The Sun.
London, England, 1821-01-31 00:00:00

DREADFUL EXPLOSION.

(From Flinders •IFe.tern Luminary.]
On Friday afternoon last, about two o'clock,
the Receiving-house of the Royal Powder Works
situated at Kinterbury the Devon side of the Ta-
mar, about a mile and a half from Plymouth-
Dock, blew up with a most horrible explosion.—
The houses at New Passage, nymouth-Dock,
and the vicinity, were shaken ; glass was broken
and roofs injured. The consternation was ex-
treme in the immediate neighbourhood; and a
number of boats from the Dock-yard, the ships in

liamoaze, and the town, put ofr towards. Kinter-
liury. On their arrival, it was ascertained, that
forty barrels of powder, besides a quantity of
flannel cartridges, filled and attached to iron shot

had explodedi but that out of about thirty per-
sons employed in the works, two only had pe-
rished—Richard Came, aged _GO, and James
Matthewson, aged 19; the latter the son of the
master-cooper. The rest were fortunately em-
ployed in landing stores sent from one of the
powder-shiPs in Hamoaze.—The bodies of the

sufferers-- are. supposed to have been blown to
atoms ; as, after a diligent search, a thigh-bone
only,•stripped of its flesh, was found, supposed
to belong to the boy Matthewson. Not one
stone was left upon another in the building where

the powder was deposited. The traverse
near twelv.e feet thick, which stood between it
and. the next building, was nearly destroyed, and.
the erections at a considerable distance were
greatly irtiured.—Much glass was broken, and
other damage done, at Trematon, Saltash, Tor-
point, &c. In the shipping a dreadful con cts.sion.
On.the descent of the shot and the remains of the
shot-boxes, fragments of the building, &c. into
Hamoaze, the appearance was not unlike that of
a heavy hail-shower on the water. Some of the
shot were' driven as far as St. Budeaux.—The
cause of this most shocking disaster is not known;
although conjecture is very busy on the occasion.—
The accumulation of powder in the grand ma-
gazine at Keyham point, about a quarter of a
mile from Dock, and on the same bank of the
Tamar, is great beyond all precedent as is that
on board the powder-ship, the Gibraltar, in
Hamoaze. In peace there is about 1000 barrels
i❑ the magazine, and it is said that there are
now above four thousand barrels in that immense

depositary. Imagination can conceive nothing
more horrible than the explosion of such a mass
of powder, accumulated so near a popnlation,
ashore and afloat, of at least 40,000 ,persons.
Every precaution, however, that human inge-
nuity can suggest, has been adopted, and is still
observed, to guard against, accident. It is, how-
ever, a fearful subject to contemplate. With
respect to the powder-ship, she is loaded so
deep, though an 80 gun ship, and the most ca-
pacious of that class in the navy, that she is as-
low in the water as if ready for sea. Might it
not be prudent to have this vessel in such a state
that on the appearance of lire she might be sunk ?
Bold as our artisans are, would any of them ap-
proach to scuttle her, and would indeed such an
operation be of any. use? The operation did fail
in the case of the Captain, of 74 guns, as from
the destruction of the upper works by the flames,
she lightened, and rendered the holes useless.
Might not all these .tremendous masses of pow-
der be removed from• the immediate neighbour-
hood of three populous :towns, and from that of
our tine navy moored in liamoaze ? • Since writ-
ing the aboVe: (adds our correspondent) I have
been told a shoulder-bone has been found.

A respectable young Clergyma❑ and the niece
of a late eminent Barrister eloped, last week,
from the neighbourhood of Bala, in North
Wales, on a matrimonial trip to Gretna 'Green.
The young Lady's fortune is sa4t6 be con-
siderable.

•
The present Sir TnomAs CA AC, C, of Hergrave
Hall, in Suffolk, who sueeeedvd to the titles and
estates-of his father, the late Baronet, who died
a short time ago in Italy, is now only in the ninth
year of his age.