Oaks Colliery Explosion - Dec. 12, 1866

The Oaks Colliery exploded on this day in 1866.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to This Day in History Class from how Stuff
Works dot Com and from the desk of Stuff You
Missed in History Class. It's the show where we explore
the past, one day at a time with a quick
look at what happened today in history. Hi there, and
welcome to the podcast. I'm Christopher Haciotas, subbing in this
week for your host Tracy V. Wilson. Today it's December

(00:23):
twelve and the Oaks Colliery exploded on this day in
eighteen sixty six. So we're in Great Britain and the
Industrial Revolution has well revolutionized industry. Coal is fueling the boom.
But to keep the machine of progress going, we've got
to get that coal out of the ground. So that
brings us to the town of Barnsley, that's located in Yorkshire,
Northern England, of halfway between Sheffield and Leeds. That's where

(00:46):
we find the Oaks Colliery. Now, a colliery is a
term used to describe both a coal mine itself and
the the agglomeration of buildings, offices and infrastructure around the mine,
basically the whole complex. Now. Prior to the arrival of
the coal industry, Barnsley was known for its linen manufacturing,
but the land was rich in coal and industrialists were

(01:07):
keen to exploit the land's riches. The Barnesley coal scene
ran deep below the surface of the ground. It was
particularly prized because it contained numerous types of coal, which
all formed way back in the carboniferous period, so we're
talking about three hundred and sixty three hundred million years
ago now. Miners sank the first shaft at the Oaks
Colliery in eighteen thirty and were able to extract hard coals,

(01:28):
which are used in train engines and steamships, as well
as soft coals that were mixed with other minerals to
make coke, a fuel similar to charcoal. The three shafts
at the Oaks Colliery were nearly three hundred meters deep each,
but over the decades the colliery experienced several explosions and disasters.
In the eighteen thirties, for instance, dozens of boys working

(01:48):
in the mine drowned when it flooded during a thunderstorm.
In the eighteen forties, nearly a hundred miners died in
several explosions, and the Oaks became regarded as one of
the more dangerous places in the region to work. By
the eighteen fifties, workers were fed up and hundreds of
them went on strike for ten weeks, claiming management was incompetent.
But eventually the workers had to go back to work

(02:08):
as they were at risk of starvation. That brings us
to the morning of December eighteen sixty six. Hundreds of
people showed up to work that day. Christmas was just
around the corner, so very few people skipped work and
they were eager to make money for the upcoming holiday.
And in eighteen sixty six December the twelve fell on
a Wednesday, and Wednesdays at the mine where the day

(02:29):
workers could make up for past absentee is um. So
with hundreds of people at work that day, you had
hewers who had cut the coal out of the ground,
and you had harriers who moved the coal to the
shaft bottom to be lifted to the top. There were
men to drive the horses in the shaft, and young
boys were called trappers. It was their job to open
ventilation doors to allow wagons to pass through. But about

(02:49):
one fifteen that day, right near the end of the
day shift, a massive explosion tore through the mine. Jets
of fire damp head ignited. Now that's the name given
flammable gases, which could have been fluted methane. At the time,
the noise could be heard three miles away, and dust
and traveled even further than that. Ventilation systems were damaged
and fresh air wasn't piped into the mine shafts for

(03:10):
several minutes. Within forty five minutes of the explosion, rescuers
were able to bring out nearly twenty men who had
been working near the surface. They were all badly burned
and only six survived. Later that evening, so many volunteers
had shown up to help with the rescue effort, people
had to be turned away. Sadly, all the other workers
deeper under the earth were killed. Would be Rescuers found

(03:31):
the bodies of fathers and sons locked in a final embrace,
and of horse cart drivers draped dead over their ponies.
They had all died of suffocation breathing the carbon dioxide
of the mine. Rescue work continued throughout the night, with
a search for survivors ending up a search only for bodies.
The next morning. Many rescuers evacuated for fear of another explosion.

(03:51):
One man, Matthew Haig, who worked as a night deputy
at the colliery, had survived an explosion there two decades
prior and recognized the warning signs. By nine am, the
pit exploded again, though nearly thirty men were still below.
A third explosion followed later that evening, and on day three,
rescuers found a man named Samuel Brown still alive. Brown
wasn't one of the original workers, though he was a

(04:13):
rescuer who had gone down the day before. He was
removed from the pit, and he was the last man
found alive. The next several days saw fourteen more minor explosions,
and the decision was made to abandon rescue efforts and
to fill the pits. All in all, the tally was
estimated at over three hundred and sixty people dead. It
was the worst mining disaster in the world at the

(04:33):
time and remains the worst in an English coal field history.
An official in question to the explosion was opened almost immediately,
though the cause was never identified. The disaster helped spurs
some reforms in safety regulation. The mining remained dangerous for years.
New research conducted in two thousand and sixteen by volunteers
with the Dern Valley Landscape partnership puts the final tally

(04:54):
of death at three eighty three. Among the dead were
boys as young as ten years old. Today, in the region,
monuments exist to both those who were killed and the
volunteer rescuers who lost their lives. Thanks to Casey, Pegrum,
and Chandler made for their audio work on this show,
you can subscribe to This Day in History Class on
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you like to find your podcasts. Come back tomorrow when

(05:16):
we get to know one of the most famous world
travelers in history.