Yorkshire Miners Association

[charz]

Hello,  i wonder if anyone can help

I have some information about my 2x great grandfather and was wondering if there is anyway to find out more about it 
John Keene Smith (could be just Keen(e)) or a variety of spelling of Keensmith.
He changed his name legally to John Keene Smith would there be a record of this anywhere?

Born 3 dec 1847, becam a miner and his life services was in Trades Unions and Politics.  He was always in office in the Yorkshire Miners Association and was one of its Pioneers along with Benjamin Pickard and Edward Cowey.  He died in an accident age 50 and was buried at Darfield.  His large funeral was honoured with the presence of masters and men by local and general officials of the Yorkshire Miners Association, the Miners permanent relief and other societies.

This info has been passed down to me but i am unsure if the is anything worth pursuing or if it is just genral info.
Thanks any help appreciated

[onefortheroad]

Hi.

Don't know exactly howmuch information you have on your gtgtgrandfather, but his burial record is here:

http://www.darfieldallsaintschurch.org.uk/burials.html

Do you know which colliery he worked (and died) at?

David

[charz]

Thank you that's very interesting and i see if wife was buried with him :-)

No i'm afraid i have no idea which colliery he worked at :-(

[onefortheroad]

There are several options for place of work - I'll do a bit of digging.

BTW, I like the way the burial record even includes the depth at which he was interred.

David

[onefortheroad]

Hi.

I'm sorry, but I can't find any further information on your gtgtgrandfather.

There were lots of mines in the Darfield/Barnsley area in the mid to late 19th century and, although I'd expect him to have worked at Darfield Main, I can't find any evidence for this.

There were, of course, numerous accidents and tragedies in the Yorkshire coalfields and John would be just another sad statistic, I'm afraid. There are certain websites that document the more catastrophic incidents, where loss of life was heavy but accidents where only one or two were killed don't seem to get much exposure.

Sadly, there's not much historical information on the Yorkshire Miners Association on Google so finding a lead to him there would be difficult.

This is probably the best website on the history of Darfield:

http://myweb.tiscali.co.uk/historyofdarfield/index.htm

Sorry I can't help further.

David

[Holmemoss]

This is the site for Coal Mining Accidents and Deaths:

http://www.cmhrc.co.uk/site/disasters/

It says 99%+ coverage of names but I know some of my own ancestors are not listed and I cannot obviously find a John Smith in 1897

[onefortheroad]

Thanks, Holmemoss.  Yes I checked that site this afternoon with high hopes.

I'm wondering if John's fatal accident was nothing to do with the pit. Is that a possibility, Charz.

David

[charz]

hello and thank you for your replies and help.

Thanks for taking the time to have a look round for me, and i have no idea what sort of accident it was or where 

Oh well it was a long shot, just thought there might be some tit bits of info floating out there   

[Redroger]

As an activist he should be recorded in the records of the Yorkshire Area of the National Union of Mineworkers, based in Barnsley, 2 Huddersfield Road, Barnsley South Yorks.Really, all you have is that he was a senior union official who died in an underground accident in 1897, and was buried at Darfield. Don't forget that there were several pits to the east of Darfield which were coming under development at that time, and which are only a few miles from Darfield e.g. Barnburgh, Hickleton etc.