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Home » Industry » Coal industry » Coal mine disasters

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  • This engraving was made by R. Roffe from an oil painting by A. R. Burt. The painting was commissioned by the owners of the Pentre Fron colliery, Minera, Denbighshire, to mark the extraordinary story of John Evans. In September 1819, a group of eleven men became trapped underground at the pit following a sudden inrush of water. Two of the men were rescued and another six managed to escape, but two were drowned and the remaining man, John Evans, was given up for lost. After thirteen days the water was pumped out and searchers went underground to look for his body. A coffin and shroud had been especially made and were ready on the surface. When the searchers arrived at the high ground near the spot where they thought the body might lie they were startled to hear a voice calling them. It was John Evans, feeble but by no means dead. He had kept himself alive for twelve days and nights by eating candles. He insisted on taking the coffin home and kept it in the house as a cupboard for many years.
Engraving of John Evans by R. Roffe from an oil painting by A. R. Burt
  • This is an appeal for public subscriptions following the Argoed colliery accident of 10 May 1837. Twenty-one men were killed in the accident, and the victims included the father and two of the brothers of Daniel Owen, the Mold-born novelist.
Appeal for subscriptions following the Argoed colliery disaster, Mold, 1837 [image 1 of 2]
Song about the Mostyn Colliery Disaster, 1884 [image 1 of 4]
  • This is a photograph of members of the Recovery Brigade who took part in the rescue operation at Gresford colliery following the explosion of 22 September 1934 which killed 261 miners. Three rescuers were also killed in the recovery operation and further underground explosions resulted in the death of a surface worker. Only 11 bodies were ever recovered from the scene.
Gresford Colliery Disaster Recovery Brigade, 1934
  • This postcard was posted at Gilfach Goch on 18 July 1905, a few days after the tragic colliery disaster - 'The Wattstown Disaster' - that claimed 119 lives. The sender notes on the reverse that this is a card of 'that awfull [sic] disaster that occurred last week ..'. Sadly, this was just one of a series of disasters which took place in the South Wales Coalfield during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries (the worst being the explosion at Universal Colliery, Senghennydd, in 1913, which killed 439 miners). Coal mining was a notoriously hazardous occupation. For instance, it has been estimated that approaching 3, 500 south Wales miners lost their lives in such disasters during the period 1837 to 1927. These disasters were often accompanied by an appalling indifference on the part of the coalowners to matters of safety underground. The human and economic repercussions of such events were also far reaching. At Wattstown in 1905 the explosion left 44 widows, 110 fatherless children under the age of 14, and a further 10 dependant adults who were forced to either fend for themselves or 'live off the parish'. Sources: Roger Williams and David Jones, 'The Cruel Inheritance. Life and death in the coalfields of Glamorgan' (Pontypool: Village Publishing, 1990) and David Egan, 'Coal Society. A History of the South Wales Mining Valleys 1840-1980 (Llandysul: Gomer Press, 1987).
Postcard of the National Colliery, Wattstown, 1905
  • This ballad by Abel Jones 'Bardd Crwst' (1829-1901), tells the story of the colliery disaster at Cwmcarn, Monmouthshire, on 10 September 1878. 258 men lost their lives and it is noted that 135 were married men, 68 were single, and 55 were boys. As a result, 131 women were widowed while 363 children lost their fathers.
Welsh ballad re. the disaster at the Abercarn Colliery, 10 September 1878, page 1