Two County Durham communities came together yesterday to remember the mining disasters that devastated the lives of hundreds of families. Catherine Priestley reports.

FEBRUARY 16 is one of the darkest days in the history of the North-East mining industry.

It is 103 years since the explosion at West Stanley Colliery, in County Durham, known locally as Burns Pit, claimed the lives of 168 men and boys, and it is 130 years since the Trimdon Grange Colliery Disaster resulted in the death of 74 miners.

Memorial services took place in both towns yesterday as people gathered to show that although the terrible events are beyond living memory, they are far from forgotten.

At the pit memorial at Trimdon Village Cemetery, near Sedgefield, the Reverend Alison Richardson led the service with prayers commemorating the dead miners and asking for the safety of the miners of today.

As the names and ages of the victims were read out, people shook their heads in disbelief as they heard that children as young as 12 and 13 and whole families were wiped out when a rock fall led to an explosion.

Local band Skerne sang part of the Trimdon Explosion, by pitman poet Tommy Armstrong, and The Northern Echo’s deputy editor, Chris Lloyd, set the scene with an account of the disaster and the painful days that followed.

Sedgefield MP Phil Wilson laid a wreath at the memorial and was joined by Durham County Council chairman Dennis Morgan. Mr Wilson said: “Communities like Trimdon were built on coal and have a long, proud traditional of mining.

Tragedies were a part of everyday life, about 3,500 miners lost their lives in the Sedgefield consitituency.

They were the engine house of the Industrial Revolution and we should never forget.”

Pensioner Vera Heslop and her daughter, Joan Carr, attended the service because they appreciate the hardship mining families faced.

Mrs Heslop’s late husband, Arnold, was a miner along with other relatives and carried the pit’s banner at three Durham Galas. She said: “This happened a long time ago but we know the importance and honour those men’s memories.”

A short service was also held at the site of the West Stanley Colliery, where an academy school is being built, by the rector of St Andrew’s Church, the Reverend Austin Johnson.

Students at North Durham Academy have been researching the pit disaster.