The Hourglass, Spring 2012 (PDF.doc 271KB new

The Hourglass
The Newsletter of Flintshire Record Office
Archives for schools
Flintshire in the 19th and early 20th centuries is a longawaited
education resource, developed through a
partnership with the NGfL (National Grid for Learning),
and is available on their website www.ngflcymru.org.uk
which can also be accessed via a link from our webpages.
Using contemporary photographs, prints and
documents, we have created a series of themed
presentations. Children in schools will be able to see
how people lived, worked and spent their leisure time in
the past.
Our aim is to bring local history to life for children in
Flintshire schools by enabling them to access original
sources remotely. However, nothing beats handling the
actual documents themselves, as a class from Nercwys
School learned on a recent visit to the Record Office.
They enjoyed finding out how to read and handle
documents properly, investigating the life of Daniel
Owen, and the Mold Riots of 1869.
Pupils from Nercwys School examining documents, under the
watchful eye of Sue Copp, Archive Assistant
Flintshire Record Office, The Old Rectory, Hawarden, CH5 3NR
Tel: 01244 532364; Fax: 01244 538344; e-mail: archives@flintshire.gov.uk
website: www.flintshire.gov.uk/archives
Spring 2012
Successful Volunteer Project
This is the very first of over 10,000 photo’s to have been
digitally scanned, in a project at Flintshire Record Office
that has lasted over 7 years and has just reached
completion.
Broughton Wellington Bomber, 1940 (PH/9/34)
The entire photographic collection of Flintshire Record
Office is now saved in digital format, thanks to the
tremendous efforts of a small army of volunteers –
without whose fantastic work, it simply would not have
been possible. All these photographs are now easily
accessible on the public service computers in our
searchroom, which also helps to protect and preserve
the fragile originals.
Staff of the Record Office have also just completed
training on how to use the new “People’s Collection
Wales” website, and we hope to be able to upload and
display an ever-increasing number of our photos on this
website in the coming months for people to enjoy.

A Hawarden Colliery
Accident, 1784
The following description of a near-disastrous colliery
accident in one of the small coal pits near Sandycroft, on
the River Dee, was written on the flyleaf of the Hawarden
register of baptisms and burials 1771–1804, (ref:
P/28/1/89), by Hugh Jones, the curate of the parish. The
blacksmith had been lowered down the shaft (120 yards
deep) in a bucket suspended from a horse whim.
On the 4th of January 1784 George Wainwright,
blacksmith, of Pentrobin [in the parish of Hawarden] went
down Sandicroft coal pit in the morning to bleed the
horses there, as being the only day [‘Sunday’ inserted]
on which they were not worked. Having done his
business, and landing at the pit’s mouth, he put one foot
out of the bucket on the treading board, by which means
he lightened the bucket, which immediately kicked up on
account of the ropes being shortened by the frost that
then happened, and so tossed him headlong down the
pit. Providentially… he had the good fortune to catch hold
of the other rope at about ten yards depth, and grasped it
so well that he did not slide down it above five yards more
before he was able to maintain his hold, and so suspend
himself by it, during which time he had the greatest
presence of mind and undauntedness of heart…..he ever
experienced. He then….called to the people that were
above to fetch such a man of his acquaintance, in whom
he had the greatest confidence to land him, and directed
them how to do it. But when he was landed and found
himself safe, his firmness departed, and he burst into an
exceeding great flood of tears at his providential and
rather miraculous escape. His mind was so agitated with
the thoughts of his late danger as to make him take to his
bed all that day, and [he] was sometime after unwell. The
only corporal hurt he received was the rubbing off of a
little of the skin of one or two of his fingers by the rope.
NB the pit was 120 yards deep.
The account provides several interesting details, apart
from those of the accident: for instance, that cold weather
significantly shortened the ropes. It must have been
unusual for a man to be raised and lowered in the
buckets, which were normally used only for raising coal.
And why was the blacksmith needed to bleed the
horses? Christopher Williams
Illustration of a horse whim from British Mining by Robert Hunt (1887)
Diary of a
Prestatyn Policeman
1877-1879
Thanks to notification from The National
Archives of an item of interest coming up for sale,
we recently purchased at auction a policeman’s
diary from the 1870s [AN 4573]. Robert Griffiths,
“P.C. 18”, completed this diary of his duties around
Prestatyn. Each day’s entry includes a list of places
visited and comments on anything of note that
happened. As might be expected, he encountered
plenty of “drunk & disorderly”, petty thieves and
poachers, and on occasion a mad dog, a corpse
on a railway line and a shooting. He was on duty
at Mostyn Hall on the heir’s coming of age and at
Bangor Races.
The diary gives a fascinating insight into the dayto-day
events of life in the area at the time.
Unfortunately it was in a fragile state on its arrival
here and will
require the
attention of
our
conservator
before we
can make it
available in
the searchroom.
Prestatyn High Street, c.1905 (PH/50/245).
Recent Accessions
AN4551 – Bethania Chapel, New Brighton, Bagillt,
records (not registers), 1935-1991.
AN4580 – St John the Baptist V.A. Primary School,
Penymynydd, Log Book, 1863-1886.
AN4581 – Flintshire & Denbighshire Yeomanry,
additional records, 1897-1967.
AN4589 – Railway records inc. plans of Mostyn
Station and train register, 1938-1967.
AN4594 – File of information and photographs of the
construction of The Running Hare, Ewloe.
If you have any
comments
or suggestions for
The Hourglass,
please contact
The Editor, tel.
01244 532364
or e-mail:
archives@
flintshire.gov.uk
If you would like a
copy of this
publication in your
own language or in
an alternative
format such as
large print, braille or
on tape, please
contact the Editor.
14957 2-12 design-and-print 01352 704000