Great Barr Mining Disaster 1908 Bee Gees, not involved

15 June 2008
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Victims%20of%20the%201908%20Hamstead%20Colliery%20Disaster

Birmingham isn’t really known as a mining area, but it has it’s share of history and struggle with the ground as do many towns. The Hamstead Colliery was active from 1875 up to the 60s:

” On the 4th. March 1908, a fire occurred at approximately 5.00a.m. in the inset near the bottom of the downcast shaft. The source of the ignition was believed to be some candles that were stored in a wooden box.When the fire broke out there were 31 miners in the pit, 6 escaped before poisonous fumes built up in the roadways. “

This week the Hamstead Miners Memorial Trust unveiled a monument to miners in Hamstead Village, their website has a ton of background information and history of the mine and the area.

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  • http://www.podnosh.com/blog Nick Booth

    What’s with all the North Birmingham stuff? Are you on some weird SEO bet for the wild lands?

  • http://www.jonbounds.co.uk bounder

    You know BiNS all the news that’s fit to print, or rather link to and make up obscure headlines about.

    North Brum fixation might be a reaction to going round Moseley in Bloom yesterday, and worrying about myself acting middle class.

  • http://www.RussL.wordpress.com Russ L

    Say it ain’t so, Bounds!

  • Matt

    Hamstead Colliery was never in Birmingham – it was on the fringes of West Bromwich and the area now comes under Sandwell. Birmingham never had coal mines. For some reason many people seem to think that Hamstead Colliery was in a north suburb of Birmingham because the boundary with Brum was close by.

  • http://www.jonbounds.co.uk Jon Bounds

    I’m not sure exactly where the boundary might be, certainly not where it was in 1908, but I lived in Hampsted for about 20 years and I’m pretty sure I lived in Birmingham.

  • Lee M

    The colliery was located in what is now Sandwell. It later became the site of the Kings (the area’s answer to the Night Out) The Dome for young uns!
    Hamstead is predominantly in Sandwell but shabbily looked upon by the Yam Yams as it’s viewed (along with Great Barr) as the wealthy part of the borough.
    As for Boundary – beyond the railway station going up Hamstead Hill.

  • http://www.RussL.wordpress.com Russ L

    My ladyfriend’s Uncle – who actually mined there – says most of Hamstead is in Birmingham but the actual pit was in the Black Country. He views The Tame as the boundary around that bit.

  • Matt

    The boundary with the Black Country and Birmingham is the River Tame. One or two parts of Hamstead could just be in Birmingham, as Hamstead station is, but I’m not sure where “true” Hamstead begins.

  • http://www.RussL.wordpress.com Russ L

    It’s worth generally noting here that bits of the Tame might constitute a boundary, but it’s not along its entire length.

    That’d just be silly.

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