1844 — June 15, Powder and gas explosions, Black Heath Coal Mine, ~Richmond, VA– 11
–~12 Griggs. Historic Disasters of Richmond. 2016, p. 40.
— 11 National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health. Mining Disasters. 2010.
— 11 Rothwell. The Mineral Industry…to the End of 1897, Vol. VI. 1898, p. 746.
Narrative Information
Griggs: “On June 15, 1844, there was another major explosion[1] that killed about a dozen men in the Black Heath Mine. The Alexandria Gazetteer reported that ‘at the time of the accident, we learned there were 12 hands in the pit” 8 colored men and 4 Englishmen.’ All of the African Americans were slaves. Although one man was saved, fallen timbers blocked the place where the accident occurred. The Richmond Whig ran a headline: ‘Terrible Accident.’ The paper reported that ‘a barrel of gunpowder was first ignited, and its explosion fired the gas, which was secreted.’ Although one man was pulled out alive, the rest of the bodies were found ‘horribly disfigured.’ The paper closed its story by reporting:
The explosion, as far as we can learn, was caused by the most wanton negligence on the part of unhappy persons, or the principal man among them. The funnel, used for ventilating the shaft, was stopped up so that a current of air could not pass through the works. In this situation, and while the…{vents} were filled with the inflammable gas, a blast was set off by some of the hands engaged in blasting coal. As might have been expected, a tremendous explosion followed.
“The company management worked for almost twenty-four hours to recover the bodies.
“This second explosion closed the mine. For almost one hundred years, it remained closed until there was an effort to reopen the coal mining industry in the late 1930s. The effort did not succeed, and the Chesterfield mines are still filled with coal and the remains of those who tried to mine it.
“The Black Heath Mine operated at a time when there were few safety devices. A minter going into a shaft had no assurance that he would ever see the light of day again. But the deaths of over three hundred miners helped to develop Chesterfield County. When you drive down the Midlothian Turnpike, remember you are driving on a road that was built to carry coal mined by men who did a dangerous job that helped to develop this nation. Whenever you look at the Chesterfield County seal, remember the men who mined the coal that fueled a nation.” (Griggs. Historic Disasters of Richmond. 2016, pp. 40-41.)
Rothwell: “In June, 1844, an explosion occurred in which 11 out of 12 person were killed…” (Rothwell, 1898, p. 746)
Sources
Griggs, Walter S. Jr. Historic Disasters of Richmond. Charleston, SC: The History Press, 2016. Google preview accessed 9-3-2018 at: https://books.google.com/books?id=KjSACwAAQBAJ&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false
National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, Mining Safety and Health Research.. Mining Disasters (Incidents with 5 or more Fatalities). NIOSH, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 2-26-2013 update. Accessed at: https://www.cdc.gov/niosh/mining/statistics/content/allminingdisasters.html
Rothwell, Richard P. (Ed.). The Mineral Industry: Its Statistics, Technology and Trade in the United States and Other Countries to the End of 1897, Vol. VI. New York and London: The Scientific Publishing Co., 1898. Digitized by Google. Accessed 9-3-2018 at:
https://books.google.com/books?id=m8woAAAAYAAJ&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false
[1] The first major mine disaster in the country was on March 18, 1839 in the same mine, leading to 40-53 deaths.