Coal Mining

Families of 57 miners who died in the Sneyd Pit disaster in Burslem, Stoke-on-Trent have been waiting 65 years for a memorial to be put up in their memory.

Barbara Limer lost her father in the disaster, and Agnus Burgees lost her 17 year old brother as well.

Old superstition

Due to an old superstition miners never worked on New Year's Day, but because the war was on in 1942, they were told they had to work.

But just before 09:00 there was a sudden explosion and 57 men died. The youngest victim was only 15 years old.

Beryl Royale remembers the day clearly. She was 11 years old and her father was in the rescue team.

Barbara Limer was three years old and her father died in the explosion.

The daughters welcomed a memorial (the pit head of a wheel) will be put up near the Town Hall in Burslem.

Fifteen limited plates to commemorate the disaster have also been made and one has been donated to the Apedale Heritage Centre, a mining heritage museum in Newcastle under Lyme.

'Don't Go Down on New Year's Day'

In 1993, BBC Radio Stoke broadcast a half-hour documentary programme about the pit disaster, produced by Mark Stewart, calling it 'Don't Go Down on New Year's Day'. It includes the story of the disaster and its aftermath, and testimony from survivors.
Listen to it here