The Sun.
London, England, 1844-11-16 00:00:00

THE LATE DREADFUL ACCI-
DENT AT BLACK WALL.

DEATH OF THREE MORE OF THE SUFFERERS.

INQUEST ON THE BODIES.

At one o'clock yesterday an inquest was held in the
Board-room of the London Hospital before Mr.
Baker and a most respectable jury, upon what may,
with horrible truth, be called the remains of William
Riley, boiler-maker, aged 32, Patrick Donovan, la-
bourer, aged 46, and Charles Mills, aged 33, en-
gineer, who added, by their deaths, three more to the
frightful catalogue of the sufferers at the late Black-
wall explosion.
The CORONER, before entering upon the evidence,
said he wished to address a few remarks to the jury
upon the facts and law of the case. An inquest had been
holden two days ago upon the bodies of seven other per-
sons who came by their deaths from the same cause which
led to the present painful investigation. Their duty
was to inquire into the cause of the accident, and by
their verdict, if blame were attributable in any quar-
ter, to prevent the recurrence of such catastrophes.
No doubt could be entertained by the jury that the
accident arose from the imperfect construction of the
main pipe, for it must have been very bad, when it
had been built to bear a pressure of 401bs. to the
square inch, yet gave way when the pressure had risen
to only 251bs. to the inch. This fact must be the
more apparent to the jury, when they consi-
dered that the material at the joint was quite
incapable of resisting the force of the steam.
It was also clear that to prevent danger there should
have been some "play" at the joint where the emission
of steam took place, to allow for expansion and con-
traction. However it would be better to leave this
matter in the hands of scientific men, and attend more
to the points which affected the want of caution or
neglect on the part of any one engaged in the entire
transaction, and thus come to the conclusion as to
whether any of those were guilty of manslaughter,
for owing to absence of intention their conduct
could not be defined to amount to murder. He
should wish to impress on the minds of the
jury, that if they were of opinion there was a
want of caution on the part of any persons concerned,
it would be their (the jury's) duty to return a ver-
dict of manslaughter against those parties. The un-
fortunate gentleman, who was the inventor of the
machinery, placed himself in the most dangerous
position, and in consequence met his death almost in-
stantaneously ; so that if there were any culpability
originally on his part, he was now out of the reach of
the law, having suffered the severest penalty that
could be inflicted upon him, and he (the Coro-
ner) thought it would be an unnecessary harshness
to charge Mr. Joseph Samuda with constructing a
machine by which his own brother was killed. In
the case of the " King v. Carr," in Sewell's Law of
Coroner, a case was stated, in which a cannon being
found to be damaged it was sent back to the foundry
to be repaired, and upon its being sent back, owing
to the imperfect manner in which it was repaired, it
burst the first time it was fired off, and a person
being killed by it, it was held to be manslaughter.
The Coroner then directed the attention of the
jury to the question of a deodand, and remarked that
in many instances this subject was surrounded with
great difficulties, for it sometimes happened that the
object or element by which death was caused wa
too insignificant for a deodand to be imposed. In
the present case the tube, the malformation of which
caused the death of Mr. Samuda and his men, was
perfectly valueless, and it therefore would be worse
than useless to impose a deodand.

George Lowe, the engineer who so miraculously
escaped by being sent upon deck by Mr. Samuda to
see the steam blow off, was called, and, having been
sworn, the Coroner read over his evidence (a full
report of which appeared in The Sun, at the time of
the inquest upon Mr. Samuda and the other sufferers),
and he deposed before the present jury to its correct-
ness.

In reply to the Coroner, as to whether any further
ideas suggested themselves to him, as to the cause of
the accident, Mr. Lowe exhibited two small tubes, one
of which fitted into the other in the same manner as
the tube from whence the steam escaped, and
stated that, if there had been a ring or collar at the
termination of one of them where they joined, so as
to prevent them from parting, at the same time that
it allowed room for expansion and contraction, he
thought the accident would have been prevented, for
if such were the case no steam could have escaped.
The CORONER thought this evidence most important,
and hoped it wouid be made known to the public and
those more immediately concerned, as after such a
suggestion it would place those using such engines
under a serious responsibility before a Coroner's court,
if an accident occurred where this ring or collar was
not used. Under all the circumstances of the case
he thought it would be useless to call the surviving
brother, as he would not be bound to criminate him-
self in any explanations he might be called upon to
give. Owing to the low rates of payment to wit-
nesses, which had been fixed by the magistrates, he
was unable to order the attendance of scientific gen-
tlemen, whose evidence might tend to elucidate several
points which might now appear obscure.
Mr. Hensel], a civil engineer, said he fully agreed
in all the previous evidence of Mr. Lowe, but thought
the suggestion with respect to the collar, or ring, not
of much importance, for if the tube were soldered with
iron, it would be as safe, as the expansive or con-
tractile power at this point was very small. One impor-
tant omission was that of an iron stay between the
tube from which the steam escaped and the deck of the
vessel. Two iron straps or stays acted as supporters
of this tube, but none to keep it from rising up.
The deceased Riley's brother stated, that he was on
board at the time of the accident, and felt conscious
that no blame was attributable to any person.
After hearing the surgical evidence, the CORONER
summed up, and the jury, after a short consultation,
returned a verdict of " Accidental death" in the three
cases.