The Horsekeeper's Daughter

by Jane Gulliford Lowes

  The colliery never slept and production continued twenty-four hours a day. At around half past nine on the night of 7th September 1880, the Knox boys said goodbye to their mother, making their way past the Dun Cow and through the darkness down the familiar coach road, which wound its way towards Seaham, on their way to start their shift at the colliery at ten o’clock.

  Neither Sarah nor their mother would ever see them again.

  5

  Heaven and Hell

  On a May Saturday morning, I picked my way through Seaham Hall Dene, towards the ancient church of St Mary the Virgin, with a single purpose in mind. “Dene” seems to be almost exclusively a north-eastern word for a small wooded valley leading down to the sea. It was the sort of sunny-but-nowhere-near-as-warm-as-it-looks day that Mother Nature specialises in around this part of the Durham coast, the sort of morning that deceives you into wearing short sleeves but leaves you yearning for a winter coat as soon as you enter the shade. Knee deep in bluebells and wild garlic, I stumbled off the main footpath and through beds of nettles, descending deeper into the dene, accompanied only by birdsong and the distant crashing of waves on the beach below.

  Decades had passed since I was last here and I had forgotten just how beautiful it is. You can follow the dene, a short distance from where Edie Threadkell lived, as it cuts first through fields and then woods, carving its way through the limestone, from the railway line to the sea, snaking past the bottom of the terraced gardens of Seaham Hall, overlooked by the little church high to the left. A green chain-link fence, recently installed by the proprietors of the hotel, separates the neatly-ordered gardens from the chaotic wilderness of the dene, much as the original boundary once separated Frances Anne and her life of incredible wealth and privilege from the dirty, desperate lives of her employees who laboured in her mines and docks a mile or so away. An abandoned, overgrown carriage bridge constructed of shining white-grey stone spans the dene, a long-forgotten connection between these very disparate worlds, its ornate red brick paving just visible here and there under the mud and gravel and weeds.

  I trudged through the muddy stream that meanders through the bottom of the dene, past the small cave which was once used in the Hall’s heyday to store ice for its distinguished occupants and their guests. The cave is currently lived in by some hardy gentleman of the road – whether by choice or by force of circumstance I do not know – but it is difficult to imagine a more placid spot. Clambering back up the steep ivy-clad banks, I re-joined the footpath which skirts the churchyard and eventually opens out onto Church Lane.

  I lifted the latch on the heavy wooden gate and began to walk up the footpath which leads through the churchyard and around to the front of the honey-coloured stone church. I had planned to start my search at the far side of the graveyard, next to the ancient stone wall boundary, under the shade of a large sycamore tree, which stands opposite the church door. There are no regimented rows of gravestones, no neatly clipped lawns or borders; the grass grows long as if in a meadow, rippling in the sea breeze, punctuated with wild flowers. The ancient headstones seem scattered at random, like seeds cast down by a divine hand. For some reason, I stepped off the path into the long grass to my left and turned to face the church, intending to examine every detail of the fabric of this most precious little building. I looked back up towards the small tower and noticed immediately that the flag of St George was missing. Unusual. It’s always there, whatever the weather. I glanced down, intending to retrace my steps to the path, and there it was, the very thing I was seeking, right next to the path, the inscription on the golden headstone written on the reverse side, indicating that the occupants of this grave were buried facing the sea.

  In Loving Memory of JOHN KNOX

  Beloved Husband of ELIZA JANE KNOX

  Who Died Sept 28th, 1905 Aged 72 years

  Also, the Above ELIZA JANE KNOX

  Who died Dec 6th, 1908 Aged 82 years

  Also, JOHN aged 17 years

  And DAVID aged 14 years

  Sons of the Above Who Were Killed

  By the Explosion at Seaham Colliery

  Sept 8th, 1880

  At twenty past two in the morning of Wednesday 8th September 1880, a massive underground explosion tore through Seaham Colliery. So great was the explosion that it was said to have been heard by sailors on ships moored at Seaham Harbour, and by the villagers at Murton, another colliery village a couple of miles inland. Perhaps Sarah Marshall and her employers, Thomas Boland and his wife Jane, were disturbed in their beds at the farmhouse in Seaton; perhaps a few doors down Eliza Knox awoke with a start and knot of dread in her stomach.

  At the time of the explosion, the colliery employed some fifteen hundred men and boys and produced half a million tons of coal a year, all of it mined by hand with picks and chisels, by coal hewers crawling on their bellies often in tunnels little higher than their knees, illuminated only by the light from their lamps, stripped down to the waist due to the intense heat. The coal seams and the tunnels which followed their course stretched out for miles underground, even out beyond the coast and under the seabed. Two thousand tons of coal would be brought to the surface of the mine every single day. At the time of the explosion, there were two hundred and thirty-one men and boys underground on the overnight shift, and hundreds of pit ponies. It is believed that more men were working overnight than usual, as some had requested time off to attend a local flower show the next day and were “working up” their hours, or had swapped shifts with their mates.

  Such was the force of the explosion that both shafts were blocked, rendering initial rescue attempts impossible. It was at least twelve hours before sufficient debris could be cleared to allow access to the upper seams, and even then, only by lowering rescuers in the kibble, a large basket on a rope, as the cage and winding gear had been destroyed. Nineteen survivors were brought up from the Low Pit shaft; a further forty-eight were eventually brought out alive from the High Pit. As time passed, the hopes of finding any other men alive quickly began to fade.

  News of the explosion spread rapidly far and wide. A telegram was sent from the Government Inspector of Mines to the Home Secretary:

  “I regret to report an explosion of gas at Seaham Colliery at 2 o’clock this morning. Two hundred men in the pit. Shafts blocked. Seventeen men saved in an upper seam. Sounds from men below. Plenty of assistance. Work progressing favourably. Hope to get down before night.”

  The Times reported on 9th September 1880, the day after the explosion:

  “A disaster which appears to be of appalling magnitude occurred at Seaham Colliery, Durham, the property of the Marquis of Londonderry… Women who may be widowed and children who may be fatherless are waiting drearily in the roadways leading to the colliery.” 9

  The Marquis himself was in residence at Seaham Hall at the time, and to his credit was very quickly on the scene. The Home Secretary, Lord Harcourt, visited, and Queen Victoria sent a telegram.

  It soon became clear that there would be no more men rescued. Fires still raged everywhere underground and those parts of the mine that were accessible were too dangerous to enter due the presence of gas and the risk of further explosions. On 10th September 1880, The Times described the scene:

  “The wreckage is fearful. The horses and ponies employed in the mine, about 250, are dead. They have either been killed in the explosion or suffocated.”10

  At least four of the horsekeepers, men like Thomas Marshall, Sarah’s father, were killed with their ponies, including John Nelson, William Stanton, William Breeze, and John Vickers. On 2nd October, it was reported that a fire had been found in the area of the stables, which was still burning some twenty-three days after the original explosion:

  “There have now been 100 dead ponies drawn from the pit. One of the horsekeepers, named Vickers, was sent to bank last night. His body was found under a fall. When got out it was so dreadfully mutilated tha
t there was no possibility of recognising him, and his son could only identify him by his trousers.”

  There were heavy losses among the young pony drivers too. David and John Knox, Sarah’s young neighbours, were amongst the dead. Their death certificates show that their deaths were not registered until 11th October 1880, some thirty-three days after the explosion, suggesting that their bodies were not recovered for some time, or that they were not easily identified, or both. The certificates were both signed by their mother Eliza with a simple “x” as she was unable to read or write. One cannot comprehend the agony that she and the boy’s father went through as they waited at the pithead for news of their beloved boys, their youngest children, eventually burying the boys together in the simple grave in the ancient churchyard at St Mary’s.

  The Knox family were not alone in their grief. There was barely a family in the village left unscathed by the disaster, barely a street that did not lose at least one man. One hundred and sixty-four men and boys perished, along with one hundred and eighty-one ponies – almost eleven per cent of the mine’s entire workforce killed in this single incident. The testimony of the rescuers who gave evidence at the subsequent inquest at the Mill Inn bears witness to the horrors they endured, the charred and horribly mutilated bodies they encountered. Families lost fathers and sons, brothers and cousins. Dozens of funerals took place every day, most at Christ Church, which was situated right opposite the colliery and where the memorial to those who perished still stands.

  Tales of tragedy and miraculous escapes abounded – one man, Thomas Johnson, had survived all five explosions at the mine. Another man missed his shift because he had overslept, another still had come up to the surface minutes before the explosion because he felt unwell. No doubt the bereaved relatives would have hoped that their loved ones perished instantly and without suffering. However, there is heart-breaking evidence that this was not the case, with some groups of men, unharmed by the initial explosion but trapped by rock falls, surviving in pockets of the mine a thousand feet or more below ground for at least twenty-four hours until overcome by gas or slowly suffocating in the darkness as first their lanterns, and then their air supply eventually ran out.

  When more of the bodies were eventually discovered, inscriptions were found chalked on planks of wood next to where these poor desperate souls lay.

  “Five o’clock and we have been praying to God.”

  “The Lord has been with us, we are all ready for heaven – Ric Cole, 1/2 past 2 o’clock Thursday.”

  (Written a full twenty-four hours after the explosion.)

  There then appears a fainter message, in the same hand:

  “Bless the Lord we have had a jolly prayer meeting, every man ready for glory. Praise the Lord – R. Cole” 11

  Perhaps one of the most tragic stories was that of thirty-three-year-old Michael Smith and his sick little boy, young Michael, who died at home on the same day. He scratched a final note to his wife Margaret and three children onto his tin water bottle:

  “Dear Margaret,

  There was 40 of us altogether at 7am. Some was singing hymns but my thoughts were on my little Michael that him and I would meet in heaven at the same time. Oh, Dear wife, God save you and the children, and pray. Be sure and learn the children to pray for me. Oh, what an awful position we are in!”

  – Michael Smith, 54 Henry Street.12

  Such stories touched the hearts of the nation, and various relief funds were set up to assist the hundred and seven widows, two aged mothers and two hundred and fifty-nine orphans left behind. Donations poured in from around the country. The Londonderrys themselves made personal contributions – the Marquis gave £200, the Marchioness £50, Viscount Castlereagh £50, and Viscountess Castlereagh £25. Queen Victoria sent a gift of £100. A gentleman by the name of Joseph Sebago, of Hyde Park, London, wrote a letter to the Editor of The Times on 7th October 1880, enclosing a cheque in the sum of five pounds for the widow of Michael Smith:

  “As a director of a large industrial concern in South Wales, I am not altogether unacquainted with miners, and it is pleasant to know that, notwithstanding the influence of trade unionism and drink, there are to be found among them such men as Smith.”13

  The Canon of York Minster, Canon Fleming, mentioned the incident in his sermon just a few days after the disaster, using it as an example in his campaign to call for better health and safety for the nation’s labouring classes:

  “We are compelled to admit that the present means to preserve human life, whether in our mines or on our railways, are entirely inadequate … much has no doubt been done in the past, but much more remains to be done.”14

  Within weeks of the disaster, relations between the miners and the colliery management began to deteriorate. At the beginning of October 1880, the decision was made, as had happened nine years before following the 1871 explosion, to brick up or “stop” the Maudlin seam in an attempt to allow the underground fires to burn out and so that coal production could resume. This caused outrage amongst the workforce and great distress among the bereaved, as many of the bodies of the victims had still not been recovered. In fact, the last of the bodies, the remains by then mummified, would not be recovered until 6th September 1881, almost exactly a year after the explosion occurred. The Durham Chronicle records how a strike was called, but the men went back to work not long afterwards as they were promised increased wages by the colliery managers, and that the Maudlin “stoppings” would soon be withdrawn. Although pay was increased, the managers reneged on their promise to take down the stoppings and remove the remaining bodies. The entire workforce came out on strike in December 1880, in protest at management’s treatment of the widows and their failure to retrieve their fallen colleagues. The widows of those who had perished were each paid one shilling per week, and three pence for the education of each child, but this was paid directly to the school. These funds were paid not by the colliery owner, but from the relief fund. Eliza Knox was paid the sum of £12 in compensation for the death of each of her sons. A group of ten widows famously interrupted a meeting of the relief committee, demanding two shillings and nine pence a week each, and a shilling each for their children. Their requests were refused. Because all of the miners’ cottages in Seaham were owned by the Londonderry estate, and exclusively for occupation by employees of the mine, those widows left without a husband or son working at the pit were eventually required to leave their homes or face eviction.

  By February 1881, the striking miners were desperate, and the resolve of some began to waiver. A few broke away and returned to work as blackleg (i.e. strike-breaking) labour; blacklegs were also brought in from other mines in the county. The strikers were blacklisted, which prevented them from seeking work at other collieries, and many were threatened with eviction. Disturbances, protests and violence followed, with some of the strike-breakers and the blackleg labour being assaulted by their former colleagues. The Londonderrys came down hard on their upstart employees – fifty men were arrested, including George, Thomas and Simeon Vickers, relatives of the horsekeeper who had perished, John Vickers. Simeon was sentenced to five months’ imprisonment in Durham Gaol along with four of his colleagues; a compromise was eventually reached and eight men were victimised. These eight, known as the sacrificed men, were sacked from their jobs and forcibly evicted, with their wives and children, from their homes.15 They were prevented from seeking work elsewhere.

  The Miners’ Union awarded each of the sacrificed men the princely sum of fifty pounds to enable them to try to make a new start elsewhere. Some of the men chose to emigrate to America, settling in the coal fields of Pennsylvania. Others followed in their wake, including two of the Vickers brothers, although they did eventually return to Seaham a few years later. Perhaps Sarah Marshall and Eliza Knox were amongst the crowds who gathered at the tiny station at Seaton to show solidarity with the men being carted off by train to prison in Durham; fearful of another r
iot, the police took the prisoners via a different route. A vote was held amongst the remaining striking miners on returning to work; the majority voted to stay out but they were unable to return the two-thirds majority required and by March 1881 the strike was over.

  The inquest proceedings rumbled on, a report was presented to Parliament and a formal Enquiry commenced at the Londonderry Institute in Tempest Road on the 10th October 1880. The Enquiry heard that ventilation in the mine was by means of a furnace fire at the bottom of the shaft. This practice was subsequently made illegal but not for another thirty years. The Enquiry eventually determined that the cause of the explosion had been “shot firing” in the curve between the two shafts, which had probably ignited a lethal combination of gas and coal dust. Incredibly, all four previous explosions had occurred at the same spot and in almost identical circumstances.

  Astonishingly, and counter to the direction of the Coroner himself and the huge amount of evidence which suggested gross negligence on the part of the colliery owners, the jury returned an open verdict. Perhaps the jury men, having witnessed the fate of the striking miners, were too fearful of the Londonderrys and their all-encompassing power over the lives of their employees and the village tradesmen to lay any blame at their door.16 In the longer term, the events at Seaham led to further research on the explosive qualities of coal dust, which saved countless lives.

  For the residents of Seaham and Seaton Village the autumn and winter of 1880/1881 were dark, desperate days. For Sarah Marshall and her family, things were about to get even worse.