Excerpt from The British Empire in the Nineteenth Century, Vol. 3: Its Progress and Expansion at Home and Abroad; Comprising a Description and History of the British Colonies and Dependencies

The people who dwell in a coal-producing country are always liable to be shocked by tidings of calamities mostly invested with a dreadful sameness of detail - the deadened roar of subterraneous explosion due to the ignition of gas from a fiery seam of coal; the column of smoke, with the shattered timbers of the staging at the pit-mouth, shot into the air; the hurried gathering of women and children around the scene of disaster; the cries of anguish that rend the air, as the bodies, brought to bank, are recognized by the wives, the mothers, the sisters, the daughters, and the sweethearts of the dead. Our first instance of colliery-accidents arose from a very unusual cause. On January 16th, 1862, about 10.30 a.m., the beam of the pumping-engine at Hartley Pit, about ten miles north-east of Newcastle-on-Tyne, suddenly broke, from rottenness of the metal, and fell into the shaft, crushing in its fall an ascending "cage". Five men were instantly killed or fatally wounded, and three others were extricated alive.

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