Sunday 9th March 1958 certainly started with a bang in High Blantyre! When Royal Engineers carried out the demolition of High Blantyre’s Dixon’s Pit, a demolition that the National Coal Board thought would cost nothing, ended up being quite costly! The Territorials were demolishing the old washing plant at High Blantyre Pit that day, but the […]
In May 1930, while workmen were engaged cutting a new roadway through Priory Pit, Blantyre, a charge of gelignite, which had been left buried by mistake the previous night, exploded, causing the death of one man and serious injury to another. The man killed was William Stewart (57), who resided 51 Small Crescent, High […]
Many people reading this page will now be aware of the fateful disaster on 22nd October 1877 where 216 men and boys lost their lives at Dixons Pits 2 and 3 , High Blantyre. This sad tale remembers the grief one of the mothers endured. Mr & Mrs George McLachlan lived at No 1 Jackson […]
With so many men and boys losing their lives in the Dixons Pit Disaster in High Blantyre on 22nd October 1877, the only way the authorities could deal with such funeral arrangements, was by a mass burial. This took place at High Blantyre Cemetery, where all non Catholics were buried, with Catholic men and boys […]
An interesting story about a Blantyre family taken from “The History of the Livingstone Memorial Church dated 1877-1927 by Rev Thos. A. Hugh, M.A” and I quote: “Mr. and Mrs George MacLachlan, for many years members of this congregation, had three sons killed in the 1877 Blantyre Explosion. Twenty three years later in 1900, they […]
In 1927, Blantyre man Hugh McPherson was in a reflective mood. Speaking of his involvement in the rescue party of the 1877 Blantyre Colliery disaster, he wrote at the time, “For many years I have had a strong desire to put on record my experiences as an explorer in that great colliery disaster, but hitherto […]
Below are the recollections of Mr Hugh Brown, penned in 1927, concerning Blantyre Colliery Disaster. This is of particular interest to me as he is also writing about my great, great grandfather Mr John Bowie. “For many years I have had a strong desire to put on record my experiences as an explorer in that […]