The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1875-10-16 00:00:00

THE IRON TRADE.
THE QUARTERLY 21EETING OF
IRONMASTERS.

WOLVEmumrToN, Wednesday.

The first of the current series of quarterly
meetings was held here this afternoon, and
there was a numerous attendance. It quickly
became known that there was to be no altera-
tion in the crucial prices of pig-iron.. Mr. Lloyd,
the manager of the Lilleshall Company of
Shropshire, was upon 'Change, and announced
that there would he no alteration in the quota-
tions of this firm. Shropshire cold blast pigs
were therefore .26., and hot blast X 4 15s. per
ton. The chief Staffordshire makers acting in
unison with bliropshire, prices of native pigs
were mostly unaltered upon the quarter. Staf-
fordshire all-mine were £4. 10s. to £4. 158 !
pigs, with a modicum of cinder, were £3.
and cinder-pigs were strong gt £2- 16s. Fin-
ished iron was declared unaltered, the prices
ranging for bars from £lO. and £lO. 13s. 6d.
down to £7. 17s. 6d. Transactions were repor-
ted in all departments, but they were for only
small quantites, and prices were strong in every
branch. Few were inclined to book forward,
inasmuch as there was a feeling almost of
anxiety as to the action which the colliers might
feel themselves called upon to pursue. Because of
the very disastrous results upon the iron trade
which would certainly follow upon any consider-
able advance in coal, the market could not brine,
itself to conclude that the colliers would resoll
to the breaking of the existing contract in their
efforts to get higher wages forthwith. Still the
market was decidedly unsettltd by the
threats.
At the corresponding quarterly meeting a
twelvemonth ago the prices were maintained on
the basis of £l2. pr ton for marked bars, but
th,re was a general concurrence of view that
iron, which had before been selling at that price,
would on the morrow he declared down 205.,
si.oult4Rneonsly with a drop of 10. in best pig-
iroa. What had been expected came about. On
the morrow, and prior to the general gatheriog
of the trsdu in Eirminglimn, a private ineetiii,4
of a few of the leading tiring was held, at which
it WaR daterillitl:•tt to reduce the price list of
!narked iron a ton, or to the basis of £ll.
for bars, with the usit:ll extra f..r Earl Dudley's
make. the same tinio the Lilleshall Compay
reduced their pig-iron 10s per ton, which lett
cold-blast at £6. 104. and hot-blast at £5. 5.
Upon this sta lard negotiations were continued
throughout the (3.2 y in respect of best bars and
plates, but the best sheettnakersnile n )
ation, and the cons liners of second-class finished
iron generally could, AS the result of the most
uccesAful g.:.toiroulv, los.. whilst :Mint:
Inakorki of that laa)11 whose product wa,-; in good
demand r•Aus64l to I clan! any. cbalt:N• Lis
(.'di.lsunnuor) quarter-day in Wolverhanigton
was signalised by Vie announcement of a drop,
by some well-known iinished-iron firws, of -C1- a
ton upon the prices fixed at the previous
3lichaeltuas qaarterl3 tx_ceting, to which we
have just referred. Marked bars, therefore, be-
came virtually £lO. Per ton. The drop was re-
sisted I,:a the New British Iron Company, but
other leading houses declined on the following
day in Birmingham, to continue to quote £ll.
for bare—indeed, they a
announce th •
ea prices AS

nnw brought down to £lO., still with the usual
x a of Its. (hi. for he Bound Oak brand.
rhough the British Iron Company held on
ihroughout the day, yet subsequently that firm
..so dropped their prices 20s. a ton ; and £lO..
we known, has been the crucial bar pi ice
throughout the quarter.

iespect of isest sheet-iron exactly the oppo-
site took place at t'qi Mit H, (J 4rt, r:y
meeting to that IA lih.h IVthavt: record, d a, oc-
curring t the quarterly nnaling nine months
before, since the nutnebetures of the general
qualities of sheets assembled, and determined to
make no alteaation, but the makers of the best
sheets, who at Mich:whim:3 last year r, solntely
kept up their quotations, now on the contrary .
lowered their rates £l. per ton.
Asi to pig-iron, at the Midsummer quarterly
meeting the chief Shrol.shira firm reduced its
quotations Ios., and the Staffordshire people
followea suit. This left cold-blast iron, at £6.
as the maximum, and hot-blast at £4. 10s. to
£4. 15s. Homatite was at the same tiu4 of-
fered at £4. (short weight), and cinder pig at
.0. (long weight).

THE WHITECHAPEL TRA.GEDY
COMMITTAL OF BOTH PRISONERS.

On resuming, after the adjournment, the depo-
sitions were read over Ly Mr. Stafford, chief clerk.
The Magistrates committed both prisoners for
trial at the Central Criminal Court. _ _

Mr. Moody applied that Thomas Wainwright be
admitted, to bail, but the Magistrate refused the
application, leaving the responsibility to a Judge
in chambers.

SHOCKING ACCIDENT*TO A PLATE-LAYER

NEAR HAGLEY.

;On Tuesday morning a fatal accident happened to
a'plate-layer. about 40 yeays of age, named Thomas
Henry Turbott, on the hue between nagley and
Churchill. He was engaged on this part of the line
when the 9.2 a.m. express from Stourbridg,e was due
at Hagley, and his attention was taken by it goods
train on the down line just as the express came by,
at the rate of over forty miles:an hour. He was
then on the six-foot, but from the statement of a
gentleman who was in the train, too near the metals
of the up line, and must by some means have been
caught :by the engine, as he was afterwards found
with a dreadful wound in the head, one of his legs
broken, and quite dead. He leaves a wife and three
children. His body was conveyed to the Swan Inn,
Blakedown, where an inquest was held on the body,
and a verdict of " Accidental death" was returned.