Tunshill Colliery Tragedy

The Oldham company of Platt Brothers, machine makers, owned a large colliery situated at Tunshill, at the top of Kiln Lane.

At around 10:30am on Friday 27th May 1887, a collier by the name of William Ashworth, a resident of Ladyhouse Lane, noticed a slight trickle of water coming from the roof in one of the shafts from which he was hewing coal. 

His son, John William who worked with him in the mine sounded the roof and told his father that he thought it was was unsafe. 

The two men were in the process of fitting a prop under the roof when a sudden deluge of water burst through he roof and engulfed them, both William and his son were washed along the length of the mine for a distance of around 30 yards by the torrent of water.

John was able to grab onto another mine prop and was able to raise the alarm, William managed to raise himself to his feet and both were able to make their way to the mouth of the pit along with a number of other colliers.

There was relief amongst the men until the realisation dawned that 3 men were missing;

41 year old James Mills, a collier from Butterworth Hall.
38 year old Thomas Schofield, a collier of 4 The Haugh, Newhey.
18 year old Michael Kenny, a collier also from the The Haugh.

The three men were working in a lower part of the mine, a rescue party was sent in to look for them, the water was extremely deep where they were thought to have been, the rescuers soon realised that nobody could have survived.

The police were soon called to the scene, the management of the colliery attempted to keep the news of the disaster quiet so as not to have people from the village descending upon the colliery interrupting the workers.

Thomas Schofields body was recovered around noon, the bodies of the other two men were found several hours later.