Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Dedication
- Images
- Contents
- Acknowledgements
- 1 The Disaster
- 2 The Village
- 3 The Coalfield
- 4 The Industry
- 5 The Colliery
- 6 The Aftermath
- 7 Sir Stafford Cripps
- 8 The Working Mine
- 9 The Inquiry
- 10 The Management
- 11 The Firemen
- 12 The Inspectorate
- 13 The Miners
- 14 The Union
- 15 The Reports
- 16 The Last Rites
- Epilogue
- Appendix A Nationalisation
- Appendix B The Davy Lamp
- Appendix C Butties
- Appendix D Owners
- Bibliography
- Index
6 - The Aftermath
- Frontmatter
- Dedication
- Images
- Contents
- Acknowledgements
- 1 The Disaster
- 2 The Village
- 3 The Coalfield
- 4 The Industry
- 5 The Colliery
- 6 The Aftermath
- 7 Sir Stafford Cripps
- 8 The Working Mine
- 9 The Inquiry
- 10 The Management
- 11 The Firemen
- 12 The Inspectorate
- 13 The Miners
- 14 The Union
- 15 The Reports
- 16 The Last Rites
- Epilogue
- Appendix A Nationalisation
- Appendix B The Davy Lamp
- Appendix C Butties
- Appendix D Owners
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
The news of the disaster at Gresford broke too late for the national press to do much about it on Saturday 22 September beyond rushing out single-page news-sheets for limited circulation in London, and most people in other parts of the country probably first learned about the accident from local evening papers or from wireless bulletins. By Sunday it was front page news, temporarily displacing the forthcoming wedding of the Duke of Kent and Princess Marina, the warrant for the extradition from New York to New Jersey of Bernard Hauptmann, charged with the murder of the Lindbergh baby, the typhoon in the Far East which had caused 20,000 deaths, and the dispute in the South Wales coalfield which if not resolved by the following weekend would bring 137,000 men out on strike.
The leader writers, anxious to articulate the nation's sympathy and condolences, slipped easily into gear. ‘Coal-mining’, said the Sunday Times,
is a trade in which danger is ever present. In a sense the men at the coal face are on constant active service, as soldiers are in time of war. Moreover, like soldiers … they are directly serving their country … To the miners who daily risk their lives to provide us with this precious ‘black gold’ the whole community owes a profound debt of gratitude.
The Daily Worker later pointed out, ‘to avoid misunderstanding’, that this paragraph, which it quoted, referred solely to the Gresford disaster and ‘must not be taken by the South Wales miners as supporting their demand for something more than a subsistence rate of seven shillings per shift in token of profound gratitude’.
By Monday, when it was known that attempts to control the underground fire had been abandoned, the Daily Telegraph wished to pay its tribute to the heroism and devotion of the rescue parties.
… This is the temper which makes Britons proud of their country. The men in the pit were the rescuers’ mates; therefore, whatever endurance, pluck and indomitable will could do to save them was done. The miner takes such work as part of his trade, an incident of the normal occupational risk …
—in much the same way, the Daily Worker again commented, as the directors and shareholders took the profits sweated out of the miner as part of their trade, without ‘normal occupational risk’.
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- Information
- GresfordThe Anatomy of a Disaster, pp. 47 - 60Publisher: Liverpool University PressPrint publication year: 1999