Caprington Colliery Inrush

At 11.45 on the night of 10 December 1909 the roof of abandoned stoop-and-room workings in the Ell coal at Caprington Colliery, near Kilmarnock, gave way under a field that had flooded from the River Irvine. Water and gravel poured into the old workings, found their way to No. 41 pit and ran down the shaft, driving accumulated black damp in front of them. Of the sixteen people below ground, five escaped through the new air pit after raking out the ventilation furnace that blocked their way, and one was carried by the flood into the winding shaft and came out on top of the cage. The other ten drowned. The surface cover over the abandoned seam was about eighteen feet.

Cause

The roof of abandoned stoop-and-room workings in the Ell coal, under a surface cover of only about eighteen feet, collapsed when the ground above was flooded, letting surface water into the mine.

Contributing factors

The Ell coal had been worked by stoop and room from No. 41 pit from about 1894 until 1906, when it was abandoned because the stoops were judged too small to remove without letting the surface down. The ground above is low-lying and subject to occasional flooding from the River Irvine. The Ell coal's own roof formed part of the cover and deteriorated over time. Ten of the sixteen people below ground made for the wrong outlet, apparently believing the nearer air pit was the more available of the two; the inspector thought the ventilating furnace at the new air pit may have led them to that mistake.

What happened

Thomas Aird, the fireman in charge of the shift, was in the main intake on his way to the pit bottom at 11.45 when black damp put his light out and his matches would not strike. He found the bottomer, David Livingstone, also in the dark. Judging that the black damp was coming down from the Ell coal, Aird went to the surface to relight his lamp, came back to the Ell coal bottom and opened an air door to short-circuit the air, then had to go up again, overcome. Livingstone went back down alone, shouted two or three times at the Blind coal bottom, got no answer and ascended. Five minutes later water was heard rushing down the shaft from the Ell coal in such volume that nobody could get past it. The water rose in No. 41 shaft to 22 feet above the Ell coal bottom and within 56 feet of the surface. The subsidence that let it in was in a field about 500 feet north of Caprington Castle and 135 feet south of the river; the hole into the seam was fourteen feet by twelve at a depth of seventeen or eighteen feet, and at the surface far larger, the water having washed sand and gravel down into the workings and left the cavity littered with uprooted trees.

Rescue & recovery

James McSherry, a 23-year-old miner who had once worked as a roadsman, climbed the back air-course known as the chute towards the Ell coal, met water running down it, was caught by a larger volume at a junction and carried into the winding shaft, coming out on top of the cage. A party led by the manager, John Gibson, went to the new air pit and brought out five people: John Laird, John Laird junior, Thomas Campbell, John Wilson and Hugh Gibson. To reach it those five had to rake out the fire of the ventilating furnace at the foot of the 45-degree cross-cut, pull down the sheet-iron draught screen and wait for the road to cool, which took about twenty minutes; they were then drawn up the shallow shaft by a rope. The water rose too quickly for the remaining ten. Pumping and recovery began at once. The bodies of John Stewart, James Lennon, Peter Dorans and John Balfour were found in the Ell coal near No. 41 pit on 21 and 22 December, and the other six in the Blind coal workings afterwards.

Investigation & inquiry

A public inquiry was held in the Sheriff Court at Kilmarnock on 21 February 1910. After a hearing lasting all day the jury found that the ten men and boys, employed in the underground workings of No. 41 pit, Caprington Colliery, in the parish of Riccarton, the property of the Caprington and Auchlochan Coal Company, were drowned by an inrush of surface water which flooded the pit. Thomas H. Mottram, Inspector of Mines, reported on the disaster. He found the primary cause to be the working of the Ell coal from No. 41 pit where the surface cover was only eighteen feet thick, and found no sign that working the Blind coal beneath had pulled the workings above. He inspected the escape road by which the five got out and judged it suitable when no furnace was burning.

Legal & regulatory aftermath

The inspector questioned whether the owners were justified in continuing to work the pit. Hugh Shaw Dunn, the managing partner and an experienced mining engineer, told the inquiry that the strata clotted and filled up surface breaks, and that the solidity of the old workings under the river had convinced him it was safe to work out the Ell coal and then the Blind coal below. The manager, John Gibson, had withdrawn the men once in 1904 when the surface flooded, and evidence was led that the men themselves had left the pit on an earlier occasion out of fear. Mottram concluded that had the management recognised what percolating water might do to a softer part of the Ell coal roof, they would have kept the men out whenever the surface was flooded or flooding was expected, and noted that the Mines Act contained no provision about precautions when working coal near the surface.

Recorded claims

Individual factual claims, each attached to the source(s) that support it below. Where sources disagree, both are kept.

• The disaster was caused by the roof of an abandoned stoop and room working near the surface giving way, so that a large body of water which had overflowed during the night from the River Irvine, or a burn running into it, poured into the old workings and ran down No. 41 shaft, forcing accumulated black damp in front of it. ¹
• Ten people were drowned; sixteen were below ground at the time of the inrush, of whom five escaped by the new air pit and one was carried by the flood into the winding shaft. ^2,1
• Where the subsidence took place the cover over the Ell coal was about eighteen feet thick, and the opening into the seam measured fourteen feet by twelve at a depth of seventeen to eighteen feet. ¹
• The jury at the public inquiry in the Sheriff Court, Kilmarnock, on 21 February found that the ten died while engaged at their employment in the underground workings of No. 41 pit, the property of the Caprington and Auchlochan Coal Company, drowned by an inrush of surface water which flooded the pit. ¹
• The jury's verdict records the deaths as occurring on the 9th or 10th of December 1909, while the inspector's report dates the inrush firmly to 11.45 p.m. on the 10th. (uncertain) ¹
• Thomas H. Mottram found the primary cause to be the working of the Ell coal from No. 41 pit where the surface cover was only eighteen feet thick, found no perceptible indication that working the Blind coal below had pulled the workings above, and noted that the Mines Act contained no provision as to precautions when working coal near the surface. ¹

Photographs & further reading

This page doesn't try to reproduce everything — these are the best original sources found for this disaster.

Sources

1. (primary) Caprington, 10 December 1909: report by Thomas H. Mottram, Inspector of Mines — Scottish Mining Website, reproducing the Inspector of Mines report
2. (primary) Durham Mining Museum: Caprington Colliery — Durham Mining Museum, from the Lists of Mines

Record created: 10 September 2026 · Last researched: 10 September 2026