The Sun.
London, England, 1863-04-16 00:00:00

Explosion at the Ewell Powder Mills.

About 6 o'clock yesterday morning a fearful ex-
plosion of gunpowder, by which three lives were
lost, took place at the mills belonging to Messrs.
Sharp and Adams, of Birchin-lane, London. The
manufacture is carried on in five detached buildings,
distant from 150 to 400 yards from each other.
These are known as-1, the mixing-house ;2, the
mills, which are worked by steam ; 3, the press-
room ; 4, the corning-house and glazing-room ; and
5, the dust-houses. The corning-house and glazing-
room formed one building of only one story ; it was
40ft, square, and was divided into two apartments
by a water wheel, which drove the machinery of
the mill, and by a thin partition. It was in this
building that the explosion took place. The noise
was fearful, and alarmed the whole neighbourhood.
The shock was like that produced by cannon and
file firing. Within a quarter of a mile of the spot
windows were broken in every house. In the High-
street of Sutton, three miles off, the shock was
severely felt, and the noise caused alarm at a dis-
tance of from six to seven miles. One of the work-
men engaged at the time in the press-house, about
400 yards off, on hearing the explosion, said to his
companion, "There's a blow," and made his way
into the open air. On looking up he saw a cloud
of smoke and black spots, which he knew to be
charred timbers tossed high into the air by the ex-
plosion. The workmen, on repairing to the place
after the accident, found the whole apace within 100frorn
yards of the mill covered with charred timb_cre fill
a few inches to many feet in lengdth-a "
loam not
itself was levelled with the grlosunii;ches
square
less than 12 feet long
of
and
dhe ground at a dis-
standing almost upright inince where it had been.
over the tops of
reesash and elm trees
stoodthe
tance of 30 yards from tbblo7n
ch
interveninwghi
press
om its socket.
It had evidently beenh
oung elms and as t
TWO large
touching them.
the rooms, and
,waansd
also the old
pulled
ejmuPstlogyeodneinto k
otourtnsiduep tby ye
buildingther o o t 8
or • They
were all three in the building, and were
aTthGrece,cmioccnk areth
euys u al
hadl y
blown
with it. Their bodies (or portions of them)up
picked up in the adjoining field, belonging were
Gardener, Ruxley Farm. One body, to Mr.
e that of Thos.
Woolman, was found at a distance
of 90 yards ;the
other two, those of James Baker and Henry Hook
ham, in different di •
reetions GO or 70 yards from the
mill. The body of h
fated of the th t e former was the least muti-
ree, one arm only being blown off.
Of the others the heads and limbs were separated
from the bodies and scattered about the field. One
of the heads has not been found. Mr. Sharpe's pri-
vate residence, at some distance from the scene of
the accident is much damaged. Scarcely a pane of
glass remains whole, and the woodwork is much
torn. The walls are shaken to the foundation. Two
of the deceased men left families—James Baker, a
wife and six children, the eldest only 11 years of
age, and Henry Hookham, two daughters, one a
widow, with children dependent on him. But either
he or the other sufferer bad had just secured to him,
through the kind exertions of Mr. Sharpe, a pen-
sion from Sir Henry Bridges, the former owner of