Huskar Pit was a coal mine on the South Yorkshire Coalfield, sunk to work the Silkstone seam. It was located in Nabs Wood, outside the village of Silkstone Common, in the then West Riding of Yorkshire. It was connected to the Barnsley Canal by the Silkstone Waggonway. Huskar was the scene of a notorious pit disaster in 4 July 1838.
In 1838 Huskar was connected to Moorend Colliery, and used for ventilation. It had a vertical shaft to the surface and a drift shaft (known as a "dayhole") leading to Nabs Wood. On 4 July 1838 heavy rainfall struck the area, disabling the winding engine on the vertical shaft. The workers stranded at the pit bottom were instructed to remain there until they were able to be brought up to the surface, but a number of children decided to try and escape via the dayhole to Nabs Wood. A nearby stream had burst its banks in the rain and a torrent of water entered the shaft, drowning 26 children aged 7 to 17. Some were able to escape via a passage that led to Moorend and alert colliers on the surface.
The children's bodies were brought up from the pit and buried together in the churchyard of All Saints' Church, Silkstone. A memorial was erected bearing the names and ages of those who died, [1] which today is the logo of the village's primary school. Nationwide, the disaster shocked public opinion, and the resulting inquiry led to the 1842 Mines Act which sought to introduce some protection for child miners and meant that all girls and boys under the age of ten were prohibited from working underground. [2]
In 1988, the community of Silkstone Parish built another memorial in Nabs Wood, [3] depicting two children at work underground. In 2008, to mark the disaster's 170th anniversary, the event and subsequent inquest were turned into a play [4] by Sylvia le Breton and performed by the local Grass Roots theatre group in Silkstone church. In 2010, a commemorative stained glass window crafted by local residents was installed in one of its chapels. [5]
A book by Alan Gallop about the event's history, "Children of the Dark: Life and Death Underground in Victorian England" was published in 2003 and Peter Bond wrote and performed a song, "Act of God" about the tragedy; the song is included on the 1979 album "See Me Up, See Me Down" from Highway Records.
The Kate Rusby song "Halt the Wagons", from her 2019 album Philosophers, Poets & Kings , references the tragedy from the point of view of a grieving mother. [6]
Silkstone Common is a village in the metropolitan borough of Barnsley in South Yorkshire, England.
Silkstone is a village and civil parish in the Metropolitan Borough of Barnsley in South Yorkshire, England. It is situated in the foothills of the Pennines, between the towns of Barnsley and Penistone. The parish includes the village of Silkstone Common. At the 2001 census it had a population of 2,954, increasing to 3,153 at the 2011 Census.
A pit pony, otherwise known as a mining horse, was a horse, pony or mule commonly used underground in mines from the mid-18th until the mid-20th century. The term "pony" was sometimes broadly applied to any equine working underground.
The Oaks explosion, which happened at a coal mine in West Riding of Yorkshire on 12 December 1866, remains the worst mining disaster in England. A series of explosions caused by firedamp ripped through the underground workings at the Oaks Colliery at Hoyle Mill near Stairfoot in Barnsley killing 361 miners and rescuers. It was the worst mining disaster in the United Kingdom until the 1913 Senghenydd explosion in Wales.
The Maltby Main Colliery was a coal mine located 7 miles (11 km) east of Rotherham on the eastern edge of Maltby, South Yorkshire, England. The mine was closed in 2013.
Kilnhurst Colliery, formerly known as either Thrybergh or Thrybergh Hall Colliery, was situated on the southern side of the village of Kilnhurst, near Rotherham, South Yorkshire, England.
Kiveton Park Colliery was a coal mine in the village of Kiveton Park, near Rotherham, South Yorkshire, England.
The Elsecar Collieries were the coal mines sunk in and around Elsecar, a small village to the south of Barnsley in what is now South Yorkshire, but was traditionally in the West Riding of Yorkshire.
The South Yorkshire Coalfield is so named from its position within Yorkshire. It covers most of South Yorkshire, West Yorkshire and a small part of North Yorkshire. The exposed coalfield outcrops in the Pennine foothills and dips under Permian rocks in the east. Its most famous coal seam is the Barnsley Bed. Coal has been mined from shallow seams and outcrops since medieval times and possibly earlier.
The Mines and Collieries Act 1842, commonly known as the Mines Act 1842, was an act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. The Act forbade women and girls of any age to work underground and introduced a minimum age of ten for boys employed in underground work. It was a response to the working conditions of children revealed in the Children's Employment Commission (Mines) 1842 report. The Commission was headed by Anthony Ashley-Cooper, Member of Parliament, who was styled Baron Ashley at the time, a courtesy title, and would succeed his father as the 7th Earl of Shaftesbury in 1852.
Wharncliffe Woodmoor 1, 2 and 3 colliery was a coal mine that was located at the junction of Laithes Lane and Carlton Road, about 2 miles (3.2 km) north-east of Barnsley, South Yorkshire and a quarter mile east of Staincross and Mapplewell railway station, on the Great Central Railway. The branch line junction was about 200 feet (61 m) from Staincross that connected it to the colliery via a private line. The line finished up between the three main shafts and the coking ovens.
Coal mining in the United Kingdom dates back to Roman times and occurred in many different parts of the country. Britain's coalfields are associated with Northumberland and Durham, North and South Wales, Yorkshire, the Scottish Central Belt, Lancashire, Cumbria, the East and West Midlands and Kent. After 1972, coal mining quickly collapsed and had practically disappeared by the 21st century. The consumption of coal—mostly for electricity—fell from 157 million tonnes in 1970 to 18 million tonnes in 2016, of which 77% was imported from Colombia, Russia, and the United States. Employment in coal mines fell from a peak of 1,191,000 in 1920 to 695,000 in 1956, 247,000 in 1976, 44,000 in 1993, and to 2,000 in 2015.
Bedford Colliery, also known as Wood End Pit, was a coal mine on the Manchester Coalfield in Bedford, Leigh, Lancashire, England. The colliery was owned by John Speakman, who started sinking two shafts on land at Wood End Farm in the northeast part of Bedford, south of the London and North Western Railway's Tyldesley Loopline in about 1874. Speakman's father owned Priestners, Bankfield, and Broadoak collieries in Westleigh. Bedford Colliery remained in the possession of the Speakman family until it was amalgamated with Manchester Collieries in 1929.
Moor End goods station was in South Yorkshire, England. It was originally the terminus of the Worsborough branch line which ran from the main line of the South Yorkshire Railway at Wombwell. The lower part of the line to Worsborough was opened in June 1850, reaching Moor End two years later, in March 1852. An inclined plane connected the nearby House Carr Colliery with Silkstone Common. By the end of the 19th century this had been replaced by an ordinary railway line, continuing the Worsborough branch to West Silkstone Junction.
Thorne Colliery was a large colliery within the Metropolitan Borough of Doncaster, South Yorkshire in the South Yorkshire Coalfield.
Pit brow women or pit brow lasses were female surface labourers at British collieries. They worked at the coal screens on the pit bank at the shaft top until the 1960s. Their job was to pick stones from the coal after it was hauled to the surface. More women were employed in this capacity on the Lancashire Coalfield than in any other area.
The Lundhill Colliery explosion was a coal mining accident which took place on 19 February 1857 in Wombwell, Yorkshire, UK in which 189 men and boys aged between 10 and 59 died. It is one of the biggest industrial disasters in the country's history and it was caused by a firedamp explosion. It was the first disaster to appear on the front page of the Illustrated London News.
Barrow Colliery was a coal mine in Worsborough, South Yorkshire, England. It was first dug in 1873, with the first coal being brought to the surface in January 1876. It was the scene of a major incident in 1907 when seven miners died. After 109 years of coaling operations, the mine was closed in May 1985.
Bentley Colliery was a coal mine in Bentley, near Doncaster in South Yorkshire, England, that operated between 1906 and 1993. In common with many other mines, it suffered disasters and accidents. The worst Bentley disaster was in 1931 when 45 miners were killed after a gas explosion. The site of the mine has been converted into a woodland.
Philosophers, Poets & Kings is the sixteenth studio album by English folk singer Kate Rusby. It features traditional folk music, original songs and covers of Fairport Convention and Oasis. The album was released by Pure Records, including on CD and on vinyl, on 17 May 2019. It garnered positive critical reception that praised the production and instrumentation. The final song, "Halt the Wagons", commemorates the death of 26 children in the Huskar Pit mining disaster.