The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1876-01-01 00:00:00

DEATH OF A TRADE SECRETARY.

The Sheffield Telegraph records the death of a well-
' known trade secretary, Mr. Normansell, late of the
South Yorkshire Miners' Association, who was buried
in the Barnsley Cemetery en Monday. The funeral
was attended by many thousands of people, and by
the leaders of various trade associations from all parts
oaf -the kingdom. Mr. Macdonald, M.P., addressed the
—large assemblage at the grave•side, and spoke with
emotion of the deceased and his great services to the
miners of South Yorkshire. In a memoir of Mr.
Normansell, the Sheffield Telegraph relates some of his
early struggles and experiences, contrasting them with
superior lot of the collier of to day. Mr. Norman-
sell's father was banksmau at a pit, and in 1830 was re-
ceiving 2. 6d. a day, to earn which he had to leave home
at 4 a.m. and work till 6 or 7 at night. At the age of 7
young Normausell was set to earn his own living. At
3 in the morning he had to leave his bed and make
for the pit, his' hour for returning being between 6
and 7in the evening. It was literally bed and pit
for young Normansell. For his long hours of labour
John Normansell was paid 6d. a day. His regular
employment was to push corves or tubs along the
roadway in the mine by pressing them forward with
his head, helped by another little fellow who made
up the " team." At the age of 14 his wages were 88.
a week, gradually raised to 3s. a day by the time he
was 20. He then married, but had received next to no
education, and signed the marriage register with a cross.
His wife, however, woe able to write, and her example
induced him to attend a night school, where he learnt
to read and write. Gradually be raised himself among
his fellows. In 1857 he was the first check weighman
appointed on behalf of the miners in South Yorkshire,
and from small beginnings the South Yorkshire
Miners' Associa ion has grown, under his direction, to
le one of the most pawerfu,l, and ,wealthy incluataial
c onf ederai lots in England—counting by the nor e the
collieries in connection with it, and its members by
tens of thousands; rich enough to sustain strikes and
lock-outs, to buy an expensive colliery of its own, to
give £l,OOO to the Plimsoll Fund, and to meet heavy
claims by members on account of sickness, orphanage,
widowhood, and superannuation. As the colliery
was acquired early in 1875, when this property com-
manded its maximum value, while the priee of coal has
since slowly decreased, the sanguine expectations of
the association in respect of profits are not, it is thought,
likely to be fully realized. Mr. Normansell has been
examined before all the Parliamentary Committees and
Royal Commissions appointed of late years to investi-
gate mining operations and trade questions. He was
only 45 yeais old, ad his death arose from inflamma-
tion of the brain, a result attributed in part to anxiety
arising out of the recent calamity at Swaithe Main, the
workings of which he inspected after the explosion.

Ere Mary could adjure the spectre to speak, it spoke.
It said, apparently with effort, in a low, husky, and
measured voice,—
"I am the spirikof S. G.':
Then followedian unearthly chorus of invisible
beings—the inarticulate burden of a spirit song.

"Why do you appear tome?" gasped the terrified
girl. "What would you have me do ?"
"Come with me."
" With you! Whither !"
"To the Summer Land, Mary. To the Spirit Home,
,which you who have not 7.. et passed its portals call the
Grave. There, in thtlikeeh perpetual fountains, to
cool the burning fever 91 ur too fond love."
"Surely," Said Bliti=y" you are not a wise spirit. I
have not yet departed this life."
i•t"—"That," repliedthe apparitien-• "matters- not; .You
• ,
will know more anon. Come!"

"I will not 1" cried the maiden.
"Come, I say," reiterated the ghost, now in a tone
liremde---"-Airesay-I--feelthe approach of day-
break. Come ere its Erst_ glimmer shall compel me to
derkt and' terminate this manifestation. o,me 1"
An with a materialized hand, which, though cold and
clamiiityir.Fm palpable as her own, the sprit seized.
her the-arra:- k.l_ Come !Come !".
" o?" shrieked Mary. "No ! I tell you I will not
come. Let go of me. Ah !" And-collecting her whole
strength in her voice she uttered a piercing scream,
which alarmed the house, and immediately summoned
all its inmates to her bedside. _ _

She had been dreaming after all, not only that she
had seen S. G. 's, ghost, but that her betrothed S. G.
was dead. All the other antecedents to his imaginary
appearance were only the baseless fabric of a vision,
except in so far as the vision had some foundation in
the fact that S. G. xnd herself were indeed going to be
married. Their nuptials actually took place within a
very few days, and the lads and lasses of it sang jocular
songs on_ the occasion. One of them in particalar bore
a burden which strangely reminded her of the
chorus she had heard in her dream. It was simply as
follows

" Tol de riddle 10l di day."