Senghenydd

The Universal Colliery at Senghenydd had exploded once already, in 1901, killing eighty-one. The safety recommendations made afterwards had not been carried out.

At eight in the morning firedamp ignited and raised coal dust through the workings. Four hundred and thirty-nine men and boys were killed, the youngest fourteen.

The village had about two thousand people in it. Nearly every house lost somebody.

Rescue teams worked for weeks; some of the dead were not brought up until the following year. Eight men were saved from behind a fall after two days.

The manager was fined twenty-four pounds - about five and a half pence for each life - and a Welsh newspaper ran the headline: Miners' Lives at 1s 1¼d Each.