Cymmer, Rhondda Cynon Taf
Cymmer is a village and community in the Rhondda Valley, Wales. It is so named because of being located at the 'confluence' of the Rhondda Fawr and Rhondda Fach river valleys. Several collieries were opened here in the middle part of the nineteenth century. A coal mine disaster in 1856 resulted in 114 casualties, and the lack of payment of any compensation to the miners' families caused bitter feelings in the community.
Cymmer, Rhondda Cynon Taf
High Street, Cymmer; the A4233 runs past the Welsh Baptist Chapel (Capel Bedyddwyr Cymraeg Pisgah), built in 1894. Still in use in 1998, the chapel is now closed and boarded up
Cymmer Colliery explosion
The Cymmer Colliery explosion occurred in the early morning of 15 July 1856 at the Old Pit mine of the Cymmer Colliery near Porth, Wales, operated by George Insole & Son. The underground gas explosion resulted in a "sacrifice of human life to an extent unparalleled in the history of coal mining of this country" in which 114 men and boys were killed. Thirty-five widows, ninety-two children, and other dependent relatives were left with no immediate means of support.
Cymmer Colliery c. 1905
Two thrusters and a trapper (who worked the ventilation doors, usually boys) in a UK coal mine about 1853
Gravestone of "three sons of Thomas and Catherine Morgan, namely Morgan aged 18 Yrs Enock 14 and Thomas 11 who died by the Great Explosion in the Cymmer Colliery July 15th 1856". They were buried in the Cymmer Independent Chapel graveyard.
