26th November 1901

SHOCKING GUN ACCIDENT.

A serious accident occurred at the village of Gornal Wood. Staffordshire, through the reckless carrying of a loaded gun. A man named David Beardsmore had been out shooting, and in returning home he carried his loaded gun on his shoulder at full cock. The trigger was accidentally caught, and the gun exploded, the charge striking three persons named Southall, Hodgetts, and Pritchard.
They all sustained terrible injuries, necessitating their removal to the hospital.

19th April, 1902

AN ARMED MADMAN.

On Monday afternoon at Sedgley Police Court Harry Jackson (29), Windcliffe Road, Wall Heath, wood carver, was charged with unlawfully wounding William Cartwright, landlord of the Lion Inn, Upper Gornal, and Charles Wright, Fold Street. Wolverhampton, cabman, briefly described the sensational incident which took place at Sedgley on the 3th inst.
At about 12 p.m., whilst he standing near Mr Cartwright's public house, a man rushed up to him and said, "there is a man running after me with a knife". Mr and Mrs Cartwright then came out of the house. At that moment someone down the street shouted Murder, and the prisoner appeared on the scene. Jackson at once took off his jacket, which he threw on the tramline, and said, I know you have come for me. You are too many for me. You had better take me." Cartwright said, What breaking people's windows for "?" Prisoner looked round and said, "You had better shoot me I know you are too many for me." Immediately after making this remark prisoner jabbed Mr Cartwright several times with something which looked like a shoemaker's knife, and struck a horse with it. Mrs. Cartwright then went towards her husband, who was lying on the ground.
Witness tried to get on his cab, but Prisoner was too quick for him. Witness then ran towards the tramway depot, followed by prisoner, and as he ran he heard the smashing of glass. The entrance to the depot witness fell from elevation near some electric wire drums, and before he could get up prisoner stabbed him three or four times with some sharp instrument. Witness shouted, and prisoner stabbed two of the tramway men who went to his assistance. Other tramwaymen appeared on the scene and seized prisoner.
Prisoner, who has been in a 1unatic asylum, was remanded in custody for seven days

15th January, 1903

POLICE STONED AT SEDGLEY

  On Monday, at Sedgley Police Court, before the Stipendary (Mr N.C.Neville), John Hopson, Charles Hickman, and Thomas Cartwright, all of Lower Gornal, were charged with being drunk and assaulting the police, and Benjamin Bate was charged with inciting the prisoner to resist the police.
  P.c. Lewis stated that on Saturday night he found Hopson drunk and creating a disturbance in Temple Street, Lower Gornal, and upon taking him into custody he assaulted witness and P.c. Challener by striking and kicking them. Cartwright and Hickman threw stones at the police, and Bate incited Hopson to resist them. A large number of people assembled, and several of them pelted the officers with stones, and in consequence of the violence of the crowd it was found necessary to take the prisoner to the police station at Lower Gornal.
  Subsequently, whilst the prosoner was being conveyed to the station at Sedgley a crowd of people followed the officers and stones were again thown at them.—P.c.Green stated that, owing to the violence of the crowd, the police were compelled to draw their staves. One of the stones thrown at them struck Hopson on the head. Witness described the disturbance as being the worst riot he had ever seen in the district.— The whole of the defendants denied the allegations, and Hopson contended that the police were not justified in arresting him.—Supt.Walters stated that Hopson had a very bad record.—Hopson was sentanced to seven weeks imprisonment with hard labour, and Hickman and Cartwright were each fined 40s. and costs, or in default two months imprisonment, and Bate was fined 25s. and costs.
  The Stipendary remarked that Hopson had only just escaped being convicted as a habitual drunkard, and informed him that if he was brought up in the near future for being drunk he would be deprived of drink for three years, and all publicans would be warned not to supply him.

27-28th February 1903

GREAT STORM

A fierce storm caused a great deal of destruction around the British Isles, and widely reported that it totally destroyed a theatre at Lower Gornal [?].

17th March 1903

WONDERFUL ESCAPE.
Woman Falls Down a Disused Pit.

A married woman named Abigail Meredith, residing in Summit Place, Gornal Wood, Sedgley, had a sensational experience on Sunday. She went into the yard at the rear of her cottage, and, whilst standing near the kitchen window, the earth gave way, and she disappeared. It was then discovered that the covering of a supposed disused pit, the presence of which was unknown to the woman, had collapsed.
After some delay, a bucket attached to a rope was lowered, and, to the great surprise of the men engaged in the rescue, the woman was able to get into it. What was more surprising was that, although the pit was 66ft. deep, the woman escaped without even a fractured limb. Her miraculous escape was due to the fact that she fell feet foremost, and the air inflating her clothing caused the letter to act as a parachute.

19th June 1903

FIVE MEN INJURED.
A Remarkable Colliery Accident
PRECIPITATED DOWN A PIT SHAFT.

Yesterday five men, named Noah Jones (Castle Street, Sedgeley). Joseph Cox, John Webb (Upper Gornal), Simeon Tye, and William Hickman (Lower Gornal), were more or less seriously injured at Lord Dudley's new sinking at Baggeridge Wood. Sedgeley. The men, having removed the central portion of a scaffolding, attached it to the "bowk" for the purpose of removing it to the surface. When the bowk had ascended some distance it became detached from the rope, with the result that all the men were precipitated to the bottom of the shaft, a distance of about 30ft.
How the bowk became detached from the rope is a mystery, but the general supposition was that the scaffolding in some way became wedged against the sides of the shaft. It would appear that some slackening of the rope took place, when the scaffolding was wedged, to cause a detachment, but whether the bowk became unhooked through a reversal of the engine to relieve the pressure could not be ascertained. All the men sustained contused wounds, and some of them fractured limbs. Jones, who was the most seriously injured, was not expected to recover, his spine being fractured. All the injured men were removed to the Guest Hospital, where they were detained.

17th October 1903

A WOMAN ENGULFED AND KILLED.

A serious "crowning-in," being attended with a fatal result, has taken place at Gornal Wood, Sedgley. The victim of the occurrence, which is peculiar to the mining districts of the Black Country, was Mrs. Emma Webb, 50, widow, licensee of the Forge Inn, Gornal Wood.
She and her daughter were returning from Pensnett along a road by the side of Lord Dudley's private railway. When they were within a short distance of their home, a portion of the road, without any warning, completely subsided, a gap 16ft. deep and about 18ft. in circumference, being created, engulfing Mrs. Webb.
Her daughter, who had a narrow escape from sharing the same fate, ventured to the edge of the chasm after recovering from the fright, and, looking down, shouted to her mother, whom she could discern at the bottom, receiving the reply, "All right, Edith."
Help was at once obtained, and eventually a man named Robert Chandlin, Chapel street, Pensnett, who was lowered by means of a rope, succeeded in bringing the body of Mrs. Webb to the surface. Dr. Norwood was sent for, but could then only pronounce life extinct, Mrs. Webb's neck having been dislocated by the fall. The subsidence was stated to be due to mining operations.

Another account by the Dudley News, 1903.

Mrs. Emma Webb, landlady of the Forge Inn, Gornal Wood had been shopping in Dudley, accompanied by her daughter.
They had come by tram, alighting at Chapel Road. From here residents at Gornal Wood often take a short way home along a private railway line belonging to Lord Dudley.
Mrs.Webb and her daughter had tramped nearly a mile along this path, and were in sight of their home. The mother and daughter were chatting together, when suddenly the ground gave way, creating a hole about nine feet across. Through this, with a cry, the mother fell and disappeared out of sight.
The daughter, walking close at the side of her, screamed, and only by a miracle was she saved from a like calamity. One of her feet slipped right on the brink of the pit, and it was a wonder that she, too, was not swallowed up by the earth.
She, however, managed to catch the side, and succeeded, after a minutes exciting endeavour, in pulling herself into safety. Then she knelt down by the side of the hole which proved to be her mother's grave and gazed into the depths. Full eighteen feet beneath she saw her mother lying doubled up, her head tucked under her.
A train of wagons loaded with coal appeared insight. Wildly the girl shouted and gesticulated, and Cotton, a pointsman, rushed to the spot where Edith Helena Webb, a girl of sixteen summers, was kneeling in agony of despair, and was quickly followed by Caudlin, the driver of the engine.
Cotton persuaded the girl to go home. Ropes were brought, and Caudlin, at the risk of his life, offered to descend the pit. The walls of the hole broadened towards the bottom, so that the sides crumpled in rapidly, covering the body with earth.
Disregarding this danger, Caudlin lowered himself, and grasping the woman, held on to the rope, and with the assistance of several men, who by this time had collected, was drawn to the surface.
The body was carried to the Forge Inn, the residence of the deceased. . . . So many are the subsidences in the land around that many of the houses are all aslant and cracked as the result.

28th May 1904

Henry Westwood, of Ruiton. was fined £4 4s. or two months hard labour at Sedgeley for catching homing pigeons. Four pigeons taking part in a race were missed, and were found in prisoner's possession.

18th September, 1906

At Sedgley Police Court yesterday, William Henry Shaw, grocer, Gornal Wood, was charged with being drunk whilst in charge of a horse and trap at Gornal Wood. Mr.Foster, who defended, said the defendant, who was too ill to appear, was a very respectable man, and formerly a member of the District Council. The Stipendiary said he found that defendant had already been many times convicted of furious driving and also of being drunk in charge. He fined defendant 20s. and costs, or in default one month's imprisonment.

17th October, 1906

DARING THIEVES

  The Staffordshire police are actively engaged in inquiring into a daring robbery of telegraph wires belonging to the Postmaster General, which has been committed in Bagley's Lane, a main road at Lower Gornal, Sedgley. The thieves climbed the poles in the night and cut down 430 yards of copper wire, weighing 50lb., and got away with it.

12th January 1907

RAID ON A POLICE STATION.

At Sedgley, on Monday, the South Staffordshire stipendiary remanded Henry Marsh, wholesale fruiterer, Dudley, who was alleged to have assaulted the police under exceptional circumstances.
The stipendiary, a fortnight ago, issued a warrant against Marsh for neglecting to answer a summons charging him with a minor offence, and it was alleged in the sworn information placed before the stipendiary that the prisoner and six other persons raided Lower Gornal Police station at midnight, and, on gaining admittance, prisoner seriously assaulted two police officers, causing considerable consternation.
The prisoner was anxious for an adjournment to enable counsel to defend him, and appeared greatly surprised when the stipendiary refused bail

1st April 1907

HOUSES WRECKED BY COAL-MINING

Owing to mining subsidences at Gornal Wood, near Himley, Staffordshire, nearly twenty houses belonging to cottagers have been wrecked during the last three weeks, and the authorities, as a precautionary measure, have bad to close nine houses.
Others will be closed this week. The subsidences are due to coal getting in shallow workings.

3rd October 1907

AN UNFORTUNATE FAMILY.

An inquest was held on Monday by the South Staffordshire coroner at Lower Gornal concerning the death of John Mason, fruit and vegetable dealer. Deceased, when walking in his sleep, fell down stairs and dislocated his neck. It was stated that he was the fifth member of his family who had met with a violent death within the last ten years.

13th January 1909

COAL PICKERS BURIED.

In making a new road at Lower Gornal, Staffordshire, workmen struck a seam of coal. Nearly all the women, in the village came out to shovel up the coal, but a fall of some 30cwt. of loose earth buried many of them, one woman being seriously injured.

4th September 1909

THE EARTH OPENED.

The earth sank in some gardens at Gornal Wood, near Wolverhampton, and swallowed fruit trees and vegetables. Men were digging potatoes in their gardens when the ground, hedges, and trees began to shake in a terrifying manner. The men rushed into their cottages and almost at the same moment the subsidence occurred. The cottages were shaken, and some of them were so damaged that they will have to be demolished. The subsidence is known in the black country as a "crowning." It was due to the fact that coal is being taken from the mines there within twenty yards of the surface.