Story
James Lewis Wilson was born in Kippax in 1865. He was the third child of James Wilson (1824-1902) and Ann Wilkinson (1829-1865), and his mother died after giving birth to him. His father remarried Mary Ann Garlick (1840-1912) on 3rd November 1867.
In 1881, James was a farm servant for the Birkinshaws at Warren House Farm, but started working at Peckfield Colliery a little later. On 5th August 1887, James and Joseph Inman were both sentenced to two months’ imprisonment for assaulting Martha Eleanor Harrison, who was thirteen years-old at the time.
In 1889, James married Emily Plows (1868-1915), and they went on to have 3 children, the last being Eliza Ann Wilson on 19th June 1895. On Wednesday 29th April 1896, James spent his evening at a pub in Kippax with his neighbour Alfred Webster (1859-1930), of Providence Place, Kippax, who’d been his friend since infancy.
Arriving at the colliery as usual the following morning, James walked West along the West Level, and turned North up New North Road, walking passed Goodall’s gate where the explosion took place minutes later. He was only 160 metres from the explosion, and was killed in the blast. He was 29 years-old.
When news of the explosion reached Kippax, Alban Cheesbrough (1870-1945) saw one of his sisters tapping at the window of his neighbour, Emily Wilson, James’ wife, and she informed Emily of the disaster. Alban heard Emily cry out: “My God, and Jim’s down.”
James’ body was brought out of the mine on 2nd May. A Leeds Mercury reporter witnessed his step-mother, Mary Ann, who had brought up James from the age of two, trying to identify his body: “The mother of James Wilson, who also visited the dead-house yesterday morning, could not at first recognise her son, and told the policeman in attendance that the body was not of her flesh and blood. After examining his clothing, however, she discovered that the suspicions of the colliery officials were only too true, for it was in reality her son. The reason she could not at first identify him was because his face was so blackened and swollen.” At the Inquest, James was formally identified by his childhood friend Alfred Webster, who confirmed that his friend’s face was burnt. James was brought back to Kippax and buried on 4th May 1896, but there’s no headstone. It’s extremely likely he was buried to the left of Francis Rainbird Edwards who was also killed in the disaster, since this plot now contains James’ son, William T Wilson (1893-1954).
Emily re-married in 1898 to Robert White, and had a second family, with some of her children and grandchildren returning to live in Micklefield.
30th April 1896. The Peckfield Colliery Disaster at Micklefield 