Story
John Sissons was born in Sherburn-in-Elmet on 16th January 1869, and lived there all his life. His parents were John Sissons (1832-1887) a farmer, and Ann Hedben (1835-1897, pictured below), who married in Sherburn on 22nd April 1854.
John married Annie Maria Conway (1863-1904) in Sherburn on 22nd April 1889, and after the death of his first wife, he re-married Sarah Ann Roberts (1875-1954) in 1905, and had a large family in Garden Street and Garden Lane, Sherburn. On the day of the disaster, John – who was also known as Jack – found himself in the East Level with John Charles Ball and several other miners. Ball described how the Group made their way back to the pit bottom:
“We set as best we could. We could not see for dust. Mr John Sissons, first one, the second my father, and the others following on. Well, we did not seem to go only a few yards when John Sissons said “O Lord, there‘s a man there.” I said not, because I could see no-one. He was buried. But John said again, “I know there is, I had my foot on him and was trembling all over him.” So I got on my knees and scraped all the dust away where his feet had been, and I got the biggest shock of my life. It was our Deputy, dead. And he had saved my life earlier in the morning by being a bit rusty with me. Well, we could do no more for him, he was dead, and so me and John Sissons made our way to the pit bottom, leaving father and the other men gazing on the body of Mr James Shillito. So that when we got close to the pit bottom, all was still as death. I had my left hand on the wall, so that I knew when we were at the far end. We could still not see for dust, so I said, “Come back to me, Jack, we are in the pit bottom.” So he came back to me and we found our way to the shaft, and by the look of it we should not get out in a month‘s time. Well, there was nothing to signal to the pit top with, so I said to Jack, “You shout up and see if they can come down to us.” So he shouted up and instead of anybody answering down the shaft, it was a man in the West side that was alive. Well, we got an answer down the shaft. We could not see the condition of our pit bottom, so we shouted and asked them to get down to us at No.2 shaft, so they said they would. So that we went off to find the man that had been shouting to us. It turned out to be Mr George Hicks of Micklefield. Poor man, he was in a sad way when we found him. My ginger beer came in very useful. Poor man, he was parched.”
After surviving the disaster, John continued working as a Coal Miner. He passed away in 1952, at the age of 83 years.
30th April 1896. The Peckfield Colliery Disaster at Micklefield 