Talk of Blantyre on Saturday 5th January 1895 was a huge explosive noise heard throughout the district, causing much concern, alarm and curiosity.
The explosive noise turned out to be of much more serious nature than first thought. At Dixon’s Rows in Stonefield, the residents were in great fear as many were confident that there must have been another fearful explosion at one of Blantyre’s pits. Many people remembered what that noise was like, but as people came from the various pits in Blantyre, it soon became evident, that thankfully it wasn’t below ground.
Mr. A.B. Maxwell, Inspector of the Poor, who lived in one of the villas on Stonefield Road, close to where the explosion was thought to have originated from, informed reporters that Saturday that the shock was a most severe one, which shook the walls of his house. He ran out believing a boiler explosion had taken place, but could not see the cause in any other nearby homes.
Nearby, residents of Dixon’s Rows were out in the streets, standing in icy, snowy conditions, speaking of the terrific shock which they also had felt, with a few panes of glass broken in some of the houses and women complaining that the crockery had fallen from their shelves.
The police were called and made an early investigation, focusing on the locality of the noise complaint and immediately visited the gasworks on Stonefield Road. Astonished, they were to learn that the explosion was not gas related and all was fine there. They then visited the pits in turn to check, and again left confused and bewildered when all was fine too at each colliery. During the colliery visits, they went to each dynamite magazine and found them secure and unaffected.
Back at Dixon’s Rows, interviewing residents, police were interested in the statement of one particular pit sinker who through knowledge of working each day with dynamite, said this was undoubtably the noise of dynamite exploding in the open air. Not below ground. Not something mechanical failing, but definitely sticks of dynamite being used. The theory was that some workman had come into possession of the dynamite and nearing his home, thrown it away or up in the air and falling on to the frozen ground, had ignited. The thought was the guilty person, knowing what a stir had been caused, was keeping the matter to themselves, not speaking of it.
To the best of my knowledge, this was never explained, but the stir caused in the area, enough for reporters to be commenting on it a week later. AI pictures the scene.
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