The Express.
London, England, 1862-01-25 00:00:00

THE HARTLEY MINE CATANTROPHL

TO TUT MOMS or TIER means.
Stn,—Deatu to his most terrible shape has once
more been busy in the northern coal Ilea Misery
and misfortune are overshadowing, as they have
but too ilea dune b,fore, twiny & hitherto happy
cottage 11. ale. Has air. kTrible disaster no lesson

lu the depths and ("arbutus of the terrible mine
of Bartley, surrounded by horrors of every descrip-
tion, welt mei ivy*, the support umuy
iami-
hes, bare been plumed and destroyed. The dos-
truss of the poor widows and childrou, whose hus-
bands, 1011% and fathers bare thus at one fell blow
bet:n from thous, cannot be desciibesi. Those
alone aho bare sulferal under sunikr losses can
uuderstat4 it.

Many who were presout at the mouth of the
mine when the awful nature of the aceideut became
more fully bowels may well remember all their lives
the white, despairing, upturned faces of those
whine tie:tryst and dearest friends were dying should
without hope of rescue at their feet.
Well aid it be for northern coal•owners and
viewers, and all who have the control and manage-
swat of coal mines, if this last sad lesson, written
so fortiVsy by the terrible hand of Death, teach
t►em to :Ave re:oursu to the only safe remedy.
Hartley Pit, the scene of this most horrible
calamity. unparalleled in extent iu the annals of
cord mining, is an old mine with extensive work-
ings. lt has three seams—the high main, 38
fathoms ; the yard coal, 65 fathoms ; and the low
seam, 11:, fathoms from the surfaoe. In the last of
these the men were working at the time of the acci-
dent in the shaft. A single pit about 12 feet in
diatnete: conueets these seams with the surface,
and is divided into two shafts by a wooden brattier,
or partitiou. There are also two staples or little
shafts, one from the surface to the high main, the
other from the yard coal to the low seam. No
means of communication, however, other than the
main s!htft exists between the yard seam and the
main seam, a distance of 27 fathoms. In the absence
of this e.onmunication lies the secret of the enormous

loss of lite which bas taken place. Had there existed
a small staple similar to those already mentioned
bytwetia the yard seam, where the men are now
lying dead, and the high main, or had there been a
second and independent pit into the mine, the whole
of thew• 915 men and boys would have escaped from
the seene of disaster within the hour. There can
be no Litter prof of the absolute necessity of two
indeprod.mt pits into each mime.
This terriule instance is not the only one,
although the moat deadly, in which life has been
lost through working collieries, and especially those
of lark;.! extent, with but a single shaft. Although
an accident such as this—blocking up the shaft—
Leaiuct,•r from aueli a cause occurred before, yet
but to.. many lives have already been lost for want
of two independent and separate shafts ; the chief
cau.ace being destruction of the wooden brattine in
the stud: *uy explosion or tire, and c►osing by inun-
dation.

At Killitigworth, in 1806, the lower part of the
bratuee WWI blowu down iu au •:plosion, and it
was twe•ity-three or twenty-four eras before the
bottom •d the shaft could be reached, there being
ia this .ass also no other means of egress.
At the great axplosiou at Wallmmul in 1833,
about :JU fathoms of the brattice were blown down,
by whic3, out of the 102 byes lost, Mr. Saddle, its
viewer, thought 40 to 50 were destroyed that aught
have been saved.

- - .
And id Heaton, in 1815, water from old workings
suddenly broke iu and inundated the mine, enclos-
ing 75 wen and buys. It was afterwards found that
they bed retired to a higher level of the mine, and
there waited for rescue ; it, however, never came,
and of ter eating their candles and some horseflesh,
they all dull by the lingering tortures of starvation for
want of Use!. What were their denunciations left in
record their shovels and prison walls, I will
not now repeat. A second pit to the rise would
have kought these men safely to their families on
the tin' d.iy of the inundation.
At the List explosion at Yarrow, where 40 lives
were lest, many of those destroyed by the after-
damp would also have been saved by a second pit.
And ut Herndon, two years ago, where 7t6 men
and I.oys were destroyed, at least two-thirds, here
also killed by the afterdamp, would have been
saved had there been another pit, which would
here obs Lard the necessity of the meta traversnig
this pa. exed region to neaps.
This afterdauip, or carbonic acid gas, the most
deadly of all the coal gases, produced so abundantly
in explusions, destroys about 70 percent of the
miner; killed at such flume. In every explosion
nestle the whole of these would be say.id by a
second pit.
Awl tow we have thin unparalleled cue of the
disasters of • single shaft bringing conviction to
the whole northern world. Let us now see what is
said on the sdvantages of two or more independent
shaft* by those whoseopiniens are entitled tube heard.
George Stephenson, in a communication to the
South Shields committee on accidents iu coal-mines,
says I think that the ventilation of coal-mines
would be much more certain it two pits were sunk
instead of our. The system in the neighbourhood
of livwcast:e has been tusiak one large shaft, and
to divide it into two, three, or four divisions, be-
tween the one and the other bring only live inches
of sic. Al." This is the dangerous brattice which
eunsetimes cost. 1,5001. a year to keep iu repair.
" Now I consider that a much better, and, in
the end, much cheaper. ventilation would be
carried on by having two pits instead of one.
The Killingworth pit was 14 feet in diameter,
divid.J into tour shafts by wooden partitions, as
above described. Now, four 7 feet shafts yield the
same cubic contents as the ODD 14 feet. It is true
that the dressing et the aides in walling in the
small shaft is double that of the fourteen ; but then
ali the wooden partitions an saved,whieh will make
up the di&renee A the out By this plan only
true nisi would be required in each shaft, the whole
.rried on with kern wear and tear, and much safer
for the men ascending mil descending, and the
ventilation up and d..4cn the shaft always perfect"
And again :—•• I Lave opened out a large collieryin
Luie2dershire on this plan—shafts 222 yards deep,
and perhaps fewer accidents than any colliery in
erdatesee."

Mr. John Garfortb, a proprietor and director of
minim in Lancashire, when examined before the
House of Commons' Committee in 1&15, in reply to
a quetion about enforcing the constant use of
lamps in miims, thus emphatically exprtales him-
self :—" Sink more shafts, nothing elm will do. I
Mitre been aol.mintal with it all my life front ten
years old, and I sun now approaching seventy."
Agri thAt is the conviction of hi. lengt exp.-
rientst Sink more shafts."

Mr. James Mather, Secretary to the South
Shield. Committee, iu his repon nu the accident at
Burr:mow thu. speaks :—" There is bowever,*a cer-
tain awl Apeeifie cure, which, well applied, would
Ton:use the evils of Burradon. A new pit to the
rte., to be eaneutially iiectioutry for carrying
ton the- u workiuga with safety and success. Its
east will probably be the chearanit way of working
the mine. ti.nater or later thi. measure will require
to h 5 ice! reininrae to, aiel better awe than late."
Thu South Shields Committee ou Accidents iu
Moen, in its reins t, as reprinted by the Howe
of Conaimais states " that the imperfect state of
veutalation in the northern mines is canned by too
few nh• ftc in proportion to the extent of under-
grvniel workiiipi. And that iu uu cane ought
theme t., be leis than one veutilating shaft appor-
tioued to, at the leant, every 40 acres. And that
no sq extraction of coal in a new mice
sliettld be allotted to be wade wilco' two dirdinet
awl separate shaft. have been previously put
d orn, which should be secured by act of par-
lenient."

And so state many others, men of eminence
and scientific knowledge, thoroughly aciplaiutod
with the subject on which they write and speak.
As to the pretended argument, too frequently
urged by *IWO of those manacled with mines, that
• sowied shaft would not repay the outlay, and
which is the ciuse that many new mines in this
fatal district li4Ve been sunk and are now worked
with l.ut one bratticed shaft, there is no solid
fowada•we for it. From data at hand, it is shown
that within a mile or two of this horrible scene of
diorites sows ventilating and winding shafts, 8 ft.

in diameter, nearly 200 yards down—the !quite depth
as Hartley—have been sunk at an expense of less
than 3'. per yard for sinking and walling, and one
engine pit, 11 feet in diameter, for less than 51. per
Yard-
After one shaft is sunk, or when it is in progress,
unleas there be sofas extraordinary and unusual
quicksand or feeder of water, a second is put down
much more easily, as the tint serves, when to the
dip, to drain and keep the other dry, if placed
within a re. enable distance. Of this lam assured,
by high mining authority, that a single pit, 11 feet
in diameter, down for 300 yards, would not coat
more under ordinary circumstances than from
2,000/. to 2,300/. Yet is this false economy as to
the construction of second shafts allowed to stand
between the miners and their safety, and to per
Petually klive them on the very brink of de-
struction.

These facts and opinions of mining authorities,
as well as the statement of Stephenson already
given, sii.taiu in every point the views now at-
tempted to be demonstrated, and which you also
have ably supported in your article in the Daily News.
Many more facts might be adduced did time and
your columns admit. It is to be hoped, however,
they will not be required, but that, above all, this
last terrible demonstration will have brought home
conviction to every mind of the necessity of, at
least, two independent and separate shafts in every
mine.—l am, tc.,
A VOICE FROM THE MINES.
Jan. 23.