Gassed, shocked and badly bruised, Hewitt eventually managed to wriggle free and in the darkness crawled towards the pit bottom. Fortunately the rescuers heard his cries for help and rushed to his assistance. As the explorers staggered wearily out of the cage a number of fathers and mothers broke the cordon at the pit top and rushed towards them but a sad shake of Potts' head told them that there was little hope.

Other teams went in and bodies began to be brought out to the adjacent lamp cabin, which was now being used as a mortuary, bodies were laid side by side on fresh straw to be identified and claimed by relatives. Day wore on into night but the crowd still remained and miners from other collieries were now standing by. A religious service was held near the mouth of the shaft. Mothers, fathers, wives, friends, neighbors, spectators and sightseers all stood bareheaded. One reporter declared that never in his life had he seen such a poignant scene.

By 10.30 p.m., Mr. Potts the colliery manager had chosen fresh team leaders and they, on their part, had picked young tough reliable experienced miners. In addition, the teams were backed up by Mr. N Atkinson, H M Inspector of Mines, Mr. Richardson the manager of nearby Adderley Green colliery and Mr. R Holmes, manager of Parkhall colliery. Before descending the shaft the explorers were briefed, split into teams and fortified with a hot meal then they lined up in front of the waiting cage. Though brave and looking calm and serene as they entered the cage each one of the explorers was under no illusion, death was a probability but many more men and boys were still below ground, although hope for the survivors was now being dimmed. To bring them up alive out of that foul smelling inferno would require a miracle but miners and their families have always demanded that the bodies of their kith and kin be brought out of the pit whenever possible. The funerals gave the victims their rightful due and helped to resolve the shock of the bereaved.

All night long the rescue teams worked desperately to find the victims but progress was painfully slow. The task of propping up the roof and clearing a passage through piles of debris was backbreaking work. Sealing off affected areas where gob fires were suspected and repairing damaged separation doors with brattice cloth all delayed the rescuers, the magnitude of the explosion was inconceivable. Normally an explosive force bursts in all directions but underground it goes for the least line of resistance and cuts a swarth of devastation along the drifts and roadways, like a bullet out of a rifle barrel. A blast had blown up the Cockshead main drift and into the Bambury workings leaving death and destruction in its wake. Large sections of the roadways had collapsed, chocks, packs, ventilation doors and brick stoppings were all holed allowing the air to escape into the gobs and take a short cut back to the surface leaving other parts of the mine without air. And massive cracking of the roof support had brought the roof crashing down in clouds of dust. Worst of all was the fate of those employed along the levels whose work took them directly along the path of the blast.

The scenes were dreadful. Men, boys and horses had been blown aside like puppets and lay strewn around. The body of George Salt who was head horse keeper, 42 years of age was found badly burned and further on four more bodies had to be eased from under their pit ponies, and the blood and pit dirt wiped from their faces. They were pony drivers, George Steele 14 years of age, Sam Sherwin 13 years of age, James Bailey 18 years of age, and John Williams, 16. They were laid on stretchers with clean sacks covering their faces. An ex-soldier in the rescue team said it was like a battlefield.

The team came across an air crossing near the top of the Cockshead main dip and found that the separation door had been severely holed by the blast and therefore the downcast clean air had been drawn back to the surface, along with the return air current to the upcast shaft. This is what is known as a short circuit of the ventilation so the doors had to be patched up temporarily with brattice cloth to force the current to flow normally before the rescuers could venture, they found the mutilated body of 18 year old George Bradshaw. He could only be identified by his lamp number. The same applied in number 2 main gate where the body of Charles Sherwin, 21 years, was found. His brother was already lying in the lamp cabin. He also had another brother who was to be recovered later in the Bambury seam.

Elsewhere there was the body of William Lawton 18, then Albert Edwards 20, George Edwards 42, and Josiah Edwards 57. These three, father, son and uncle had died together. Other sections of the Cockshead had a similar story to tell, as more bodies were recovered, all dead in the prime of life. On the surface relatives and friends went into the lamp cabin cum mortuary to identify the bodies. Young wives and

mothers-to-be, tears streaming down their cheeks, were helped by the older more mature women and in a shed nearby articles of clothing such as clogs, scarves and caps and other items such as watches, knives and other personal effects were on display with the pathetic appeal ''Please identify and add a name''. Eventually the rescue team had to withdraw. Conditions were such that gas was seeping out of the old drifts. Number 2 drift was still full of gas and in number 5 drift the gas was down to 25 yards of the upper level. The return roadway of drift number 3 had been hit by the blast and was impassible and even the new road nearby, that had just been made, was seriously obstructed by falls, with the roof weighted on, and more falls were expected.

The exploration extended over three months and was carried out under conditions of great danger, the last body to be retrieved from the Cockshead was that of Isaac Derricott aged 60. He was so badly mutilated and burnt that he had to be placed in a sack. Though he was the father of a large family at least they were old enough to fend for themselves. But poor Arthur Fletcher who had tried so hard to save the lives of those in his charge, only 26, an up and coming official, was denied the dignity of a decent burial along with four others aged from 19 to 27. They were George Wilson, Spencer Whitehurst, Joe Bull and William Bull, the inquiry states very coldly "Five bodies still remain in the seam as it was considered imprudent to reopen that portion of the mine in which they probably lie." There were 77 persons in the Bambury and Cockshead seams at the time of the explosion of which 64 were killed along with 16 pit ponies, leaving 13 survivors. The effects of the explosion in the Bambury seam and the consequent deaths there of 37 persons were caused by coal dust.

In an underground explosion the blast preceding the flame kicks up the dust from the roof, floor and sides and while it is suspended in the air it is ignited by the following flame and this carries on as long as there is dust to supply it. Burning of the coal dust uses up the oxygen in the atmosphere and the incomplete combustion produces a deadly carbon monoxide from which the 37 miners died.

In those days, safety was often diluted in the pursuit of profit and at the inquiry it was stated that the Cockshead seam was a dusty seam (and I am sure that all miners will agree with that) and in both the intake and return roads it was about 2 or 3 inches deep on the floor. The men had used water to lay the dust until Mr. Potts had objected because this made the floor heave up and lift and of course this had to be repaired and this added costs to production. He had also reduced the number of men doing repairs in the pit to cut costs and in the Bambury seam the dust was only removed when it covered the rails and wagons of coal could no longer run so if it was preventing production they cleared it up and it was due to these conditions that the 37 victims died, not by the direct violence of the blast but from its toxic effects.

At this point I would just like to refer to the Mossfield colliery explosion of 21st March 1940 in which 11 miners were killed. The inspector's report stated, "The loss of life in the 1889 explosion was catastrophic compared to the present occurrence. There is little or no doubt that this was because that explosion was propagated by coal dust there is also little doubt that the effects of the recent explosion would have been greatly magnified but for the fact that the roadways were copiously treated with stone dust". As it was, the explosion was limited both in extent and violence.

The Explodablity of Coal Dust