The Springwell Pit disaster occurred on 6 December 1872 at Springwell

coal mining Coal mining is the process of resource extraction, extracting coal from the ground or from a mine. Coal is valued for its Energy value of coal, energy content and since the 1880s has been widely used to Electricity generation, generate electr ...

pit near

Dawley Dawley ( ) is a former mining town and civil parish in the borough of Telford and Wrekin, Shropshire, England. It was originally proposed be the main centre of the 'Dawley New Town' plan in 1963, however it was decided in 1968 to name the new ...

Shropshire Shropshire (; abbreviated SalopAlso used officially as the name of the county from 1974–1980. The demonym for inhabitants of the county "Salopian" derives from this name.) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in the West M ...

(now part of

Telford Telford () is a town in the Telford and Wrekin borough status in the United Kingdom, borough in Shropshire, England. The wider borough covers the town, its suburbs and surrounding towns and villages. The town is close to the county's eastern b ...

). Miners at the pit would grab hold of a

chain A chain is a serial assembly of connected pieces, called links, typically made of metal, with an overall character similar to that of a rope in that it is flexible and curved in compression but linear, rigid, and load-bearing in tension. A ...

running the depth of the

mine shaft Shaft mining or shaft sinking is the action of excavating a mine shaft from the top down, where there is initially no access to the bottom. Shallow shafts, typically sunk for civil engineering projects, differ greatly in execution method from ...

and be hoisted 150 ft to the surface. On this day, eight miners clung to the chain. When 50 ft from the base of the lower part of the chain snapped, causing the miners to fall to the base of the shaft, before the chain, estimated to weigh 1 tonne, landed on top of them. All of them were killed instantly, except one, who died shortly after being brought to the surface.

Memorial

The miners' funeral attracted large crowds at

's Holy Trinity Church. The miners were buried in a communal grave and a large memorial is still visible in the church yard today. A new memorial, bearing the names and a brief history of the disaster has now been erected in the town centre, outside the Methodist church and supermarket. In 2008 Dawley History Group organised a memorial service to try to get the disaster recognised by local people, whose families are now largely from the

Black Country The Black Country is an area of England's West Midlands. It is mainly urban, covering most of the Dudley and Sandwell metropolitan boroughs, with the Metropolitan Borough of Walsall and the City of Wolverhampton. The road between Wolverhampto ...

following the development of Telford New Town.

Victims' names & ages

* John Davies (19) * Edward Jones (21) * Isaiah Skelton (15) * Allen Wyke (20) * Robert Smith (18) * William Bailey (21) * John Parker (22) * John Yale (21)

References

* * {{reflist Coal mining disasters in England 1872 mining disasters 1872 in England 19th century in Shropshire