2-969-927 - /Heritage Images

Dinner given by Frances Marchioness of Londonderry to Pitmen, on Chilton Moor, 1856. A 'great festal meeting' at a coalmine between Sunderland and Seaham in the north of England. Chilton was '...the largest colliery property in England in the hands of one individual...Producing an average approaching one million tons of coal per annum...a finer body of men than those 3000 sturdy pitmen who turned out at the bidding of their noble mistress could not have been assembled in any agricultural or manufacturing district in the kingdom...The walls were hung with coloured drapery...there were thirty tables...each affording seats for ninety men [who sat beneath] banners inscribed with the names of their respective pits...The Marchioness rose...and proceeded with emphasis and marked feeling to address the meeting...'. From "Illustrated London News", 1856.