accident at the Langley Colliery, Mr.
H. R. Watson, J.P., of Loscoe Field, manager to the
Butterley Company, now lies in hospital in a serious condi-
tion. Mr. Watson was superintending the fixing of new
winding gear, and a new drum was set revolving in order to
test the brake. Whilst the drum was revolving at high
speed one of the oak lags became loose owing to the breaking
of a pin, and was thrown from the drum with great force.
Mr. Watson, who was standing near the door of the engine
house, was struck on the forehead by the flying timber. He
was felled to the ground, and rendered unconscious.

The Midlands.

Pennant Hill Colliery Drainage Appeal.,

Mr. J. C. Nicklin, the surviving partner of the firm of
Messrs. Thomas Nicklin and Son, of the Old Crown Iron
Works, Smethwick, has just issued cheques, equal to 10s.
in the £, of the debts incurred by this firm, which had to
suspend payment in 1894.

The fire wfliich broke out at No. 60 Pit, Lower Gornal,
near Dudley, belonging to Mr. W. Parrish, was extinguished
on Saturday. A previous attempt to get at the fire was
abortive, owing to the fumes and smoke which rose from the
shafts v’hen they were uncovered. Immediately the out-
break was discovered, however, the firm were able to rescue
the 50 horses stabled below. Four hundred miners have
been affected by the stoppage.

The joint meeting of the Arbitrators and Commissioners
under the South Staffordshire Mines Drainage Acts, sat at
Dudley on Monday to hear an application by Messrs. H. S.
Pitt and Company for further graduation in respect to the
Pennant Hill Colliery, Rowley Regis, in respect of which
they were now paying 51d.—The case for the appellants was
submitted by Mr. Percy Pitt and Mr. Horace Poole (mining
engineer). The former stated that Pennant Hill was practi-
cally a dry pit, and, except for night pumping, they were
drawing no wafer. This was due, however, to the operations
of two other collieries that belonged to them—the Ramrod
and the Bell End, where they were raising 24,000 tons of
water per week.—Mr. W. B. Collis (the engineer for the
Old Hill district) pointed out that these two collieries were in
the Oldbury district, and therefore outside the drainage area.
—Mr. Pitt said those pits kept the water out of the dis-