3-028-516 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

A disaster of which heroes were born: the Dock Disaster at Newport, 1909. '1. Seeking To Save Those Buried Beneath The Wreckage: A Rescue Party At Work After The Dock Disaster. 2. Tom Lewis, The Fourteen-Year- Old Hero Who Volunteered To Climb Down Between The Narrow Openings Through The Timbers In The Trench, Worked There For Nearly Two Hours, And Was Within An Ace Of Being Killed. 3. Heroes Made By The Disaster: Endeavouring To Rescue The Burning Men From The Débris...The rescue-parties as a whole worked splendidly, and there were several cases of great individual heroism, not only on the part of those who were seeking to save, but on the part of those who were entombed. Notable amongst the former is the case of Tom Lewis, the fourteen-year old son of a working stevedore, who volunteered to crawl through the narrow openings between the fallen timber, went to the aid of an imprisoned man, and worked head downwards for nearly two hours to free him. Just as he seemed to have succeeded there was a sliding of earth and breaking of timber, and the lad was hauled back to the surface only just in the nick of time. The man he had sought to save perished'. 39 men were killed when part of a new sea lock at Newport Docks collapsed. From "Illustrated London News", 1909.