The Express.
London, England, 1847-10-13 00:00:00

PROVINCIAL.

SIR ROBERT PEELi; expected at Liverpool. Ho
dines with the mayor on Friday. Both the Liverpool mem-
bers, and Mr. Gibson, the artist, are expected to meet him.
THE ADJOURNED MEETING OF DELEGATES repre-
senting the factory operatives, fixed for Sunday last, took
place, but with closed doors. It is stated that 27 district'
were represented, 15 by delegates, and 12 by letter, and that
all except three were in favour of a total cessation of labour,
rather than submit to a reduction of prices. The meeting
was further adjourned till Sunday next, when the day is to
be fixed for the general strike. Manchester, up to this time,
has had no general or public meeting of workmen on the
sub ject.
DREADFUL ACCIDENT AT BACUP.—During the past
' week large crowds have been collected at the Mechanics'
Institute, Bacup, to listen to addressee by Mrs. Jackson, of
Wakefield, on the temperance question. Mrs. Jackson was
subsequently announced to preach, on the evening of Sunday
last, in the Wesleyan Association Chapel, Baeup, and, from
the interest excited by her previous appearances, the little
chapel was filled to overflowing. The services had not been
commenced more than twenty minutes (by which time, it is
believed, there were at least 1.500 persons in the chapel),
when a woman seated in the gallery was heard to scream, and
immediately the alarm was spread through the well-
' packed multitude in the gallery that that portion of
the chapel was giving way. It would be utterly
impossible to attempt to describe the scene whieh
immediately ensued. The first and natural impulse was
to rush to the door—and this the nearest to it were alone
able to accomplish. In this, as in all similar cases, the in-
stinct of sellpreservation rendered every one indifferent,
save as to the means of his own personal safety, and the
stream of human beings came with such force, that they
were wedged one against the other; and by the crushing
from behind, great numbers were knocked over. As stream
succeeded stream, and was landed at the door, hundreds
who had kept erect, as it were, by the way in which they
were wedged together, fell down as if their legs had been
taken from them the moment the pressure was relaxed. The
dense masses, as they were vomited forth, were thus strewn
upon the ground—pile upon pile of human beings, men,
women, boys and girls trampling upon and bruising each
other. The dresses of some were torn off their body, the
clothes of many of the women and girls literally hanging from
their persons in tatters, and, all over the scene of disaster
were scattered, in promiscuous confusion, hata,caps, bonnets,
shawls, shoes, umbrellas, parasols, hymn books, bibles, trod-
den under foot and destroyed. As soon as the crowd became
somewhat collected and composed they set about rendering
assistance to the more helpless and injured portion. Two
persons, a woman and a boy, were found dead lying in the
yard, opposite the door of the chapel, where they are sup-
posed to have been knocked down by the crowd, and being
unable to rise, must have been crushed to death by the
trampling of the dense mass overhead ; and another, a young
man,
n a
He
lahaf.
risynnegb:.i.7.l.l IA also
os
r :riraeyt: tuhpr
injured,
mi o'clock,umore, .:a afterg.m
all angled
dt
he:entid
or.
expectedn r d,
find heads s fon
recover. The alarm, it turned out, was perfectly mah-
out foundation. It appears that a kind of hold fast or
staple came out of the wall for the purpose of suspending
the iron pipe of the stove, by which the chapel is heated.
againstga egr gallery
rotohfh
•ue the
pipe,c h aapidl
woman. Thd ee
close to the gip*, and hearing
a:ratahslipiioglettitPfailwrees'm4 extendsut
souus okmdc
siltingee° under
hk the
dg
the fall of the iron staple, imagined that kin* of GM prop*