There
are signs of ancient times all around us in and around Easington
District. At Warden Law, alongside the Seaton to Houghton road, there
are two tumuli or prehistoric burial mounds, each surmounted with a
crown of trees, an eerie sight in the moonlight. Between them runs
Salter’s Lane, an ancient highway, the A19 of its day, which carries
on to Haswell, Wingate and Teesside. There are other tumuli in
Easington district and the Castle Eden Vase and other prehistoric
artefacts confirm that man has been here for many thousands of years.
Fertile soil and the ready availability of fish and shellfish must
have made this land an attractive proposition to early humans.
Much later Easington district was
incorporated in the Roman Empire along with the rest of England but
there are no visible signs in the district of this long lost
civilisation. As the Romans departed in the 5th. Century AD new
invaders took their place and the whole of the county of Durham
eventually became part of the Saxon kingdom of Northumbria, whose
capital was York. Many of the place names in Easington District are of
Saxon origin - Seaton (‘township-by-the-sea’), Seaham
(‘hamlet-by-the-sea’), Murton (‘moor-town’), Cold Hesledon and
Hesleden (‘hazel-dene’), Easington (Essyngtana, place of Essa’s
people) and Haswell (‘hazel-well’).
Eventually the monarch of the
southern Saxon kingdom of Wessex, Athelstan (grandson of Alfred the
Great), established himself as the King of All England in the early
part of the 10th. Century. By then there was a new and extremely
dangerous external enemy with a habit of turning up in some numbers
anywhere along the coast to cause mischief and destruction. These were
the Northmen and Easington district was in the frontline of the
defence against them. The oldest structure in Easington District today
is St. Mary the Virgin church at Old Seaham, which may date back to as
early as AD 800. If this date is even more or less correct then the
church and village were sited in a very dangerous and vulnerable
position for those troubled times. The later siting of Easington
parish church high on a hill overlooking the German Ocean may well
have been a precaution against a surprise attack by Vikings.
Sheer distance from London meant that
the far north of England, frontline against the Scandinavians and
later the Scots, was usually remote and detatched from the affairs,
personalities and events which shaped the nation’s history. Few of our
sovereigns came this way or knew much about the North, preferring to
delegate authority to the Prince-Bishops of Durham. One definite
exception was the Conqueror himself, who rampaged through the county
in his infamous ‘Northern Expedition’ to avenge a Saxon rebellion
against him. He laid waste the northern shires to such an extent that
there was no point in including them in his later Domesday Book. The
population of County Durham took generations to recover from this
genocide. The Conqueror’s grandson King Stephen (1135-54) was a
usurper who dragged the country into a dynastic civil war over the
throne. The Scots took advantage of the 20 year anarchy in England to
seize the whole of the north of the country. They were soon driven off
by Stephen’s energetic and undisputed successor Henry II (1154-89).
Henry’s son of infamous memory, King John (1199-1216), passed through
our county in his seemingly endless wars with the baronage.
Seventy years and more passed before
the next royal visitor to the county, King Edward I (1272-1307),
grandson of John, a man with a mission to unite all of the island of
Great Britain. He simply passed through on his way to massacring the
population of Berwick and temporarily imposing his will on the south
of Scotland. His inept son Edward II (1307-27) was defeated by the
Bruce at Bannockburn in 1314 and obliged to flee south for his life.
For the next decade Scots armies terrorised the northern counties. On
at least two occasions they penetrated as far south as Hartlepool,
ruining the village of Dalton-le-Dale and many others in their
passage. The son of the Bruce, David II, took advantage of Edward
III’s war with France to try to repeat the performance in 1337. Once
more East Durham was ruined but the King of Scots was eventually
brought to book in the battle of Neville’s Cross and became a prisoner
of the English Crown. There was to be no further serious trouble from
rampaging Scots for 300 years and East Durham once more reverted to
the role of backwater in the affairs of the nation.
Salter’s Lane and the Great North
Road at Durham were the slender threads which connected Easington
district with the commerce, ideas and technology of the outside world
but the highways also regularly brought pestilence to counterbalance
those advantages. At the end of the 1340s Britain was decimated by an
epidemic of bubonic plague which originated in the Far East. Perhaps
as many as a third of the population of Europe may have died in this
and later outbreaks of what was called ‘The Black Death’. Easington
district was particularly badly affected and the survivors had to trek
west to buy food from the dalesfolk whose isolation from other humans
had saved them. Food and money were left on special ‘Plague Stones’,
some of which still survive in Weardale and elsewhere.
The ‘Rising of the North’ in 1569 was
intended to remove the Protestant Elizabeth Tudor from the throne and
replace her with her imprisoned heir the Catholic Mary Stewart, former
Queen of Scots. It was crushed and its principals fled into permanent
exile, leaving the commoners to their fate. Elizabeth demanded a quota
of executions from each participating district and for this reason two
Easington men were selected and publicly hanged on the village green.
At some later point in the reign of Elizabeth all of the churches and
clergymen of Easington district became Protestant. Eventually most of
the population, wanting only a quiet life, also saw sense and
transferred their religious allegiance from Rome to London.
The childless Elizabeth was succeeded
by her distant Protestant cousin James VI of Scotland (only child of
the Queen of Scots) in 1603 and the two countries were united in a
personal union. This seemed to have brought a sensible end to the
perpetual Scottish threat to the northern counties of England but it
was to prove an illusion. James’s successor Charles I soon involved
himself in a conflict with both Parliament and Presbyterian Scots
which led to a three-way civil war. As so many times had happened
before the Scots took advantage of English disunity to occupy
Northumberland and Durham. Royalist, Scottish and Parliamentary armies
chased each other round and round the northeast of England for several
years and Easington district was ruined once more. Even in the 1650s,
long after the execution of Charles I and the establishment of the
Commonwealth, Dalton-le-Dale was without a parish priest and there is
a huge gap in the parish registers. He had either died and not been
replaced in the turmoil or he had simply fled. Charles II was restored
in 1660 and normality soon resumed at Dalton-le-Dale and elsewhere.
The northeast was not directly involved either in the Glorious
Revolution of 1688-89 or the Jacobite Rebellion of 1745 for Charles
Edward Stuart chose to invade England from Scotland via the north-west
route through Carlisle and Lancaster. He retreated the same way to
meet disaster at Culloden in 1746.
Down the centuries after the Conquest
the various manors, estates and labouring serfs within Easington
district changed hands many times, sometimes by outright purchase,
other times by inheritance or marriage. As the countless generations
of labourers tended the fields they cannot have guessed that the
greatest harvest of all lay far beneath their feet. Other than the
churches none of the mediaeval structures in the district have
survived to the present day, though there are ruins at Dalden Towers
(near Dalton-le-Dale) and at Ludworth which lies just outside the
modern boundaries of the district. Ancient churches stand at Old
Seaham (c. AD 800 ?), Dalton-le-Dale (c. AD 1150 ?) and Easington (c.
AD 1100 ?). Another (c. AD 1134 ??) stood derelict at Monk Hesleden
but was mysteriously and inexplicably demolished by the Council one
day in 1968. At Castle Eden there is an 18th. Century church
constructed by the local landowners, the Burdon family. No new
churches or chapels were erected until the first coalminers arrived to
transform and populate the empty district in the early 1830s.
In 1801 the total population of
County Durham was just 150,000. Over a third of these people lived in
the ancient towns of Hartlepool (1,047), Barnard Castle (2,966),
Stockton (4,009), Darlington (4,670), Durham (about 7,500), Gateshead
(8,597), South Shields (with Westoe about 11,000) and Sunderland
(about 18,000). Even that great metropolis of the far North,
Newcastle, just across the Tyne in Northumberland, had only 30,000
inhabitants at the beginning of the 19th. century, little more than
Greater Seaham has today.
The rest of the county of Durham, not
just the high ground as now, was as empty as some parts of western
Ireland are today. The tiny communities which together made up what we
now call Easington District had just 2,310 souls in the year 1801,
about the same as modern-day Wingate. Almost the smallest of these
minute and ancient agricultural communities was the scattered
‘constabulary’ of Dawdon (22 people in two farmhouses) in
Dalton-le-Dale parish, destined to become the collosus of the district
(as Seaham Harbour) until being itself eclipsed by the new town of
Peterlee in the 1960s.
The eastern half of the Durham
coalfield, upon which Easington District is situated, is concealed by
many hundreds of feet of Permian magnesian limestone. The powerful
steam engines required to drain deep mines did not exist until the
early 1820s. As the third decade of the nineteenth century dawned
technological advances had been made which made it possible at last to
investigate just what lay under the rolling limestone hills of East
Durham. At Rainton, four miles west of Seaham, coal is just below the
ground. A few hundred yards away to the east at Hetton, at the start
of the limestone escarpment, the coal is several hundred feet below
the surface. It was there on December 19 1820 that the new machinery
was put to the test.
Deep mining was an entirely new,
dangerous and expensive business, far beyond the financial means of
most coal owners, and necessitated the creation of a large company for
the purpose, the Hetton Colliery Company. Whilst digging proceeded the
famous engineer and pioneer of steam engines, George Stephenson, began
construction of a railway from the pithead at Hetton to Sunderland in
March 1821. The new line, the first in the world to be designed to
use locomotives, was some 8 miles in length and ran to the Hetton
Company's own staiths on the river Wear, where coal could be loaded
directly on to large vessels, thus missing out a number of middlemen
at Penshaw and on the river. The excellent publicity received launched
the Stephensons on to even greater things, as the world knows. More
importantly for the history of County Durham, coal was found
at the Hetton Lyons Blossom Pit sinking, at 650 and 900 feet, in seams
six and a half feet thick! By 1832 Hetton Lyons and its two sister
pits Eppleton and Elemore were annually producing 318,000 tons of coal
worth £174,000, and the combine was the largest mine in England.
Hetton Colliery and its railway proved that 900 feet of limestone,
water and quicksand and a large hill (Warden Law) blocking the way to
Sunderland were not insurmountable obstacles to the exploitation of
the rich reserves of coal and that achievement did not go unnoticed.
Before long others, such as Lord Londonderry, Lord Lambton (1st. Earl
of Durham), Lord Howden and Colonel Thomas Braddyll of Haswell, would
enter the arena and the tapping of the deeply concealed Durham
coalfield began in earnest. Their target was the tranquil idyll of
Easington District.
Below you will find the population
figures for Easington District in the first four censuses of the 19th.
century. The large and sudden increase in the population of Dawdon in
1831 was due to the foundation of the town and port of Seaham Harbour
three years before. The rise of the population at South Hetton and
Haswell in the same census was caused by the sinking of the first two
collieries in Easington District. Once these had begun production
(1833 & 1835 respectively) and proved they were viable the stampede
into East Durham was on. By 1841 Thornley and Wingate collieries were
also in production and four other pits were being sunk (Murton,
Shotton, Castle Eden and South Wingate). By the time of the 1851
census Seaton and Seaham collieries (later amalgamated as ‘Seaham’ in
1864) were being sunk. All of the then existing 8 collieries in
Easington were on the western edge of the district for the technology
did not yet exist to contemplate even deeper mines on the coast.
No new collieries were sunk in the
decade 1851-61. In fact the district experienced its first pit closure
with the collapse of South Wingate Colliery in 1857. In 1869 the
sinking of Wheatley Hill commenced and this was followed a year later
by two other new ventures at nearby Deaf Hill and Hutton Henry.
Wheatley Hill was severely handicapped by under-capitalisation and
went bankrupt at least twice before the turn of the century but
eventually proved itself. Shotton Colliery closed in 1877 and became a
ghost village for the next 23 years until it was reopened by the new
Horden Coal Company in 1900. Castle Eden Colliery folded in 1893,
Haswell in 1896 and Hutton Henry in 1897. The 20th. Century saw the
opening of the coastal super-pits at Dawdon, Easington, Horden,
Blackhall and Vane Tempest and the creation of new mining communities
in East Durham.
TOP
Apart from these fixed habitations
there is evidence of transients living on the East Durham beaches and
sometimes occupying the numerous caves along the rugged coastline. The
Portsmouth Telegraph of October 14 1799 reported thus:
Woman from the Seashore
‘On Thursday se(ven)’nnight a woman
was brought to the Lunatic Hospital near Newcastle who has lived
upwards of three years among the rocks on the sea-shore near Seaham.
From whence, or in what manner she first came there is unknown, but
she speaks in the Scottish dialect and talks of Loch Stewart and
AberGordon in a rambling manner. She is about thirty-five years of
age, inoffensive and cheerful, and during her residence among the
rocks was fantastically dressed in the rags which chance or the wrecks
threw in her way; she always kept a good fire of wood or coal, which
the sea threw up, and it is supposed lived upon shellfish & c. What is
remarkable, a beard has grown upon the lower part of her chin, nearly
an inch long, and bushy like the whiskers of a man.’
Until the mid 1840s County Durham was
divided into the following wards:
1. (NW and North), Chester (le-Street)
Ward, (included Bedlingtonshire, Norhamshire and Islandshire, now
parts of Northumberland).
2. (East), Easington Ward
3. (South East), Stockton Ward
4. (South West), Darlington Ward
Two settlements were considered large
enough and important enough to run their own affairs - Durham City and
Sunderland Town. For historical reasons connected to the Palatinate
(abolished 1836) County Durham included not only three areas of
Northumberland but also several other small enclaves in other
neighbouring counties, such as Craike, near Easingwold in Yorkshire.
Easington Ward was clearly
much larger than Easington District is now and included such
far-apart places as Bishopwearmouth Panns, Penshaw, South Biddick,
Lambton, West Rainton, Pittington, Sherburn, Coxhoe, Kelloe and
Trimdon. Virtually a quarter of the county. The population of the
entire old Easington Ward in 1841 was about 24,000.
October 1 1844 was the date the new Act of Reorganisation took effect
(Act of 7 & 8 Victoria. C.61), rationalising the ancient boundaries of
the counties and removing many of the strange and archaic anomalies
(such as Bedlingtonshire and Craike) that had existed. Thereafter the
new district of Easington assumed more or less its present
shape and size (Greater Seaham, Murton, Cold Hesledon, Hawthorn,
Easington Village, Thorpe, Castle Eden, Monk Hesleden, Nesbitt, Hulam,
Sheraton, Hutton Henry, Wingate, Deaf Hill, Wheatley Hill, Thornley,
Shotton, Haswell and South Hetton). The population of the new
district in the census of 1841 was only 15,491. In 1801 the same
area had just 2,310 people.
Chapter
2, The Collieries
Easington District Collieries in
Chronological Order
|
Colliery |
Duration |
Known
owners before Nationalisation in 1947 |
Major
Disasters |
|
1. South
Hetton |
1833-1982 |
South
Hetton Coal Company |
|
|
2.
Haswell |
1831,
1835-96 |
Haswell &
Shotton CC |
28/09/1844
(95) |
|
3.
Thornley |
1835-1970 |
John Gully
& Partners |
05/08/1841
(9) |
|
4.
Wingate Grange |
1837/40-1962 |
Lord Howden
& Partners |
1906 (26) |
|
5.
Murton (initially known as Dalton New Winning) |
1838,
1840-1991 |
South
Hetton CC |
15/08/1848
(14)
21/12/1937
(4)
26/06/1942
(13) |
|
6. South
Wingate (also known as Hart Bushes Colliery or Rodridge
Colliery) |
1840 (?) -
1857 |
Milbank ?? |
|
|
7.
Castle Eden (also known as the Maria Pit or Hesleden Pit) |
1840-93,
1900- ? (as a pumping station only) |
Wilkinson,
then
Horden CC |
|
|
8.
Shotton |
1840-77,
1900-72 |
Haswell &
Shotton CC,
Horden CC |
|
|
9.
Seaton/Seaham
(‘The
Nack’ pit) |
1844/49-1983
Merged as
‘Seaham’ in 1864. ‘Amalgamated’ with Vane Tempest 1983 |
North
Hetton & Grange CC and Londonderry Colls. to 1864, then
Londonderry alone |
1852 (6)
(Seaton)
1864 (2)
(Seaton)
1871 (26)
(Combine)
1880 (164)
(Combine) |
|
10.
Wheatley Hill |
1869-77,
1878-84, 1890-1968 |
Hartlepool
CC to 1884, and then Weardale Steel, Coke & Coal Company |
|
|
11.
Hutton Henry |
1869 (?) -
1897 |
Milbank ?? |
|
|
12. Deaf
Hill |
1870 (?)
-1967 |
Trimdon
Coal Co. |
|
|
13.
Seaham Dawdon |
1899-1991 |
Londonderry |
|
|
14.
Easington |
1899-1993 |
Easington
CC |
1951 (81 +
2 rescuers) |
|
15.
Horden |
1900-87 |
Horden CC |
|
|
16.
Blackhall |
1913-81 |
Horden CC
(??) |
|
|
17.
Seaham Vane Tempest |
1923-93 |
Londonderry |
|
|
18.
Hawthorn Shaft |
1959-93 |
NCB |
|
NB: Hawthorn Shaft was not a colliery in
the strict sense of the word. Coal was transported there underground
from Elemore, Eppleton and Murton collieries and then raised to the
surface for onward shipment by rail. The closure of the three feeders
meant the end for Hawthorn Shaft too.
NB:
Castle Eden Colliery closed for good in 1893. The site was reopened in
1900 but only as a pumping station to assist the drainage of the new
coastal super-pit at Horden and the newly reopened Shotton Colliery.
Collieries and Censuses
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Collieries or connection
with
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
‘Dormitory’ for Seaham &
Murton collieries
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Dawdon 1899-1991, Vane
Tempest 1923-93
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Seaton/Seaham 1844/49 - 1983
(merged 1864)
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
‘Dormitory’ for
Seaton/Seaham after 1850
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
‘Dormitory’ for Murton
Colliery after c.1885
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Took overflow population
from Murton & Easington colls
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Haswell 1835-96; Sth.
Hetton 1833-1982; Hawthorn Shaft 1959-91
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Took overflow population
from Castle Eden Colliery
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Castle Eden 1840-93; Horden
1900-87, Blackhall 1913-81
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
No connection with
coalmining
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
No connection with
coalmining
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
No connection with
coalmining
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
South Wingate 1840 (?)
-1857;
Hutton Henry 1869 (?) -1897
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Wingate 1837/40-1962
Wheatley Hill 1869-77,
1878-84, 1890-1968; Deaf Hill 1870 (?) -1967
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
NB:
Castle Eden Colliery closed in 1893. The site was reopened in 1900 but
only as a pumping station to assist the drainage of the new coastal
super-pit at Horden and the reopened Shotton Colliery.
There is some
doubt over the commencement date for South Wingate Colliery.
Conventional wisdom has it as being 1840 but there was no sign of the
colliery or any sinkers in the census of June 1841. A later date is
more probable. The colliery was definitely operating by the time of
the 1851 census.
There is also
some doubt over the commencement date for Hutton Henry Colliery.
Conventional wisdom has it as being 1869 but there was no sign of the
colliery or any sinkers in the census of 1871. A later date is more
probable. The colliery was definitely operating by the time of the
1881 census.
Likewise there
is considerable doubt over the commencement date for Deaf Hill
Colliery. Conventional wisdom has it as being 1870 but there was no
sign of the colliery or any sinkers in the census of 1871. A later
date therefore is more probable. The colliery was definitely operating
by the time of the 1881 census.
Sub-Chapters
and photos on all 18 collieries to be inserted here.
Chapter
2, The Railways
Maps to be inserted here
1. Hartlepool to Sunderland via
Haswell
1835/36-1993
The Past
In 1832, an incredibly early date in
railway history, the Hartlepool Dock and Railway Company received
Parliamentary approval to construct a passenger/freight line from
Hartlepool to Haswell (via Hart Station, Hesleden, Wellfield and
Shotton) with the intention of eventually pushing through to
Pittington, Moorsley, Rainton and beyond and hopefully diverting coal
trade from collieries en route such as the new ventures at Haswell and
South Hetton towards Hartlepool. In the same year a rival company, the
Sunderland Dock & Railway, started to build a line from Sunderland to
Haswell (via Ryhope, Seaton, Murton and South Hetton), which opened on
August 30 1836. Both lines terminated at Haswell but initially there
was no connection between them as they were on different levels and
almost at right angles to each other. There were two separate
stations. It was necessary for both passengers and freight to change
stations and trains to complete their journey to Hartlepool or
Sunderland
The directors of the new Durham (Shincliffe)
& Sunderland Railway Company in 1832 had been unconvinced by the early
locomotives produced by George Stephenson and others and instead opted
for fixed engines which could manage steep gradients far better. Later
locomotives had the power to cope with gradients but by then it was
too late and the company was stuck with the archaic method of
transport until it was taken over by the North Eastern Railway in the
1850s.
The advantage of fixed engines was
that they overcame the necessity for much of the excavation work
required to make a railway line as level as possible. Consequently,
for reasons of economy, the Sunderland to Durham (Shincliffe) &
Haswell ended up with some of the steepest gradients in the British
railway network and was later used to test the power and brakes on new
models of locomotives. From Ryhope to Haswell via Seaton, Murton
Junction and South Hetton was a continuous upslope. One night in the
1890s the brakes on a downtrack loco failed at Murton and the runaway
train raced past Seaton before derailing itself on the curve ahead.
Several people were killed.
The disadvantage to fixed engines was
that they made a journey tortuous in the extreme due to the need to
change haulage equipment for each leg of a journey. From Sunderland to
Ryhope, which was flat, the trains were hauled by a locomotive. There
the loco was replaced by a chain connected to the fixed engine house
at Murton Junction. The coaches were than pulled uphill, stopping at
Seaton on the way. At Murton the chain was changed for another one
connected to Haswell fixed engine house. To get to Durham was even
more complicated. It was necessary to change trains at Murton Junction
and gravity brought the coaches (still connected by a chain) downhill
to Hetton. From there to Durham (Shincliffe) via Pittington, Broomside
and Sherburn House was comparatively flat but there were several more
fixed engines to attatch to en route. It was barely quicker than
walking but this method of transport was used some 20 years after the
development of powerful locos which could do the entire journey on
their own regardless of the gradients.
It should be remembered that the
entire length of the Sunderland to Durham (Shincliffe) and Hartlepool
railway was constructed in the mid 1830s, a very early date in railway
history and therefore very early too in the Industrial Revolution.
There was as yet no digging machinery available to help in the
construction, just raw manpower and horsepower, spades, ropes, planks
and gunpowder. The labourers or ‘navvies’ lived in shanty towns of
wooden huts and tents right next to the excavations. A few of the
workmen had their wives and families with them but the bulk of the
workforce were single Irishmen, twenty to a hut. They were a terror to
the communities through which they dug a great swathe but had to be
tolerated as a passing and unstoppable phenomenon. Every so often the
camps broke up and moved on to plague another community four miles
down the projected line. The work itself was extremely hazardous and
deaths were commonplace though they seldom occurred in multiples
unlike the coalmines. Drawings of the time depict the dangerous
conditions and the arduous work required of these young supermen.
Babies were born and died and children were raised amongst the bedlam,
drink, violence and squalor. Our nation owes much of its prosperity to
the coarse, ignorant and often brutish Irish labourers who made the
Industrial Revolution possible and who died in their hundreds in the
effort.
In 1880 the N.E.R. constructed a
branch from the Hartlepool and Sunderland line at Wellfield to
Stockton via Wynyard Park. This created a connection between Wynyard
and Seaham via Wellfield, Murton Junction and Ryhope. Coal travelled
from Seaham Colliery to heat Wynyard Hall and the Londonderry family
travelled between their two Durham residences on their own private
train with private stations at either end. As well as a rental for the
use of his land the 5th. Marquess was given the right to halt any
trains he wished in order that he could get on board, regardless of
the inconvenience to other passengers.
In the early 1890's the 6th. Marquess'
younger son Reginald, in his teens, developed an interest in
engineering and would spend days on end travelling in the cab of a
train on the family's private locomotives between Wynyard, Seaham and
Sunderland. He learned to drive the train, ate with the drivers and
stokers and often returned home begrimed. He took a greater interest
in the family's northeast businesses and possessions than anybody
since his great-grandmother Lady Frances Anne Vane Tempest. Reginald
developed TB and was sent first to a sanatorium in South Africa and
then to stay with Cecil Rhodes as his guest. His health kept declining
and in May 1898 his mother had to travel out from Britain to bring him
home, which to him was Seaham Hall. He died there on October 9 1899,
aged 20. The shops in Seaham remained shut during the funeral service
and six enginemen acted as his pallbearers. According to his wishes he
was buried at St. Mary the Virgin at Seaham Hall, the only member of
the Londonderry family to lie in the town they created. A large Celtic
stone cross was erected over the grave but this has since been removed
for safety by the current Marquess of Londonderry. The passenger
service on the so-called Castle Eden branch line between Wellfield and
Stckton via Wynyard ended on November 2 1931. It remained open for
goods traffic until 1951. It was finally closed between 1966-68 and
the line was dismantled. It has now become the splendid Castle Eden
Walkway. Passenger service on the Hartlepool to Sunderland via Haswell
was withdrawn on June 9 1952. The line remained open for freight and
minerals until the mid 1960s when it was dismantled. The northern
section from Hawthorn Shaft to Ryhope remained open until the closure
of Murton colliery in 1991. This last segment was dismantled at the
end of 1993.
The Present
At the risk of repeating myself a
walkway now exists from Ryhope (old A19 Flyover) to Hart Station, just
north of Hartlepool. With a little diversion at Station Town it is also
possible to walk from Ryhope to Stockton via Wynyard. With a much bigger
diversion because of a 200 yard gap at Murton, it is also possible to
walk from Ryhope to the edge of the Cathedral City. Needless to say
Seaham is not connected to this because ‘The Yellow Brick Road’ stops
short at Cold Hesledon though there are plans to extend it to the old
Hartlepool-Sunderland at South Hetton.
The Future
Why is
there a 200 yard gap at Murton, entailing a huge diversion for ramblers
trying to get from Ryhope to Durham City along old railways ? Get your
fingers out Easington District, Tyne & Wear and Durham County councils
Durham & Sunderland via Murton 1836-1993
The Present
This railway opened on 28 June 1839 and
ran from Durham Shincliffe via Sherburn House, Pittington, Hetton-le-Hole,
Murton Junction, Seaton and Ryhope. The western passenger terminus was
not in Durham itself but at Shincliffe, one mile south of the city. A
spur line serviced Lord Londonderry's colliery at Old Durham from 1849.
When this pit closed in 1892 the spur was taken over and extended across
the River Wear to a new station, Durham Elvet, between the County Gaol
and the Racecourse. The first Miners Gala was held on the racecourse in
1872. For the first 21 years the trains from Sunderland and other points
spilled out the miners, their bands and their banners at Shincliffe and
they then marched the two miles to the city. After 1893 the trains
delivered the miners to the edge of the racecourse. From 24 July 1893
the service to Shincliffe was withdrawn and closed, but the building
still remains, used by the County Council Highways Department.
The original purpose of the railway had
been to pick up coal from collieries en route and deliver it to the
docks at Sunderland but in this it had not been successful. At the
western end spur mineral lines did extend to the short-lived Houghall,
Shincliffe, Whitwell and Old Durham collieries. But this last colliery
and collieries all the rest of the way to Sunderland all belonged to
Lord Londonderry, Lord Lambton and the Hetton Coal company - all of
which had their own railway networks delivering coal to Sunderland and
Seaham Harbour. The severe industrial depression of the early 1890s
finished off all of the pits at the western end of the line including
Old Durham. All of their branch lines were abandoned except for that to
Old Durham (see above) which became part of the new main line to Durham
City (Elvet), bypassing Shincliffe. Elvet station was very close to
Durham County Gaol and the racecourse where the Miners Gala was held.
The passenger service from Durham Elvet
to Sunderland was not a great success either and it was withdrawn on 1
January 1931. The service was cut back to Pittington. Except for the war
years, Durham Elvet continued in use for just one day a year until 1953.
The great day was of course the Miner's Gala. In 1949 the station was
taken over by the County Council. The Sunderland to Pittington passenger
service was withdrawn on January 5 1953. The Miners Gala of July 1953
was the last time Elvet was used for passengers. Elvet was demolished in
1964 and a new office block constructed on the site. The Pittington and
Sunderland line remained open for mineral traffic until the Beeching
cuts of the early 60s. Then it was dismantled from Pittington to Murton
Junction. The section from Murton to Sunderland via Seaton and Ryhope
remained open to serve the Hawthorn Shaft combine. The closure of the
last feeder pit for Hawthorn Shaft, Murton, in 1991, meant that this
last section too was doomed. The line was dismantled from Hawthorn Shaft
to Ryhope in 1993 and has since been turned into a walkway. It is in
fact part of a continuous walkway from Ryhope to Hart Station, just
north of Hartlepool.
The Present
I repeat - the old line is in fact part
of a continuous walkway from Ryhope to Hart Station, just north of
Hartlepool. Brilliant. Enough said.
The Future
Why is there a 200 yard gap at Murton,
entailing a huge diversion for ramblers trying to get from Ryhope to
Durham City along old railways ? Get your fingers out Easington
District, Tyne & Wear and Durham County councils !
TOP
Londonderry Seaham & Sunderland
1854/55- 98
The Past
Seaton and Seaham collieries came on
stream in 1852. The docks at Seaham Harbour were by now receiving coal
from nearly 20 inland pits and were seriously overloaded. Something had
to be done to ease the pressure. The solution was to create a railway to
the much larger facilities at the port of Sunderland. On a bitterly cold
day, February 8 1853, the first turf of the Londonderry Seaham and
Sunderland Railway was dug by the 3rd. Marquess, now aged 75. He was
fated not to see the completion of this project. On January 17 1854
Frances Anne celebrated her 54th. birthday at Wynyard, the last she
would share with her husband. On the same day the Londonderry Seaham and
Sunderland Railway was completed as far as Ryhope where it met up with
the Durham (Shincliffe) and Sunderland Railway. This company would not
share its rails or its station at Ryhope (West) with the newcomer which
was obliged to lay its own tracks alongside the others on the remaining
stretch from Ryhope to Sunderland. This explains why the trackbed today
is so wide between Ryhope and Hendon. Passenger traffic finally began on
the Londonderry Seaham and Sunderland on July 1 1855 with stations at
Seaham, Seaham Colliery, Seaham Hall (for the private use of the
Londonderrys and their guests) and Ryhope (East). The town was at last
connected to the outside world by a passenger rail service. From 1854 to
1868 the LS&S had its own station in Sunderland. From 1868 until 1879
the terminus was at Hendon Burn until the new central station opened.
The new railway terminated at Seaham,
there was no southward connection to Hartlepool and Teesside. For this
it was necessary to travel on the LS&S north to Ryhope (East) and change
there to a D&S (rope-hauled) southbound train to Haswell and change
again there to a loco-hauled train of the HD&R. This situation of dozens
of independent railway companies serving the northeast was about to come
to an end. A giant appeared amongst them. The North Eastern Railway was
formed in 1854 by the amalgamation of four large railway companies: the
York and North Midland; the York, Newcastle & Berwick; the Leeds
Northern; the Malton and Driffield. In the following decades the N.E.R.
gobbled up many others including the Stockton & Darlington, the Durham
and Sunderland, the Hartlepool Dock and Railway and, eventually, the
Londonderry Seaham and Sunderland. From HQ in York the company at its
peak controlled over 500 stations, with 1700 miles of track and the
right to use another 300 miles belonging to other companies. The N.E.R.
and Hartlepool Dock & Railway amalgamated in 1857. The D&S was gobbled
up a little later. A single station was constructed at Haswell and
through trains now ran from Sunderland to Hartlepool under the same
livery.
The 3rd. Marquess died in March 1854
and his widow took over the running of all the Londonderry businesses.
On December 12 1859 she laid the foundation stone for the Seaham Harbour
Blast Furnaces at a site near Dawdon Hill Farm. An extension to the
LS&S, the Blastfurnace Branch, was constructed to connect with this new
and high-risk venture and Frances Anne's second son Adolphus was put in
charge. This was possibly not the wisest of choices given that Adolphus
was having serious mental problems at the time. Quarrels between Frances
Anne and her chief agent John Ravenshaw over the entire scheme brought
about his resignation and delayed completion of the project until 1862.
The furnaces were supplied with coal from Seaham Colliery and iron ore
from Cleveland which was brought by rail to Ryhope by the NER and then
on to the Londonderry Seaham and Sunderland railway. The newly built
extension to this line led straight into the furnaces. Lime was brought
on another short branch tramway from the quarry at Fox Cover. National
overproduction of iron and falling prices threatened the scheme by the
time of Frances Anne's death three years later and it did in fact fold
by the end of 1865. In 1869 the site was leased out to a chemical
company for the production of soda and magnesia and occasionally
pig-iron when the market revived. Both Chemical Works and Blastfurnaces
finally closed in 1885. The Blastfurnace Branch line was taken over to
service Dawdon Colliery whch appeared near to the furnace site in 1899.
The branch tramway to Fox Cover Quarry remained in use until about 1919.
In the mid-1890s new deep collieries
were planned along the Durham coast - Blackhall, Horden, Easington and
Dawdon. The 6th. Marquess contemplated extending the LS&S southward to
Easington and perhaps beyond. However the N.E.R. was also on the scene
and wanted to build its own railway to connect Seaham (and all the new
pits in between) with Hartlepool. The N.E.R. already owned Hartlepool
Dock. A clash was inevitable and for months legal action and
counter-action ensued. Londonderry opposed a new N.E.R. line, the N.E.R.
opposed the Seaham Harbour dock project and the proposed extension of
the LS&S. Finally the two sides came to their senses and agreed to
cooperate.
In 1898 the 6th. Marquess sponsored the
Seaham Harbour Dock Act which established the Seaham Harbour Dock
Company and gave it powers to construct new harbour works, including two
outer protective piers and an enclosed dock equipped with new coal
staiths. SHDC was unusual as one of the few private companies to be
established by special Act of Parliament. The capital of the Company in
1898 was £450,000. Both the N.E.R. and Lord Londonderry were major
shareholders in this new concern which took over the docks and the LS&S
waggonways and stock of coal wagons. As part of the deal the rest of the
LS&S, in almost its entirety, was sold to the N.E.R. for £400,000 and it
was incorporated in their network. The Londonderry family also gained a
seat on the board of the N.E.R. Two small exceptions were made to the
sale of the LS&S lock, stock and barrel: Seaham Hall station remained
the private property of the family and the Marquess retained the right
'to stop other than express trains within reasonable limits' (between
1900 and 1923 this privilege was used only four times, an indication of
how little the family used Seaham Hall by then. In 1923 the 7th.
Marquess, who had recently abandoned Seaham Hall, was persuaded by the
new L.N.E.R. to surrender this right.); The Station Hotel in Seaham also
remained the property of the Marquess. This public house had an entrance
straight from the platform. Seaham Colliery station became the new main
station for Seaham for through-trains but the old station remained as
the terminus for the local service from Sunderland. It was closed on
September 11 1939 as a a wartime measure and never reopened. It and the
public house were demolished in the 1970s. The N.E.R. became the L.N.E.R.
after the Great War and part of British Railways after the Second World
War.
The Present
Seaham lost its own private railway in
1898. The trackbed of the LS&SR is now part of the coastal
Sunderland-Seaham-Hartlepool-Teesside branch railway. Virtually the only
visible reminder of the old private railway is to be seen just to the
north of the former Ryhope junction with the inland Sunderland-Haswell-Hartlepool
line where the legend LS&SR can be seen stamped on the metal railway
bridge which spans Ryhope Dene.
The Future
The future of the
trackbed of the former LS&SR between Seaham and Sunderland seems to be
reasonably secure. Without her pits Seaham is rapidly becoming a mere
satellite of Sunderland which is soon to be connected up to the Tyneside
Metro system. It seems likely that Seaham too will be connected up one
day.
N.E.R. Seaham to Hartlepool, 1905-?
The Past
In 1899 the N.E.R. began to construct
the Seaham-Hartlepool connection. This necessitated the construction of
viaducts over four large denes and several smaller ones. The most
spectacular of these are at Seaton Carew, Hawthorn Dene and Dawdon Field
Dene. Dawdon Viaduct was finished in 1905 to complete the new line.
Seaham was at last connected to the south and was no longer a railway
deadend. There were stations at Hartlepool, Hart Station, Blackhall,
Horden, Easington (Colliery), Seaham, Ryhope (East) and Sunderland. Over
the years the number of stations was gradually reduced until there was
only one stop between Hartlepool and Sunderland - Seaham.
The Present
In recent decades all of the pits the
Seaham to Hartlepool extension was constructed to serve - Blackhall,
Horden, Easington, Dawdon and Vane Tempest have closed. The Durham
coalfield is history. The line from Seaham to Hartlepool and beyond has
never been a success as a passenger railway. Watch the passenger trains
as they shuttle past. Hardly a soul on board.
The Future
If the Seaham to
Hartlepool connection does go then surely a magnificent coastal walkway
can be created from the trackbed. There is even the possibily of a steam
service in summer time.
Map to be inserted here
The Hetton Colliery Railway (Waggonway)
1822-1959
Including a chapter on the Hetton
Colliery Railway in a book about the railways and communities of
Easington District might seem a little strange - after all the HCR began
in Hetton and ended in Sunderland and at no point does it even touch our
district. However the railway was constructed in the early 1820s when
Hetton was indeed part of the then Easington Ward, which was much
larger than Easington District is now. The HCR ran from Hetton to
Sunderland by crossing over Warden Law Hill, one of the highest points
for miles around, and thus it could be seen from various high points
(e.g. Mount Pleasant and Kinley Hill) in and around Seaham and elsewhere
and for a brief while (from 1896 to about 1920) it may have been
connected to Seaham Harbour via the old Rainton and Seaham line. More
importantly the HCR (about which there is little published material)
deserves a place in this book because of its unique place in railway
history and for its role in opening up the coalmines of Easington
District. The HCR was fed by Hetton Lyons, Eppleton and Elemore pits.
These were the first deep mines in the county of Durham and were the
inspiration for all of the other deep collieries which came later in
Easington District, including the three Seaham pits. In 1921 the
Londonderrys sold Silksworth Colliery to Lord Joicey and that pit was
also connected to the HCR.
TOP
The Past
The Durham coalfield is divided into
two distinct parts - the exposed and the concealed. In the western,
exposed, half fuel at or near the surface must have been collected from
earliest times. There are places today in west Durham where people can
literally dig up coal from their back gardens and there are still
several open-cast sites which are likely to be around for decades to
come. The first clearly documented evidence of coalmining in the exposed
coalfield is in the Boldon Book of 1183, a register of the Bishop of
Durham's personal lands and the dues paid by his tenants. Small mines,
probably simple bell-pits, were worked during the mediaeval period in
the Tyne and Wear valleys. Limited in quantity and of indifferent
quality, these coals were sent by sea to London and the Low Countries.
The Industrial Revolution encouraged a dramatic increase in production
from the 16th. century onwards. Because of their nearness to the sea
Durham and Northumberland became the most important coal-producing and
exporting counties in the period 1550-1700. Early waggonways and then
the railways proper enabled coal and coke to be moved to the ports on
the rivers and coast, where they were loaded on to large ships for
export. A coal exchange was established at Billingsgate in London in
1769 and coal cartels began to operate in the Durham coalfield in the
18th. and early 19th. centuries. Before the advent of steam coal mines
had to be drained by primitive water-wheels and this placed a physical
limit on the depth of the mines and the amount of water that could be
removed.
Waggonways may have been used at small
mines in the Midlands in the 16th. century. The earliest waggonway in
the northeast was near Blyth, probably opened in 1609 to carry coal from
pits near Bedlington to the river Blyth. In about 1630 Sir Thomas
Liddell, of Ravensworth Castle, is said to have laid the first waggonway
to the Tyne from the Teams Colliery near to Derwenthaugh. The first
waggonway on the Wear was laid by Thomas Allan in 1693. By 1793 on a
stretch of the river near Fatfield there were ten coal staiths connected
by rail to some thirty pits. The rails of all these early lines were
made of wood and the wagons were horse-drawn. By the middle of the 18th.
century rails were made of cast-iron. By 1820 cheaper wrought-iron was
increasingly in use. Wherever a large weight of goods had to be
transported regularly between two fixed points railways showed
themselves to be very practicable. At first hills set a limit to their
use but inclined planes soon circumvented this problem. Complete canal
boats were let down and drawn up on slopes between different canals.
Similar inclined planes were placed to connect nearly level railways,
and so the possibility of overcoming every difficulty of the ground was
offered by them. Empty wagons were drawn up the line by the weight of
the full ones in descent, a system apparently perfected by a Mr. Barnes
of Benwell Colliery.
The eastern half of the Durham
coalfield is concealed by several hundreds of feet of Permian magnesian
limestone. The powerful steam engines required to dig and drain deep
mines did not exist until the start of the 1820s. The first exploitation
of the concealed coalfield using the new technology took place at the
tiny village of Hetton where sinking commenced on December 19 1820. Deep
mining was an expensive business, far beyond the financial means of most
coalowners, and necessitated the creation of a large company for the
purpose. Hetton was at the edge of the exposed coalfield. A few hundred
yards to the east were old shallow pits at Rainton which sent their coal
on horse-drawn wagons up a waggonway to Penshaw where it was loaded on
to small vessels, taken down the river Wear, and re-transferred to
larger boats for export to London and abroad. The new Hetton Colliery
Company decided to dispense with all of these middlemen and have its own
direct waggonway connection to its own staiths near the mouth of the
river, eight miles to the northeast, for direct loading on to
ocean-going vessels.
Whilst the exploratory digging
proceeded at Hetton George Stephenson, the famous engineer and pioneer
of steam engines, oversaw the construction of the railway from the
pithead to Sunderland from March 1821. He was allowed by his usual
employers, the 'Grand Allies', to undertake this extra work, his first
completely new railway, without any diminution of his salary as resident
engineer at Killingworth Colliery in Northumberland. His brother Robert
(after whom George's equally famous son Robert was named) was the
resident engineer for this, the remarkable Hetton Colliery Railway. The
new line was the first railway in the world to be designed to use
locomotives. Stephenson sold 5 of his own locos to the Hetton Company,
but they were not terribly successful and were replaced by others in the
1830s.
The HCR ran uphill from Hetton to the
Copt Hill, climbed over the top of Warden Law Hill, and descended past
Silksworth on its way to the river at Sunderland. The railway was far
from straight for it needed to make skilful use of the terrain. The
first four stages totalled a climb of 317 feet 9 inches in about 2.8
miles. From the top of Warden Law Hill to the staiths above the river
was seven more stages away, very nearly 5 miles, and a collective drop
of 522 feet. Wagons, eight at a time and holding over two and a half
tons each, were transported from Hetton to the Wear in about two hours -
using fixed steam engines for the steepest gradients, self-acting
inclined planes for the less steep, and very early locomotives and fixed
engines for the few level stretches. Over the 8 miles there were two
locomotives, six stationary engines, and 5 brake arrangements on as many
inclined planes. At the time of its opening, November 18 1822, the
Hetton Colliery Railway was regarded as one of the engineering wonders
of the world and it attracted visitors from as far afield as America and
Prussia. The North-East was at the forefront of technology, the Silicon
Valley of its day. The excellent publicity received launched the
Stephenson clan on to even greater things - the Stockton & Darlington
Railway (opened in 1825), the Manchester and Liverpool (opened in 1831)
and the Birmingham & London. These pioneering achievements have earned
George Stephenson a place on the back of every modern £5 note.
Coal was found at the Hetton
Lyons Blossom Pit sinking, at 650 and 900 feet, in seams six and a half
feet thick. By 1826 Hetton Colliery and its sister mines at Elemore and
Eppleton were producing 318,000 tons of coal worth £174,000 and had
become the largest mining combine in England. Hetton Colliery and its
railway proved that 900 feet of limestone and quicksand and a 300 foot
hill were not insurmountable obstacles to exploitation of the rich
reserves of coal and that lesson did not go unnoticed. Before long
others, including the 3rd. Marquess of Londonderry and Colonel Thomas
Braddyll of Haswell, would enter the field and the tapping of the
concealed Durham coalfield began in earnest.
Between 1828 and 1831 Lord Londonderry
constructed a waggonway from his Rainton pits to his new harbour at
Seaham. This, the Rainton and Seaham railway, passed under the HCR at a
point opposite to the public house at the Copt Hill. No junction was
effected between the two at this point in time but there may be have
been one later. Rainton Colliery closed in 1896 and the Rainton and
Seaham line became redundant. The sections west of the Copt Hill were
dismantled. The section from the Copt Hill to Seaham Colliery and Seaham
Harbour was transferred from Londonderry Collieries to the Hetton
Colliery Company and a junction may have been created which enabled the
HCC to ship its coal from either Sunderland or Seaham Harbour. The new
connection to Seaham Harbour was used only lightly and was abandoned at
some point before 1920. The original Hetton Colliery Company was gobbled
up by the Lambtons, Earls of Durham, late in the nineteenth century. At
the very end of the century the Lambtons in turn sold out all their
mining interests to Sir James Joicey. In 1920 the 7th. Marquess of
Londonderry sold Silksworth Colliery to Joicey. This pit had been
connected to the Londonderry Seaham and Sunderland Railway but was now
linked instead to the Hetton Colliery Railway. Thus in its time the HCR
served Hetton Lyons, Elemore, Eppleton and Silksworth collieries.
When Hetton Lyons Colliery closed in
1950 Elemore, Eppleton and Silksworth collieries carried on using the
ancient HCR and the old staiths on the Wear. The end for railway and
staiths came with the construction of the new Hawthorn Shaft near Murton
from 1952-58 to which the coals from Eppleton, Elemore and Murton were
sent underground for onward shipment down the old branch line from
Murton to Sunderland Docks via Seaton and Ryhope or to Seaham Harbour
via the South Hetton line. After a working life of 137 years the Hetton
Colliery Railway carried traffic for the last time on Wednesday,
September 9 1959, and dismantling began the next day. The last 90 feet
of track was lifted at Hetton on November 20 1960.
You have to wonder what the planners of
Sunderland and Durham County councils were up to back in 1959. No
attempt seems to have been made to keep the trackbed of the Hetton
Colliery Railway intact. It is not as if this part of the county is
over-blessed with historical monuments. A golden opportunity was missed
to preserve Stephenson's masterpiece, a direct link back to the
Industrial Revolution which so altered this county and especially
Easington District. A continuous walkway/cycleway/bridleway/ tourist
attraction could have been created - linking the heart of Sunderland to
the serene countryside at Hetton and then on to Durham City via the old
Durham and Sunderland branch of the N.E.R. Instead in the 35 years since
its closure the course of the Hetton Colliery Railway has been bisected
by the quarry at Warden Law (itself now disused), the new A19 Sunderland
bypass, and the expanding estates of Moorside and Farringdon. Some
sections have been taken back by adjacent farmers.
The present
Today, in fragments, there is still
much to see of Stephenson's masterpiece. The three best viewing spots
are:
1) At the Copt Hill public house on the
Houghton and Seaham road you are at the top of the inclined plane from
Hetton Colliery and can see down into the valley where the pit was
located.
2) At the summit of Warden Law Hill,
above the old quarry. From here, on a clear day, there is a spectacular
view in every direction and the sheer scale of the railway can be
appreciated. Truly a wonder of its time.
3) From the eastern perimeter of
Farringdon estate the course of the railway can be followed, in isolated
segments, past Plains Farm and on into the centre of Sunderland, running
gently downhill all the way. All traces of it vanish as it crosses the
Chester Road. The staiths are long since demolished.
The Future
The Hetton Colliery Railway preceded
the Stockton and Darlington Railway by three years. It was the first
railway in the world to be designed to use locomotives. It marked a
crucial stage in the career of George Stephenson. These three facts
alone give the HCR a unique place in the history of transport. Until
very recently however there were no information boards, no sign-posts,
nothing to indicate its importance. Now Sunderland City Council has at
last put up some signposts and released some very informative free
pamphlets for ramblers.
The Rainton and Seaham Railway
1831-1988
Map to be inserted here
The Past
In 1813 Sir Henry Vane Tempest of
Wynyard, MP for County Durham, died from an apopleptic fit at the age of
42 and left his considerable fortune and his mines at Penshaw and
Rainton to his only legitimate child, 13 year old Frances Anne. At a
stroke, no pun intended, she became the second largest exporter of coal
from the River Wear with an income of £60,000 per year, a tidy sum now,
a fortune then. 'Rainton Colliery' was a collective term for several
old, shallow pits, some of which had been worked since at least 1650 by
Frances Anne’s ancestors. The coal in the Rainton district is just below
the surface and in all probability mining had gone on there for a
millenium or two before that.
The entire 'Rainton Royalty' was owned
by the Dean and Chapter of Durham Cathedral and leased to Frances Anne.
At the time that she inherited the Rainton complex incorporated six main
pits and many small ones covering an area of some 9 square miles. The
main pits were the Nicholson's, Rainton Meadows, the Plain Pit,
Woodside, Hunter's House and Resolution. The smaller pits, some of which
were worked directly by Frances Anne and the others leased out to
smaller independent operators, included the Quarry Pit, Annabella, the
North Pit, The Knott, Old Engine and Pontop Pit. The Rainton and Penshaw
collieries were complemented by workshops at Chilton Moor. The coal was
pulled by horses from the Rainton pits on a waggonway (which had
probably existed since the opening of Rainton Colliery) to the staiths
at Penshaw (via Colliery Row, Junction Row and Shiney Row), from which
point the Wear was navigable. There it was loaded on to small vessels
called keels and taken to Wearmouth where it was transferred to larger
vessels for the onward sea voyage. Wages for this and the local port tax
of six shillings a chaldron amounted to £10,000 per year. A port at
nearby Seaham, linked to Rainton by a waggonway, would have enabled
Frances Anne to save paying this and gain an edge on her competitors.
For the moment the heiress was a minor
under the care of guardians and her business was run by agents
appointed by the Court of Chancery. In 1819 Frances Anne, as old as the
century, married a man old enough to be her father - 41 year old Lord
Charles Stewart, a five foot nothing reactionary and minor hero of the
Napoleonic Wars. 'Fighting Charlie', as the family called him, had never
been to County Durham in his life and knew nothing about his new wife's
business, coal. On the credit side he stood to eventually inherit a
marquessate, money and land from his father and childless elder
half-brother Robert Stewart. That same half-brother, better known as
Viscount Castlereagh, was Foreign Secretary, Leader of the House of
Commons and Prime Minister in all but name and able to exert immense
influence on behalf of his friends and relatives.
Sir Ralph Milbanke's plan for a harbour
at Seaham ('Port Milbanke') now came to Stewart's knowledge and he
determined to buy the estates of Seaham and Dalden when he heard that
they were to be sold at a public auction. This took place on October 13
1821 and his bid of £63,000 was successful. He raised part of the money
by charging it on his brother's Irish property. Stewart simply wanted to
avoid middlemen on the Wear and be independent of the port of
Sunderland. As yet there was no thought that coal might lie under Seaham
itself, but such ideas could not be far away. Chosen spot for the
proposed harbour was the limestone promontory called Dalden (or Dawdon)
Ness on his new estates. Frances Anne was rich but her money was
controlled by trustees who had no confidence in the venture and for the
next seven years Stewart failed to find financial backing despite
obtaining the favourable views of leading engineers of the day such as
Rennie, Telford and Logan.
TOP
Stewart was certainly not idle during
this waiting period. A seventh large pit, Adventure, was sunk at Rainton
from 1820 to 1822, and an eighth, the Alexandrina or Letch, in 1824. A
completely new colliery complex was sunk at Pittington (consisting of
the Londonderry, Adolphus and Buddle pits) from 1826 to 1828 on land
leased from others. Stewart also leased land at Hetton in 1820 from the
estate of the Earl of Strathmore. Here the future North Hetton Colliery
(later called Moorsley) would appear in 1838. In 1825 Stewart combined
this tract of land with an adjacent part of the Rainton Royalty, which
he leased from the Dean and Chapter and where two more pits (Dun Well
and Hazard) were planned, and sub-leased the lot to William Russell of
Brancepeth. Included in the deal was the nearby North pit and permission
to use the old waggonway to Penshaw and the staiths there. Stewart
received rent and royalties and also had a share in the new North Hetton
Coal Company that was established. When the Rainton to Seaham line was
constructed in 1831 he made sure that the last four named pits were
roped into his rail network.
When Castlereagh committed suicide in
1822 his half-brother Charles became the 3rd. Marquess of Londonderry.
If he had been able to build his railway and harbour in the first years
of the 1820s Charles Stewart would have gained an immense advantage over
his competitors. The savings made on cutting out the Wear middlemen
would have enabled him to deliver his coal to the export market at a
price that ensured a fat profit. In 1820 another option had been
available. His chief 'viewer' John Buddle recommended that a connection
was built from the Rainton & Penshaw Waggonway to link up with another
waggonway which ran from Newbottle Colliery to staiths near to Wearmouth.
This colliery and waggonway were the property of the Nesham (or Neasham)
family who were keen to strike a deal. Doubts about the waggonway's
ability to handle all of the additional coal from Rainton and Penshaw
collieries and the fact that he would be dependent on others discouraged
Stewart from proceeding. In 1822 Lord Lambton snapped up both Nesham's
Waggonway and Newbottle Colliery. The new Lambton Waggonway was then
extended southwestwards to join up with Lambton's other collieries at
Cocken, Littletown and Sherburn. This shrewd move gave Lambton the same
advantage as the Hetton Company, independence from the Wear middlemen.
The opening of the Stockton and
Darlington Railway in 1825 enabled pits northwest of Darlington to send
their coal cheaply to Stockton at which point the Tees was navigable. A
new port was planned nearer the sea which would become Middlesbrough.
Next came the Clarence Railway which further connected Teeside (Port
Clarence) to inland pits. Vast new docks were also planned for
Sunderland. Finally the information that Colonel Thomas Braddyll planned
to build a harbour at Hawthorn Hythe and a waggonway from there to his
new colliery at South Hetton spurred the Marquess into action. It was no
longer a question of gaining an advantage but of survival in a very
competitive industry. Without the new harbour and railway it was only a
matter of time before his collieries were gobbled up by others and
incorporated into their railway systems. The problem in 1828 was that he
still did not have the money for such an undertaking. Hearing that
Londonderry was determined to proceed Braddyll abandoned his own
impractical scheme and tried to buy a share in the Rainton & Seaham
project but the Marquess decided to go it alone. Braddyll was however
persuaded to lend Londonderry £17,000 on condition that his future South
Hetton coals would be shipped from the new port and facilities at Seaham
Harbour.
Because of Londonderry’s money problems
the construction and running of the Rainton line was contracted out to
Shakespear Reed of Thornhill who put up the cash and charged so much per
chaldron carried. Their contractor was Benjamin Thompson and so
inevitably the waggonway became known as Benny's Bank. Shakespear Reed
got 3 shillings (15p) per chaldron for the guaranteed 50,000 chaldrons
to be shipped each year, with a reducing rate thereafter. The line cost
them £20,000 to construct. In 1840 Londonderry was able to exercise his
option to buy out Shakespear Reed for £22,721 16s 1d. The deal thus
proved very profitable to both parties.
Breakdown of costs of
the Rainton and Seaham Railway.
Seaham Self-Acting Plane
£ 779. 15. 2
Londonderry Engine Plane £
1770. 15. 7
Seaton Self-Acting Plane
£ 759. 0. 7
Gregson's
Plane £ 991. 12. 1
Warden Law Engine Plane £
1548. 6. 1
Copt Hill Engine
Plane £ 2210. 10. 6
Rainton Engine
Plane £ 2453. 11. 5
Sidings at Rainton
Bridge £ 168. 19. 6
Sundries at Rainton Bridge
£ 446. 16. 0
Coal Waggons
£ 6336. 0. 0
Sub-Total £17,465. 6. 11
Engine Houses
£ 2,534. 13. 1
Total £ 20,000. 0. 0.
On July 25 1831 the first coals ran
down the new railway line from the Rainton pits to be loaded onto the
new brig the 'Lord Seaham'. The Rainton & Seaham railway was initially
only 5 miles long, from Seaham Harbour to Rainton Meadows pit but later
additions created a network of over 18 miles of railway track. Fixed
steam engines hauled the coal from the Rainton collieries to the top of
the Copt Hill. At a point just opposite to the public house the new line
passed under the Seaham to Houghton road in a short tunnel. The Hetton
Colliery Railway at this point crossed the road by means of an overhead
bridge. Thereafter the going to Seaham was comparatively easy and more
fixed engines and an inclined plane took over to bring the load across
the fields of Warden Law and Slingley, skirting to the south of Seaton
village. From Seaton Bank Top another inclined plane and then a final
fixed engine brought the coal to the top of the Mill Inn Bank, where one
day Seaham Colliery would be sited. The last leg from there to the new
harbour was downhill and also utilized a self-acting incline system.
According to Tom McNee from 1831, on Saturdays only, a specially
constructed coach brought people from the Raintons to Seaham
Harbour to shop. The journey must have been a tortuous one, involving up
to four changes of haulage machinery, but doubtless it beat walking.
In 1838 North Hetton Colliery (Moorsley)
came on stream and began sending its output down the Rainton line. Lord
Londonderry sank two more pits in the Pittington area on land owned by
the Pemberton family - at Belmont in 1835 and Broomside (Lady Adelaide
and Antrim pits) in about 1842. A ninth large Rainton pit followed in
the late 1840s and was named after the new Lady Seaham, wife of the
future 5th. Marquess. All of these pits and the works at Chilton Moor
were linked up to the Rainton and Seaham railway which now had some 15
miles of track. In 1849 another colliery was sunk 3 miles to the west of
Pittington on the old Tempest property at Old Durham, within sight of
the Cathedral. This was called the Ernest pit after Londonderry’s
youngest son. A spur line connected Old Durham colliery with the Durham
and Sunderland Railway and coals passed along this line for a couple of
miles before connecting with a branch of the Rainton & Seaham railway at
Broomside Colliery.
In 1844 the Seaton Colliery or High
Pit was sunk, not by Londonderry but by the North Hetton & Grange Coal
Company, on a site chosen because of its proximity to the Rainton and
Seaham line. The Marquess it seems was still nervous about the expense
of sinking a new deep colliery and preferred others to risk their money
in what might prove to be a fruitless undertaking. Before long he had
his proof when the Hetton Company discovered rich but deep seams of
coal. On April 13 1849 the sinking of Seaham Colliery or Low Pit was
begun by Lord Londonderry. It was right next door to the High Pit and
also right alongside the Rainton and Seaham line. It is not recorded
what the North Hetton & Grange Coal Company made of this development.
The first coal was drawn from Seaton on March 17 1852. Seaham started
producing later but the exact date is not known. At 1800 feet the mines
were among the deepest in the country and their workings soon extended
under the North Sea. The Londonderry colliery portfolio was now the
largest in Britain in the hands of a single individual and was producing
over one million tons of coal per year from an area of some 12,000 acres
between Seaham and Sunderland on the coast and extending as far inland
as Durham.
Charles Stewart, 3rd. Marquess of
Londonderry and Founder of Seaham Harbour, died in 1854. His widow, for
35 years in his shadows, now stepped into daylight and began running the
businesses herself. She added Framwellgate Colliery to the family
portfolio in 1859 and this too was linked up to the Rainton line which
now, at its peak, had over 18 miles of track. At the end of 1864, a few
weeks before her death, the Marchioness bought Seaton Colliery and
merged it with Seaham.
Frances Anne's heir Earl Vane (later
the 5th. Marquess of Londonderry) was advised that the best days of the
Rainton and Penshaw pits were over and to concentrate on the new
winnings at Seaham and the proposed new colliery at Silksworth. The slow
process of abandoning central Durham began with the transfer of the
workshops from Chilton Moor to Seaham in January 1866. For another
generation the Rainton complex remained productive but declining and the
Rainton and Seaham railway kept operating, carrying millions of tons of
coal to Seaham Harbour. Ominously the instruments of the Rainton Band
were sold off to the 2nd. Durham Artillery Regiment in 1877. The end of
the band presaged the final end of Rainton Colliery 19 years later.
Before then the family divested themselves of many unwanted assets.
Framwellgate and Penshaw collieries were sold off in 1879 and the Plain
Pit at Rainton closed at about the same time. The severe depression of
the early 1890s finished the rest of the inland pits off. Pittington/Broomside
and Belmont Collieries (which had already been sold off) closed in
1890-91. Old Durham Colliery closed in 1892 after being worked for some
50 years. Adventure was shut down in 1893. The four remaining Rainton
pits (Rainton Meadows, Nicholson's, Alexandrina and Lady Seaham) were
closed down in November 1896. Buyers were eventually found for Rainton
Meadows and Adventure drift. Meadows had closed by 1923 but Adventure
somehow survived the Great War, the General Strike, World War Two and
nationalisation and finally closed only in 1978.
The rest of the 'Rainton Royalty' was
taken over by Lambton Collieries Ltd. and worked from existing
collieries at Cocken and Littletown. As the coal from Meadows and
Adventure pits and from North Hetton/Hazard/Dunwell could be carried on
N.E.R. lines the waggonway from the Raintons to Seaham Harbour was
redundant after a working life of 65 years. The sections west of the
Copt Hill were dismantled in December 1896. The run from the Copt Hill
to Seaham Colliery remained open for a while longer to enable the Hetton
Colliery Company to ship their coal at Seaham if their own line to the
Wear was choked but this section too had gone by 1920.
TOP
The last remaining section of the
Rainton & Seaham, from Seaham Colliery to Seaham Harbour, which was a
self-acting inclined plane, remained open and working until after the
Miner's Strike of 1984-85. That strike was lost and the fate of the rump
Durham coalfield was sealed by Conservative victories in the General
Elections of 1987 and 1992. In 1987 British Coal 'amalgamated' Seaham
Colliery with Vane Tempest. No more coal was produced at the old mine
and it was relegated to the role of a third shaft for the newer
colliery. Vane Tempest coal came to the surface at Seaham Colliery and
was transported to the main railway line or the docks from there. The
connection from Seaham Colliery to the docks was finally severed in 1988
following an accident with a runaway locomotive. Thus was closed the
last section of the Rainton and Seaham line completed 157 years earlier
which had brought life to the infant town. 'Benny's Bank' was probably
the last working self-acting gravity line in Great Britain - a direct
link back to the Industrial Revolution and the Founders of Seaham
Harbour.
The Present
This last section from the Seaham
Colliery to Seaham Harbour, so recently abandoned, will one day make a
very pleasant walkway if Easington or Durham County Councils can be
persuaded to take an interest in the matter. For the rest of the line,
the section from Seaham Colliery to the site of the Rainton collieries,
abandoned between 1896 and 1920, it is of course far too late for such
notions. Much of the land it occupied was taken back by neighbouring
farmers or has been obliterated by new housing or roads or open-cast
mining. When the line was constructed, 1828-31, a nucleus of small coals
(the most-readily available material) was used to construct the
embankments. People from the village of Seaham Colliery were able to
extract over 1,000 tons of this during the General Strike of 1926, a
posthumous gift from that long dead tyrant the 3rd. Marquess. Thus there
is no trace of the line between Seaham Colliery and Warden Law apart
from a continuous trail of tiny pieces of coal on the ground.
At Warden Law however an 800 yard
stretch was over level ground and somehow escaped destruction at the
time and encroachment by farmers later. It is still possible to walk
along the old track here and this section is clearly visible from the
air over a hundred years after it's closure, delineated by two rows of
trees. Further west the old line is still visible in a wood to your left
just before the golf club on the Seaham to Houghton road. Between the
Copt Hill and Rainton Bridge the line has been built over for housing or
taken back for agricultural use. At Rainton Bridge the railway was
sliced by the new Durham to Sunderland A690 road sometime in the 1960s.
Beyond the A690 the original line again is clearly visible, with 30 foot
embankments covered in coal fragments, for about half a mile. For the
next mile the Rainton and Seaham is obliterated by the former open-cast
mine (situated on the very site of some of the original Vane Tempest
pits) before emerging near to West Rainton. The last mile of track from
here to the terminus at the site of the old Adventure colliery is
clearly visible and delineated. The branch lines to Pittington, Chilton
Moor and Framwellgate are still visible but are overgrown or built on in
parts. The branch from Rainton bridge to North Hetton Colliery (via
Dunwell and Hazard) has been converted into a beautiful country lane.
In it's heyday the Rainton and Seaham
line was used by over a dozen pits owned by the Londonderrys and others,
an umbilical cord linking central Durham with the coast. The Raintons
and Pittington today are dotted with old pit workings, shafts and spoil
heaps and criss-crossed by the trackbeds of old railways and waggonways
which bear silent witness to the industrial prosperity of other days.
The coal at Rainton was not exhausted in 1896 - it had simply become
uneconomic to produce. Today the northern part of the old Rainton
Colliery (roughly a triangle whose corners are the old Plain Pit,
Rainton Meadows and the Nicholson's Pit) can be seen to your left as you
drive from Durham to Sunderland on the A690. In the middle of the
nineteenth century Rainton and Pittington were important railway hubs
almost completely surrounded by Londonderry pits. Today they are
tranquil villages far from any busy railway line and the nearest
colliery is a hundred miles away in Yorkshire.
The Future ?
There
probably isn’t one but it is conceivable that the section from Seaham
Colliery to Warden Law could be reclaimed and turned into a walkway.
Unfortunately the A19 is a major obstacle in the way of this plan but it
is surely not so busy that a Pelicon crossing could not be installed for
occasional ramblers. Thereafter a small amount of land would have to be
compulsorily purchased back from farmers. The Rainton and Seaham was the
vital link between the inland railway pits and the new port and town of
Seaham Harbour. Without the railway line there would never have been a
Seaham Harbour. It is that important.
TOP
The South Hetton line or Braddyll's
Railway 1833-1984
Insert maps here
The Past
The main section of the Rainton and
Seaham railway was completed in 1831. Almost immediately work began to
construct a second railway from the new harbour to the hinterland, paid
for by Colonel Braddyll, owner of the new pit at South Hetton. This, the
South Hetton and Seaham line (alao known as The Braddyll Railway), also
utilised gravity on its final legs and was completed in 1833. It ran
from the new winning past the still tiny hamlet of Murton, on past the
ancient village of Cold Hesledon and through green fields down to the
clifftops. One day it would separate Seaham Golf Course from Parkside
estate but that day was still over a hundred years in the future.
Initially the South Hetton line served
only the one colliery. In 1835 Haswell Colliery was opened and the
waggonway was extended to it. In 1841 Shotton Colliery was sunk and a
further extension was pushed to there. This 2 mile extension was later
abandoned in favour of a branch line from Shotton to the Sunderland-Haswell-Hartlepool
line. The only surviving traces of this Shotton connection are the
buttresses of the bridge which carried the waggonway over the
Sunderland-Haswell-Hartlepool line which can be seen by ramblers on the
Haswell to Hart Walkway. Murton Colliery, another Braddyll pit, came on
stream in 1843 and it too was connected up to the South Hetton line. In
1844 an explosion killed 96 at Haswell and the pit was always
problematical after that, opening and closing several times. It closed
for good in 1896. After the final closure of Haswell the South Hetton
line served only two collieries - Murton and South Hetton and this
situation continued for the next 62 years.
From 1958/59 the coals from Eppleton,
Elemore and Murton Collieries were sent underground to Hawthorn Shaft
for raising to the surface. From there most was sent to Sunderland (on
the rump Hartlepool to Sunderland line) and some passed down the South
Hetton line. One by one the four feeder collieries closed down and only
Murton was left by the time of the Miner's Strike of 1984-85. During
the 151 years of its existence millions of tons of coal had been sent
down it to Seaham Harbour, bringing work and revenue to the new town.
The Strike, the longest and most bitter
of them all, was calculated to stop the closure of the surviving
collieries, in Durham and elsewhere. An early victim was the South
Hetton line, destroyed at Parkside by local people digging for coal in
that grim winter. As with the Rainton and Seaham line the nucleus of the
embankments had been made in 1831-33 with the cheapest and most readily
available material at hand, pea to marble sized pieces of coal which had
no other economic value. In its time the line had carried millions of
tons of coal and served six inland collieries (none of them owned by the
Londonderrys), and accounted for more than one life and limb. It would
have been abandoned anyway with the closure of the last of the feeder
pits, Murton Colliery, in 1991.
TOP
The Present
Today the old Braddyll Railway is a
very pleasant walkway from Seaham Harbour to Cold Hesledon but after
that it is almost obliterated by the gigantic slag heap left behind by
the Hawthorn Shaft combine. Beyond the slag heap the line connects with
the old Sunderland-Haswell-Hartlepool railway. From there it is possible
to follow old railway lines continuously all the way to Ryhope,
Hartlepool and Stockton. The course of the old waggonway from South
Hetton to Haswell Colliery is still clearly visible all the way from
Hawthorn shaft to Haswell village but is is now like a rollercoaster,
suggesting that the embankments suffered the same fate as those at
Parkside sometime in the past. The course of the waggonway from Haswell
village to Haswell Colliery and on to Shotton Colliery has long since
returned to fields.
TOP
The Future
At the moment the section from Seaham
Harbour to Cold Hesledon (‘The Yellow Brick Road’) is a very pleasant
walkway but there is no path from there to connect with the old
Sunderland-Haswell-Hartlepool line at South Hetton. Thus Seaham will be
cut off from the developing national network of old railways which have
been turned into walkways. Surely it is not beyond Seaham and Easington
councils to obtain a strip of land no wider than 20 feet to make the
connection ?
The Growth
of Easington District 1801-1901
1. The huge rise in
the population of Dawdon in 1831 was due to the founding of the town and
port of Seaham Harbour in 1828.
2. The large
increase in the population of Seaham (Old & New) in 1851 was due to the
sinking of Seaton Colliery in 1844 and the adjacent Seaham Colliery in
1849. The two collieries merged as ‘Seaham’ in 1864.
3. The rise in Cold
Hesledon’s population in 1891 was due to the expansion of nearby Murton
Colliery.
4. The fall in the
population of Haswell & South Hetton in 1901 was due to the closure of
Haswell Colliery in 1896
5. The fall in
Shotton’s population in 1881 was due to the closure of Shotton Colliery
in 1877 (opened 1840). The colliery reopened in 1900 after a closure of
23 years.
6. The huge fall in
Monk Hesleden’s population in 1901 was due to the closure of Castle Eden
Colliery in 1893 and nearby Hutton Henry Colliery in 1897.
7. The rise and
fall in Hutton Henry’s population 1841-1901 was due to the opening and
closing of South Wingate Colliery (1840 ? -57) and Hutton Henry Colliery
(1869 ? -97).
8. Thornley
Colliery was partially closed in 1891 which explains the population fall
in the census of that year.
9. The fall in
Wingate’s population in 1891 was due to the recent closure of Wheatley
Hill Colliery (1884). The colliery reopened in 1890 but this was too
late to greatly affect the 1891 census figures.
The Communities
1.
Dalton-le-Dale
Population changes
in the 19th. Century were:
Dalton-le-Dale village had no direct
connection with coalmining though Murton Colliery, a mile to the west,
was originally
called Dalton New Winning. Until 1875
Murton did not have its own Anglican church and so the earlier records
relating to Murton citizens are to be found in the parish registers for
St. Andrew’s in Dalton-le-Dale. Dalton village took some of the surplus
population from Murton and Seaham collieries as the census returns show.
2. Dawdon
(Seaham Harbour)
The
new town and port of Seaham Harbour was founded in 1828 by the 3rd.
Marquess of Londonderry. The purpose of the new port was to enable Lord
Londonderry to export coal from his small inland collieries and be
independent of middle men on the River Wear and at Sunderland. Only late
in the 1840s did it become clear that coal lay under the Seaham estate.
Seaton Colliery was sunk from 1844-52 and Seaham Colliery was sunk from
1849 to c. 1852. These merged as ‘Seaham’ colliery in 1864. Dawdon
Colliery was sunk 1899-1907 and Vane Tempest was sunk 1923-29. The three
collieries closed a few years after the defeat of the Miners Strike of
1984-85. Seaham no longer has any connection with coal mining or coal
export.
Population changes
in the 19th. Century were:
TOP
3. New Seaham
(Seaham Colliery)
New
Seaham colliery village was constructed from 1844 onwards. The new
community was within the parish of St. Mary the Virgin at (Old) Seaham
until the building of New Seaham Christ Church in 1857 and the creation
of a new parish in 1864.
Population changes
in the 19th. Century were…
The sinking of Seaton Colliery (the High
Pit) by the North Hetton and Grange Colliery Company began in 1844 and
production of coal commenced in March 1852 after a long and desperate
struggle against flooding. The sinking of Seaham Colliery (the Low Pit)
by the 3rd. Marquess of Londonderry commenced in 1849 and it began
production not long after Seaton though the actual date is not recorded.
The two pits were amalgamated as Seaham Colliery under the control of
the Londonderry family in November 1864. There were no less than seven
known explosions at the pits, before and after amalgamation. There were
three in one year at Seaton in 1852, the first year of production, with
six men and boys killed in the last of these. One of the casualties was
an 8 year old boy. Another explosion at Seaton in 1862 burnt to death
two more workers. The massive explosion in October 1871 miraculously
killed only 26. Even more miraculously none died in the huge 1872 blast.
Finally 164 men and boys were killed in the calamity of September 1880.
Though there were no further explosions there were many single or
multiple fatalities at Seaham Colliery after 1880 - Seaham’s graveyards
are littered with decaying headstones which testify to that grim truth.
Seaham Colliery Pit Village (New
Seaham) was constructed from the mid 1840s onwards and was virtually
complete by the time of the 1880 disaster (see above chart). Another
street was built betweeen 1881 and 1891, called Viceroy Street in honour
of the office held by the 6th.Marquess of Londonderry from 1886 to 1889.
A final small row, Stewart Street (the family name of the Londonderrys),
appeared between 1891 and 1895.
By the 1930s much of the housing at
Seaham Colliery, cheap and cheerless to begin with, was well past its
best and the village was earmarked for wholesale demolition under the
Slum Clearance Act. Parkside estate was constructed at the end of that
decade and most of the inhabitants transferred en masse to there in
1939/40. Knowing that Westlea and Eastlea council estates were planned
to arise on the ruins of their village a few of the inhabitants decided
to stay put and wait for the new houses. When war came they were joined
by those made homeless in Seaham Harbour by German bombing. The Germans
also managed to hit the colliery village, scoring a direct hit on the
Seaton Colliery Inn after hours one night in October 1941 and killing
the landlady and her friend. Eventually the aptly-named Phoenix was
constructed on the site.
The old pit village was finally swept
away between 1945 and 1960 but there are still a few remnants left in
1995 (The Miner’s Hall bulding, High Colliery School, the row of houses
on Station Road which incorporates the New Seaham Inn, now called The
Kestrel). The village and most of its inhabitants were gone by 1960 but
Seaham Colliery itself survived until the late 1980s. It was
nationalised in 1947 after a century of ownership by the Londonderry
family. In 1987 Seaham was 'amalgamated' with Vane Tempest Colliery and
the old pit was relegated to the role of being third and fourth shafts
for the newer concern. No more coal was produced at Seaham Colliery. The
Seaham/Vane Tempest 'combine' was closed by British Coal in 1994 and
both sites were cleared. Now there is a great open space where Seaham
Colliery stood for 150 years.
TOP
History of New Seaham
The preparatory working for the sinking
of Seaton Colliery or the High Pit began on July 31 1844. The actual
sinking of the shaft commenced on August 12 1845. The mine was developed
not by the landowner Lord Londonderry but by the North Hetton and Grange
Colliery Company, on a site chosen because of its proximity to the
Rainton and Seaham waggonway. The main shareholder of this concern was
Lord Lambton, 2nd.Earl of Durham, an individual with many other inland
pits and who was the second largest producer of coal in County Durham
behind Londonderry himself.
The North Hetton and Grange Colliery
Company was licensed to exploit only the coal under Londonderry’s land
between Seaton and Warden Law, but that canny lord reserved any and all
seaward coal for himself. The Marquess it seems was still very nervous
about the expense of sinking a new and very deep colliery and preferred
others to risk their money in what might yet prove to be a fruitless
undertaking. Also, as usual, he was short of cash despite the fact that
business was booming. Before very long he had his proof when the North
Hetton and Grange Colliery Company discovered deep but rich seams of
coal.
Sir Ralph Milbanke, he who had sold the
estates of Seaham and Dalden to the Irishman for a song a quarter of a
century before, must have turned in his grave. Even before this
development Lord Londonderry was probably on paper the richest man in
the county of Durham. His numerous pits at Penshaw and in the Rainton
and Pittington districts and elsewhere in Durham were at their peak and
the demand was such that he could usually sell every ton that he
produced. Now, almost by accident, he had secured his family’s future
for the next century.
The nearby Mill Inn was known as the
'Nicky Nack' and its landlord was dubbed 'Tommy Nicky-Nack Chilton' and
so Seaton Colliery soon acquired the nickname. Little is known about
these early years but a letter survives in the Londonderry Papers at the
Durham Record Office which informs us that on January 27 1845 a party of
guests travelled from Lord Londonderry’s mansion at Wynyard (near
Stockton, now owned by John Hall) to Seaham Harbour to observe the
opening ceremony for a new extension to the docks. On the way they
passed the digging at Seaton, where a depth of 40 fathoms had been
achieved of an anticipated 240 fathoms. At the request of the ladies
present two of the ‘sinkers’ ascended from the bottom of the shaft in a
large kibble or bucket. They resembled drowned rats more than men but
they maintained their dignity and flatly refused to 'run about and show
themselves' to the spectators.
The pit later made much slower progress
due to the water problem. After coal was reached but before it could be
exploited a second colliery was begun nearby by the lord of the manor.
The reaction of the North Hetton and Grange Colliery Company directors
to this development has not been preserved but they cannot have been
very amused. Nearly thirty years after the first tapping of the
concealed coalfield at Hetton the 3rd. Marquess of Londonderry, now 71,
at last took the plunge and sank his first deep coal mine. The sinking
of Seaham Colliery or the 'Low Pit' commenced on April 13 1849. The Low
Pit shaft was 1797 feet deep and the High Pit shaft was 1819 feet deep.
Both were 14 feet in diameter. The new mines were the second and third
deepest in the country (behind Pemberton Main at Monkwearmouth). The
first coal from Seaton was only drawn on March 17 1852, after almost
seven years of battles against flooding and quicksand. Seaham began
producing a little later after a much shorter battle, but the precise
date is unknown.
In the first weeks after coming on
stream there were three explosions at Seaton, the last of which, on
Wednesday June 16 1852, killed six men and boys and injured several
others. Among the dead was a 10 year old boy, Charles Halliday or
Holliday. The inquest was held at the Mill Inn with Mr.Morton, Agent of
the Earl of Durham, present. It was revealed that naked lights (candles)
had been used in the pit, nearly four decades after the invention of the
safety lamp. The jury recorded a verdict of accidental death.
To justify their huge outlay of money
the Londonderrys' new Seaham pit needed to be a giant in production
terms compared to its predecessors inland and this soon proved to be the
case. By 1854 (when it had barely begun production and would soon employ
far more) 269 hands were employed, making it as large as any of the
Rainton and Penshaw pits owned by Lord Londonderry. By the mid-1870s
Seaham/Seaton was producing as much coal as all of the other Londonderry
pits at Rainton, Pittington and Penshaw combined. By 1880 the mine
employed 1500 men and boys and had an output of half a million tons of
coal per year. By the time of the census of 1881 some 3,000 people lived
in the village of New Seaham.
Charles Stewart, 3rd.Marquess of
Londonderry and 1st.Viscount Seaham, died at his home, Holdernesse House
in London’s Park Lane, in March 1854. A new place of worship, Christ
Church, was built at New Seaham in 1855 by Lady Frances Anne as a
memorial to her husband. It is virtually the only monument to the old
tyrant that still stands in the town he created. The church received
free heating and lighting courtesy of underground pipes from the
colliery 200 yards away. Christ Church also included a graveyard which
was to become the last resting place for generations of New Seaham
inhabitants. Previously the dead had been interred at either the ancient
St.Andrew’s at Dalton-le-Dale or the even older St.Mary’s at Old Seaham
or the new graveyard at St.John’s in Seaham Harbour.
Like her late husband the Marchioness
was infamous for her parsimony and yet on March 1 1856 this complex
character entertained between three and four thousand of her pitmen at
Chilton Moor. In 1857 she spent over £1000 to entertain 3,930 of her
pitmen, dockers, quarrymen and railwaymen at Seaham Hall, in the
presence of the Bishop of Durham and numerous friends. Her friend and
protege Benjamin Disraeli recognised in his writings after her death
that Frances Anne was a tyrant in her way but it would be fairer to
describe her as a benevolent despot. As Durham mine owners went the
Londonderrys were actually among the best and the miners of the day
preferred to work for them than most others. Bad as they were living
conditions at New Seaham were far better than most older mining villages
in the county. In the 1850s the Marchioness built Londonderry schools at
the Raintons, Kelloe, Old Durham, Penshaw and New Seaham (which still
stands) and later her son Henry constructed another at Silksworth. She
personally paid the teacher’s salaries and all other expenses and
allowed the children of non-employees to attend.
The 1850s saw the building of several
streets in the vicinity of the two pits and the creation of a tight-knit
community. Window tax was abolished in 1851 and mechanised brick
production (with machine-pressed bricks) was developed in 1856, both of
which made the process cheaper and easier. The typical 'through terrace
house' at Seaton/Seaham Colliery had one room downstairs and one
upstairs (often divided into two by a partition to provide separate
sleeping accomodation for boys and girls). The downstairs room served
for cooking, bathing, meals, general living and as sleeping space for
parents. The back yard had a dry closet privy (a netty) and a coal shed.
Social life centred on the back alley.
At Hartley Colliery in Northumberland
in January 1862 over 200 men and boys died of suffocation when the only
shaft was blocked by falling machinery. Shortly after this disaster, the
greatest single loss of life in the Great Northern Coalfield, the Seaton
High Pit and Seaham Low Pit were joined by an underground link. Within
weeks, on March 29, a cage rope broke at the Low Pit and the shaft was
blocked by stone. Over 400 men and boys and 70 ponies escaped via the
High Pit. They would have shared the fate of the Hartley colliers and
perished within hours without the connection. The Northumberland and
Durham Miner’s Permanent Relief Fund had its origin in the widespread
need which followed the Hartley Disaster. Before Hartley it was the
individual worker’s responsibility to subscribe to a 'club' to cover
'private' medical expenses. There were discretionary payments from the
mine owners, at a level below that of wages, for some workers who
suffered an accident, with the limited objective of retaining the
services of skilled workmen temporarily disabled. For those permanently
crippled or worse there was nothing and before long they and/or their
widows and children were given their marching orders from their colliery
houses. The Employer’s Liability Act was still 20 years in the future.
Another explosion on April 6 1864 at
Seaton Colliery severely burnt two men, Tristram Heppell and William
Fairley. Both died in agony in their homes some days later.
Heppell’s father, a master sinker of pits, had been a contemporary and
friend of George Stephenson at Killingworth Colliery in Northumberland.
Heppell was a member of the Seaham Volunteers and so was given a
military funeral at St. Mary’s. Reverend Angus Bethune conducted the
service. We shall come across this individual again later in this
narrative.
When an Act of Parliament prohibited
the working of coal-mines without two outlets from each seam Lady
Frances Anne decided that the simplest way to comply with this
legislation in the case of Seaham Colliery was to buy Seaton Colliery
from the North Hetton and Grange Colliery Company and amalgamate it with
Seaham. This was done in November 1864, and was virtually the last
business deal she completed for she was dying by then. She died at
Seaham Hall on January 20 1865, three days after her 65th.birthday.
Her collieries passed to her son Henry, Earl Vane, who succeeded his
half-brother Frederick as Marques’s of Londonderry in 1872.
'Observer', who wrote 'Gleanings from
the Pit Villages' in 1866, gave Seaham Colliery high praise in contrast
to older Durham pit villages. He commended its roomy dwellings, good
gardens and wide streets. The usual outdoor meeting place for men at
Seaham Colliery in dispute with the management was the ball alley. This
was also used for gambling, fist-fights and games of hand-ball against
teams from neighbouring collieries. The surface of the wall eventually
deteriorated and it was abandoned to nesting birds in the 1920s.
All of the Easington district
collieries began to receive a steady stream of Cornishmen and Devonians
and their families in the mid-1860s. A street would be eventually be
named in honour of the Cornish at Seaham Colliery and a whole district
of Murton was taken over by these refugees from the dying lead and tin
industries and nicknamed ‘Cornwall’. Wingate Grange Colliery also
received a very large contingent. Seaham Colliery also absorbed Scots,
Irish and Welsh and also a group from Norfolk. Wood Dalling and
neighbouring villages must have been stripped bare of their agricultural
labourers, lured north by the prospect of higher and consistent wages by
the agents of the Marquess of Londonderry and other coal owners. Most of
these people would retain their accents for the rest of their lives but
their children and grandchildren were completely assimilated into the
host community and became Geordies. Seaham Colliery must have been a
very cosmopolitan place in these early days and it cannot have been
unusual to hear a dozen accents during a day’s work at the pit.
The first mass meeeting of the lodges
of the new union, the DMA (Durham Miners’ Association), took place at
Wharton Park in the city of Durham in July 1871. Just three months later
on Wednesday October 25 1871 26 men and boys were killed in another
explosion at Seaham Colliery. On the day before the tragedy a mass
meeting of young men and boys had determined to ask for some alteration
in their bonds - in particular a reduction in their hours of labour. For
many below the rank of hewer the working day lasted from their rising at
3am until they returned home filthy at about 6.15pm. There was barely
time for any relaxation before going to bed. A deputation was sent to
see the manager Dakers but he refused to give them an answer until the
next conclusion of the bond in April 1872. Dakers refused even to see a
second delegation. In consequence a mass meeting of all the men and boys
was called for the Thursday night with a view to laying the pit idle.
The disaster intervened.
The explosion of Wednesday October 25
1871 occurred at 11.30 pm, otherwise the death-toll would have been much
higher - by now the colliery was employing 1100 men and boys. The shock
was felt at Seaham Harbour.John Clark, aged 9, sitting on the surface in
a cabin near the pit shaft, was blown 10 yards by the explosion. The
force of the blast was such that many ponies were killed in their
underground stables 1.5 miles away from the epicentre. Two men named
Hutchinson, father and son, working as 'marrows' (marras), fired the
shot which triggered the blast. The father, Thomas senior, survived the
explosion but was badly injured. For days he hovered between life and
death and medical opinion concluded that he could not survive. But
survive he did - for he was destined to be killed in the 1880 explosion.
Thomas Hutchinson junior left a pregnant widow and two children. Manager
Dakers and Head Viewer Vincent Corbett went down the pit to assess the
situation and made a decision which to some seemed harsh and to others
seemed like murder. The ‘stoppings’ were rushed up to starve the fire of
oxygen and save the mine irrespective of the men thereby entombed. The
explosion occurred on Wednesday - by Sunday the furnace was re-lighted
at the shaft bottom for ventilation. The men were somehow persuaded to
return to work while the bodies of their colleagues lay entombed for
several weeks in nearby workings. Religious decency then laid much
greater emphasis on proper burial of a body in consecrated ground.Four
of the bodies were brought out immediately after the explosion but the
remaining 22 were not recovered until December 20. The appeal fund
produced just over £2,000. The inquest was held at the New Seaham Inn
(now called the Kestrel). Verdict - Accidental death. Just as the
village began to recover from the tragedy it was struck another mortal
blow with an outbreak of smallpox. There was another explosion in 1872
but there was no loss of life or injury.
Manager Dakers either retired, died or
moved on at the start of 1874. He was replaced by a 21 year old,
Mr.Thomas Henry Marshall Stratton, who was fated to be in charge when
the 1880 disaster occurred. By then he was still only 28 and due to move
on from Seaham Colliery to his next post. The man had no luck. There was
another county-wide coal strike in 1879, the first major confrontation
since the the Great Strike of 1844 and, as usual, the miners were
defeated. Before the village of Seaham Colliery could properly recover
from this ruinous episode an even greater disaster struck in the
following year. The death of one collier started a train of events which
led to an immense tragedy. A man called Robert Guy was run over and
killed by a set of tubs on the Maudlin engine-plane at Seaham Colliery
on August 7 1880. Adverse and critical remarks made at the inquest a few
days later obliged manager Stratton to have refuge holes from the
rolling tubs made larger and more frequent to prevent a recurrence of
the tragedy. This work went on for several weeks and it may well have
been a shot fired in the course of it which triggered the great
explosion.
In that hot August of 1880 the Seaham
Volunteer Artillery Brigade distinguished itself in the big gun shooting
of the National Artillery Competition at Shoeburyness, picking up a
beautiful trophy and over £200 in prize money, a very handsome sum in
those days. The team members were welcomed back to Seaham as heroes and
their crackshot Corporal Hindson was carried shoulder-high through the
town. The next big event in the town’s social calendar was Seaham’s
Annual Flower Show, to be held in the grounds of Seaham Hall from
Thursday September 9 to Sunday the 11th. The 5th.Marquess himself, a
rather shy and unassuming man, was to make one of his rare visits in
order to present the prizes. Indeed he was to honour the town his
parents had founded with his presence for an entire week. As it turned
out he was to stay for a good deal longer than he anticipated. Many of
the miners at Seaham Colliery had entries in the show and some of these
men swapped shifts with those disinterested in horticultural affairs in
order that they might attend. It was to prove a fateful decision for
those who should have been working on the Tuesday/Wednesday night and
for those who ended up working when ordinarily they would have been at
home sound asleep.
At Seaham Colliery there were three
shifts per day for hewers (everyone else worked much longer hours) of 7
hours each, covering the period from 4 am to 11.30 pm. The shifts were:
1) Fore Shift, 4 am to 11.30 am 2) Back Shift, 10 am to 5.30 pm 3) Night
Shift, 4 pm to 11.30 pm. Each shift involved some 500 men and boys and
at the overlap of the shifts there could be over 1,000 men in the pit.
From 10 pm to 6 am, when the colliery was comparatively quiet, was the
maintenance shift, which employed far fewer workers. Fortuitously the
1880 explosion took place at 2.20 am during one such maintenance shift,
100 minutes before the start of the Fore shift, which is why only 231
men and boys were below ground.The tragedy could have been much much
worse, eclipsing the disasters at Hartley and West Stanley.
On the fateful evening of Tuesday
September 7 1880 Joseph Birkbeck (or Birbeck), choir master and organist
at Christ Church, slept through his ‘knocker’ at his home at 19 Post
Office Street and thereby missed his shift and of course forfeited his
pay. The decision, conscious or otherwise, was to save his life and
enable him to live until his nineties. His father and namesake (17 Mount
Pleasant) was not so fortunate. Corporal Hindson (22 John Street, Seaham
Harbour), the crackshot, had a premonition of his own death. Three times
he started out for work on that dreadful night and twice he returned
home. The third time he did not return. John Hutchinson (15 Post Office
Street) went to work even though he was poorly because he knew the
financial result of any failure to attend. His condition deteriorated
however and he felt obliged to return home before the end of his shift.
He abandoned his place of work in the Maudlin seam minutes before the
explosion, leaving his marrow Pat Carroll (Cooke Street) alone, but had
to sit down for a rest on his way back to the pit shaft. He actually
fell asleep and was roughly awoken by the prodding of a stick by the
overman Walter Murray who told him to go home if he was unwell. At the
shaft bottom Hutchinson talked for a while with Laverick the onsetter
whilst waiting for the cage to descend. He had barely stepped from the
cage at the surface when the pit blew. The ground shook, waking up
people in the neighbourhood. The sound of the explosion was heard on
ships in Seaham Harbour and as far away as Murton Colliery and the
outskirts of Sunderland. Some men saw a great cloud of dust blown
skywards out of the shafts. The Marquess heard the noise at Seaham Hall
and was among the first on the scene.
The explosion of Wednesday September 8
1880 took place at 2.20 am in the Hutton and Maudlin seams, the middle
of the three levels at the pit.The highest level was the Main Coal Seam,
the lowest was the Harvey. Both shafts were blocked with debris and it
was twelve hours before a descent could be made. Even then the rescuers
had to use the emergency kibble (an iron bucket) for the cages were of
course out of action. The cage remained out of action at the Low Pit for
nine days. In the pit the engine house and stables had caught fire and
many of the ponies were found to have suffocated. The hooves of some of
them (complete with shoes) were preserved as souvenirs, polished,
inscribed and adapted to various uses, such as stands for ink-wells,
snuff-boxes and pin-cushions. Fifty four ponies and a cat survived.
Further on the rescuers found debris and mutilated human corpses. Body
after body was then located in the dark tunnels. Nineteen survivors from
the Main Coal seam were brought up the Low Pit shaft which was not
blocked at the level of that seam. The main rescue work was done from
the High Pit shaft where it was also possible to use a kibble. Forty
eight more survivors were brought out this way. Of the 231 workers only
67 had thus been rescued by midnight of the first day, leaving 164
unaccounted for. None of these survived. Some 169 men and boys had been
working in the affected seam - only 5 of these survived and were
rescued.
The roads into Seaham were completely
blocked by people in the next few days. Most of these were simply morbid
sight-seers who obstructed the way for the rescue teams despatched from
other collieries near and far. Special trains from Sunderland to Seaham
for the Flower Show (now cancelled) were instead packed with these
'spectators'. The families of those dead or missing were unable to get
anywhere near the colliery. The crowd round the pit reached an estimated
14,000 on the Wednesday night (the day of the explosion). By Sunday
there were an estimated 40,000 people in the vicinity to see the first
mass funerals. After that the interest wore off and the crowds gradually
drifted away to other entertainment. The bereaved were at last left
alone waiting for news, any news, of their loved ones.
164 men and boys were dead. The flower
of the village had been wiped out.There were 13 dead from Seaham Street
alone. California Street lost 12, Cornish Street 11, Australia and Hall
Streets 10 each. Every single street in the village lost at least 2 men
or boys. Some of the bodies were recovered fairly quickly, the rest only
after long and painful delays. Fires had to be extinguished before
rescue work could continue. There was no artificial breathing apparatus
available though it had recently been perfected. 136 of the 164 bodies
had been recovered by October 1. Then the Maudlin seam caught fire again
and the management decided to seal off that portion of the mine to deny
oxygen to the flames, to the horror of the kinfolk of those entombed who
still clung to the faint and irrational hope that their loved ones were
still alive. The seam was not reopened until the following June when
breathing apparatus and Fleuss’s patent lamp were used by explorers. The
last of the bodies was not in fact recovered until almost exactly a year
after the explosion.
The workmen in those parts of the pit
over which the force and flame extended were all found dead at the
places where their work required them to be, as if death had been
instantaneous. But the miners far away from the shaft had lived on, some
badly injured or burnt and others unscathed, in small and remote air
pockets, for many hours or even longer, and left evidence of this in
their writings. They eventually died from suffocation in the depleting
air. The oil in some of their lamps was found to be exhausted, showing
that they had continued to burn for some hours, possibly days, after the
explosion. A note was found pinned to one of the bodies:
September 8 1880
'E.Hall and J.Lonsdale died at
half-past 3 in the morning.W.Murray and W.Morris and James Clarke
visited the rest on half-past nine in the morn and all living in the
incline,
Yours truly,
W.Murray, Master-Shifter'
A piece of brattice-board about 2.5
feet long was found with the names of fourmen on one side and on the
other this message:
' Five o' clock, we have been
praying to God'.
Near to the board were the four dead
men. Another board had two messages written on it in chalk.The first
read:
'The Lord has been with us, we are
all ready for heaven - Ric Cole, half past 2 o' clock Thursday'.
The second message, much fainter, read:
'Bless the Lord we have had a jolly
prayer meeting, every man ready for glory. Praise the Lord’. Sign.R.Cole
Another man, Michael Smith, who had
left his dying infant son to go to work, wrote a love-letter to his wife
on his tin water-bottle with a rusty nail:
'Dear Margaret,
There was 40 of us altogether at 7am.
Some was singing hymns but my thoughts was 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 for me...Dear wife, Farewell. My last
thoughts are about you and the children. Be sure and learn the children
to pray for me. Oh what an awful position we are in ! Michael Smith, 54
Henry Street'
By a sad coincidence his son Michael
did die on the same day as the disaster. The bottle survives to this day
somewhere in the Midlands in the possession of a descendant of Michael
Smith.
Of the other victims John Southern (or
Sutherland, 12 Australia Street) left a widow and 9 children. Crackshot
Corporal Hindson (22 John Street, Seaham Harbour) was carried
shoulder-high again - this time in his coffin. His arms and legs were
blown off by the blast and identification was based on his flamboyant
beard. There was no Volunteers band at his funeral at St.John’s for it
had lost five of its best musicians. The Hendersons of 10 Cooke Street
lost the father Michael and three of his sons. Thomas Hutchinson (18
Seaham Street), survivor in 1871, was not so lucky this time. The Durham
Chronicle reported: 'One of the first of the bodies recovered was
claimed by his widow to be that of Harry Ramsay (or Ramshaw). At home
(20 Vane Terrace) the pet dog refused to approach the corpse, barked
ceaselessly and was ill at ease. The body was duly buried. A few days
later the real Ramsay was found and positively identified by the army
boots and straw belt which he always wore at the pit. This time the dog
showed every sign of recognition and even licked one of the dead man’s
boots....the unfortunate widow had to pay for a second funeral and
needed to be advanced money for the purpose by Vicar Scott.’ The only
thing wrong with this story is that according to the 1881 census Harry
Ramsey was a single man living with his parents! Another enigma we
shall never get to the bottom of.
Initially at least the Seaham Colliery
disaster excited national interest and sympathy. Queen Victoria
telegraphed from Balmoral, and the Home Secretary came to Seaham. As a
result of the explosion there were 107 widows, 2 mothers and 259
children without their breadwinners. A Relief Fund raised over £13,000.
The Queen chipped in £100. It is not clear whether or not the
Londonderry family contributed to the sum. Probably they did not (at
least not publicly) for this would have created a dangerous precedent
both for them and other coalowners. In fairness it should be pointed out
that the 5th.Marquess had already contributed to the Northumberland &
Durham Miner’s Permanent Relief Fund over the previous three years a sum
equal to one fifth of that contributed by the workmen at Seaham and his
other collieries. Londonderry and his heir Castlereagh also had the
decency to attend one of the mass funerals. Had the disaster occurred
just four months later, after the passing of the Employer’s Liability
Act (which became law on January 1 1881), then the widows and other
dependents would have received at least some compensation automatically
if an inquest jury had decided there had been negligence on the part of
the proprietors.
Of the total sum of £13,000 raised,
£7,500 was invested with the River Wear Commisioners for ultimate needs,
and over £4,000 was paid to the committee of the Northumberland and
Durham Miner’s Permanent Relief Fund for them to administer by way of
current relief in Seaham. The inquest was held at the Londonderry
Institute at Seaham Harbour. Verdict - Accidental deaths. The
locally-drawn jury might have been afraid of upsetting the Londonderry
family or their agents who ran all of Seaham’s affairs and thus made no
recommendations or remarks regarding safety at the pit.
Then things changed. Typhoid fever,
possibly contracted from handling the bodies, broke out in the village
by the end of September. Yet more deaths were caused by this pestilence.
Bitterness was expressed when only 1 shilling (5p.) a week was granted
to disaster widows, plus 3 pence (1.25p) for each child of school age.
Even Vicar Scott protested. Ten of the widows felt compelled to march
into a meeting of the Permanent Relief Committee to state their
grievances. They asked for 2/9d (14p.) per week for each widow, 1/-
(5p.) for each child and a sum of £5 for each family to enable clothing
to be bought. The Committee remained unmoved and the rate of relief
remained unchanged, which is probably the reason why there apparently is
still money in the Fund to this day, 115 years later.
Greater bitterness was caused by the
decision to brick up the Maudlin seam before all the bodies were
recovered, because fires were still raging underground. Months passed
and the resentment led to riots and strikes. In November 1880 coal
working was being gradually resumed on the management’s promise of
increased pay and an undertaking that the Maudlin stoppings would soon
be withdrawn but early in December, when it became clear that these
promises would not be kept, the strike began in earnest. Despite the
deteriorating weather the workforce were still out at the end of January
but a few, a very few, had broken away. The DMA paid out 7/6d (37.5p)
per week in strike pay. During February the first blacklegs were brought
in from outside the village and were attacked. Daily and under police
protection they had to run the gauntlet of the miner’s wives, jeering
and banging pokers on 'blazers'. Any blackleg spotted on his own was
given a good hiding. On more than one occasion the strikers and their
families massed at the pit and prevented a particular shift from going
down. More blacklegs were brought in under cover of darkness. Spies in
Sunderland somehow reported their imminent arrival at Seaham Colliery
station and there was usually a reception committee waiting to give them
a warm welcome. Eventually police had to be billeted at the pit and
these were put up in the Volunteer Drill Shed.
In February 1881 a special 'court' was
held at Seaham Police Station to deal with charges in connection with
the disturbances.The Reverend Angus Bethune was the presiding
magistrate. The other magistrates were Colonel Allison and Captain Ord.
Colonel White, Chief Constable of the County, also occupied a seat on
the bench. Bethune made all the decisions, primed no doubt by his
‘associates’. This far from saintly individual, who now rests in
St.Mary’s churchyard, was in fact little more than a Londonderry family
retainer. He lived into his 90s and was one of Seaham’s leading citizens
for 60 years, christening three generations of Londonderrys (usually in
London not Seaham). I leave it to my readers to decide whether or not
this was a kangaroo court. Watching the entire proceedings (and taking
copious notes for future reference no doubt) were the new manager of
Seaham Colliery, Barret, and his boss the Head Viewer of all the
Londonderry coal concerns Vincent Corbett. Over 50 men were summonsed.
Five men were charged with assaulting an alleged blackleg. For this
offence one Simeon Vickers (8 Cornish Street) got two months hard
labour, the others (Thomas Morgan, William Aspden, Robert Dunn and
Thomas Lannigan) got 1 month hard labour. Vickers was further convicted
of an additional three assaults on blacklegs. He got another three
months hard labour for these incidents. Jonathan Wylde was given 14 days
hard labour for assault. A great mob of supporters outside the closed
court were held back by police. The constabulary were also needed in
force to enable the convicted to be escorted to Durham Gaol the
following day.
TOP
By the beginning of March the strikers
were at the end of their tether. A ballot was taken and there was not
the necessary two thirds majority to stay out. It was agreed that work
would be resumed on condition that all hands were re-engaged. However
Vincent Corbett, Supreme Londonderry Lackey in Seaham, was having none
of it. He named 26 'marked' men, above and beyond those jailed, who
would not be taken back on. These were of course the leading union men,
intelligent and therefore dangerous. In this tense stand-off, rumours
proliferated that candymen were to be sent for to commence evictions. On
several occasions in early March reports reached the village that their
arrival was imminent and mobs of men went to meet them. All of these
however proved to be false alarms. During the adjourned hearing of some
of the intimidation cases at the Police Station in April a crowd of
miners left the precincts of the court on hearing that a 'special' train
was expected at Seaham station containing both police and candymen. This
report too was unfounded. By the end of March 1881 the strikers were
obliged to negotiate with the management. The list of marked men was
reduced to just 10, the leading unionists.
The DMA had to advise the Seaham Lodge
to accept that the 10 men must become 'Sacrificed Members' who would
give up their colliery houses within a month. Four of these - Thomas
Banks (President of the Seaham Lodge), Thomas Brown, Thomas Burt (cousin
of his namesake, the Liberal MP for Morpeth) and Robert Newham stayed
put in their homes and were duly evicted on April 29 1881. The police
arrived suddenly and in force at 10 am. The rest of the villagers could
only stand in silence and watch. They were beaten and they knew it. The
other Sacrificed Members were given £50 each by the union to start up
again elsewhere. They would of course be denied work at every other mine
in the Great Northern Coalfield. Some of the men and their families left
the village. Some of these are reported to have been obliged to emigrate
to America. At least one of them, David Corkhill, eventually returned to
Seaham and his numerous descendants walk amongst us today, possibly
oblivious of the goings on of a century and more ago. See below for more
information about the Seaham Colliery Disaster.
Seaham Colliery finally got back to
work in April 1881. All of the remaining bodies were removed by
September 6 of that year. Those widows who were now bereft of colliery
workers in their families were obliged to give up their houses and move
elsewhere. The village gradually filled up again as new workers were
imported. Fertile ground for Londonderry’s headhunters was found in the
dying Cumberland coalfield. A swarm of mining families came from the
Whitehaven area and there can be few Seaham residents in 1995 who do not
have some of these as their ancestors. Another wave came from the north
Midlands - Staffordshire and Derbyshire in particular. Some came from
North Wales, others from Yorkshire, Cornwall, Devon and Scandinavia.
Nearer to home Haswell and Usworth sent contingents too.
The four remaining Rainton pits (Rainton
Meadows, Nicholson’s, Alexandrina and Lady Seaham) were closed down in
November 1896. With the loss of much of his income from central Durham
in 1896 the 6th.Marquess decided to construct a second pit at Seaham as
a replacement. In August 1899 the first sods were cut by Theresa,
Marchioness of Londonderry, and her elder son Viscount Castlereagh, who
gave their names to the two shafts. The first coal was drawn in 1907. By
1911 the population of Seaham was 20,000 - an increase of 33% over the
previous ten years. By 1920 the new colliery, Dawdon, employed 3,300
workers and produced over 1 million tons per year. It became the premier
colliery in Greater Seaham, relegating the old 'Nack' to a poor second
place.
In 1920 the Marquess sold his
Silksworth Colliery to Sir James Joicey. It was decided that a new,
third, pit should be sunk at Seaham and that the contents of Seaham Hall
should be disposed of preparatory to its sale. On November 19 1923 the
first sod was cut at the new colliery which was called Vane Tempest
after Frances Anne and her ancestors.
The Slum Clearance Act was passed in
1930 and Seaham Council was quick to take advantage. The Carr House
Estate (Deneside) had begun even before, in 1928, and was finally
completed in 1937. People from Seaham Harbour were moved up to it and
away from their old appalling conditions. The old tight-knit community
at Seaham Colliery was also broken up and moved almost en masse to the
new estate at Parkside. Knowing that Westlea and Eastlea estates were
planned a few of the inhabitants stayed put and waited for their new
houses.404 houses for 2,017 people were completed at Parkside by
September 1940, but there were no shops and no public house.
The old streets at Seaham Colliery and
Seaham Harbour were not immediately demolished but were kept for those
made homeless by German air raids. On October 25 1941 the Seaton
Colliery Inn sustained a direct hit after hours and the landlady and a
friend were killed. One day a new public house, aptly named the Phoenix,
would appear on the site. In 1947 construction of the Eastlea and
Westlea estates began.To make way for them the old streets of the Seaham
Colliery area were demolished over the next 15 years.
On July 12 1946, the eve of the first
postwar Gala, the Coal Industry Nationalisation Act received the Royal
Assent. The official handover took place on 'Vesting' Day, Wednesday
January 1 1947. Notice boards were set up outside every pit which read:
'This colliery is now managed by the National Coal Board on behalf of
the people'. Lord Londonderry was apparently very generously compensated
for the loss of his three Seaham collieries but the precise amount he
received seems to be a secret.
The Miner’s Strike of 1984-85 - the
last, longest and most bitter of them all, was calculated to stop the
closure of the remaining collieries in County Durham and elsewhere. Once
again, as usual, the miners lost and the fate of the rump Durham
coalfield was finally sealed by Conservative victories in the General
Elections of 1987 and 1992. In 1987 British Coal 'amalgamated' Seaham
Colliery with Vane Tempest. No more coal was produced at the old mine
and it was relegated to the role of a third shaft for the newer
colliery. Vane Tempest coal came to the surface at Seaham Colliery and
was transported to the main railway line or the docks from there. The
rail connection from Seaham Colliery to Seaham Harbour was severed a
year later in 1988 following an accident with a runaway locomotive. Thus
was closed the last section of the Rainton and Seaham line laid between
1828 and 1831 which had brought life to the infant town. 'Benny’s Bank'
had been a direct link back to the Industrial Revolution and the
Founders of Seaham Harbour.
In 1991 both Dawdon and Murton
collieries were closed and the sites levelled. In October 1992 British
Coal, as part of a national strategy, announced the closure of the four
remaining pits in the old County of Durham, including the Seaham-Vane
Tempest combine. Seaham and Vane Tempest collieries were bulldozed in
1994. Now a great open site has replaced each of the three Seaham pits.
Mining in the town came to an end after a century and a half.
The twin estates of Westlea and Eastlea,
on either side of the old A19, now stand on the site of Seaham Colliery
village (‘The High Colliery’). Many ex-miners or descendants of miners,
live there today but the nearest coalmine is over a hundred miles away.
4.
Seaton-with-Slingley
Population changes in the 19th. Century
were: