Born on 24 March 1733, Joseph Priestly, discoverer of oxygen.

Portrait of Joseph Priestly in 1795 by Ellen Sharples. National Portrait Gallery/Britanica.

 

Born on 24 March 1733 in Birstall, Yorkshire, Joseph Priestly, chemist, physicist, teacher, minister, and theologian. Most famous today for the discovery of oxygen, he also discovered nine other gasses, nitric oxide, nitrogen dioxide, nitrous oxide, hydrogen chloride (gaseous hydrochloric acid), ammonia, sulphur dioxide, silicon tetrafluoride, nitrogen, and carbon monoxide. Priestly also discovered carbonated water, and was awarded the Royal Society's Copley Medal in 1773.

A dissenting minister, and founder of Unitarianism, Priestly believed in the power of science to improve the world for mankind, although he was notoriously bad at capitalizing on his inventions, and frequently upsetting both the authorities of the day and the public with his religious views, campaigning for the rights of dissenters, and support for the French Revolution. In 1791, while he was living in Sparkbrook, Birmingham, his house was looted and burned by rioters after it became public knowledge that he was hosting a dinner party to celebrate the second anniversary of the storming of the Bastille.

Rioters Burning Dr. Priestley's House at Birmingham, 14 July 1791, by Johann Eckstein. Norton Anthology of English Literature/Wikimedia Commons.

Following the burning of his house, Priestly relocated to Hackney, then a parish in Middlesex, and where he established a new home and laboratory with the help of wealthier supporters. However, he continued to be unpopular with both the public and the government, being burned in effigy, and regularly targeted by political cartoonists, as well as politicians who saw him as an enemy of the British Government. In 1792 he was granted French citizenship by a decree of the French National Assembly, but with Britain and France on the brink of war, relocating to France was not feasible, and in 1794 Priestly emigrated with his family to Pennsylvania, where he lived until his death in 1804.

Irrigation at an experimental farm in Senegal, 1964.

La corvee d'eau a Boulel/Senegal. Village experimental agricole: Les Jeunes participent activement a tours le travaux (Irrigation work in Boulel/Senegal. Young people actively participate in the work at an agricultural experimental village. Awa Magazine, Nº 3, March 1964. 

The Land Girl, March 1944.

Cover of The Land Girl, March 1944. Women's Land Army & Timber Corps. 

The Women's Land Army was first formed in 1917, using female recruits from all walks of life to replace male agricultural workers who had been conscripted to fight in the First World War, thereby ensuring Britain did not run out of food. It was disbanded at the end of the war, but then re-formed in 1939 to fulfil the same role, this time staying in existence till 1950. At its peak, 200 000 women served in the Land Army.

The Land Girl began as an unofficial publication in April 1940, but quickly proved to be extremely popular, selling around 21 000 copies a week. This was noticed by the Ministry of Food, which by this time was aware of the isolation felt by many women from urban backgrounds working in remote rural locations, and had become concerned that poor moral could present a threat to food supplies. This led to (amongst other steps) The Land Girl being adopted as an official publication, and distributed to members of the Land Army all over Britain.

Stazione di Torino Porta Nuova, 1884.

Photograph of Stazione di Torino Porta Nuova (Torino Porto Nuova Station in 1884, from Luigi Ballatore's Storia delle ferrovie in Piemonte (History of railways in Piedmont). Wikimedia Commons. 

Construction of Torino Porta Nuova began in 1861, when Turin was the capital of Italy, under the direction of the  engineer  Alessandro Mazzucchetti. The station opened to the public in 1864, and construction was finished in 1868, although the capital had been moved to Florence in 1865, and would change again to Rome in 1870. It is still the third busiest railway station in Italy, with about 70 million travellers passing through each year.

The Unlucky Attempt, print by Jabez Goldar of a sketch by John Collet.

 

The Unlucky Attempt, satirical print, March 1774. The British Museum.

The Unlucky Attempt, a satirical print by Jabez Goldar of a sketch by John Collet, published in March 1774 by Sayer & Bennett. Depicts a sexual attempt on a serving girl, by her shorter, fatter master; an attempt which is about to be interrupted by his angry wife. The master has a copy of 'An Essay on Woman' in his pocket, itself a humorous work by John Wilkes and Thomas Potter. 

Sayer and Bennet were leading publishers of satirical prints in the 1770s and 1780s, the period which included the American Revolution, and the loss of faith in the British political system which followed it, with John Bennett, a former apprentice of Robert Sawyer, taking on this side of the business, while Sawyer concentrated on maps and fine art prints.

John Collet began his career as an artist painting landscapes, but inspired by the success of artists such as Hogarth switched to satirical sketching, working with the engraver Jabez Goldar to produce plates which were sold to a variety of printmakers, including Sayer and Bennett.

Le laborage (The Ploughing), painting by Rosa Bonheur, 1844.

Le laborage (The Labour), painting by Rosa Bonheur, 1844. Sotheby's/Wikimedia Commons.

Early artwork by Rosa Bonheur depicting a pair of horses ploughing a field, painted when she was only 22 years old. Displayed at the Paris Salon in 1845, where it won third prize, resulting in a government commission of 3000 franks, which led to her first major success as an artist, Labourage nivernais (Ploughing in Nivernais), which was shown at the Salon in 1849 and won first prize. 

Labourage nivernais (Ploughing in Nivernais), painting by Rosa Bonhuer, 1849. Musée d'Orsay/Google Arts & Culture.

Rosa Bonheur was born in Bordeaux in 1922 to Oscar-Raymond Bonheur, a landscape and portrait painter, and Sophie Bonheur, a piano teacher, her three siblings were also artists. The Bonheurs were of Jewish origin, but practiced  Saint-Simonianism, which mixed Christian and socialist ideas, and, importantly for Rosa, taught that women should be educated, productive members of society. Rosa was a talented artist from a young age, but was disruptive at school and had to be taught to read and write by her mother. She was apprenticed to a seamstress at twelve, but proved highly uncooperative, leading her father to relent and allow her to work and study in the family studio. She was particularly interested in animals, and as well as painting animals in the studio, travelled to the countryside around Paris to study animals in agricultural and wild settings, and studied animal anatomy in the abattoirs of Paris, effectively copying the steps male artists of the time followed to learn to paint human subjects (life studios of the time were strictly off-limits to women, other than as models).

Rosa Bonheur is generally considered to be the most successful female artist of the nineteenth century, as well as the best animal artist. Her artwork was popular during her lifetime, often selling for large sums and appearing in leading galleries in Europe and America. She was introduced to Queen Victoria, who admired her work, during a trip to Scotland. In achieving this success, she overcame not just the obstacles associated with being a woman in art (not inconsiderable in the nineteenth century), but also of being a woman with a decidedly unconventional lifestyle. She wore her hair short, smoked, and regularly wore men's clothing, obtaining a permit from the police to wear trousers on the basis of her work with animals (it was made illegal for women to wear trousers without a permit in France in 1800, a law which was not repealed until 2013, and while this law was not generally enforced in the second half of the twentieth century, it certainly was in the eighteenth). Furthermore, while she never officially admitted to being a lesbian, she openly lived with a female partner, Jeanne Sarah Nathalie Micas, for over 40 years, and when Micas died in 1889, entered into a similar relationship with American artist Anna Elizabeth Klumpke, who was 34 years her junior. Upon her death in 1899 Rosa Bonheur was buried in the same tomb as Nathalie Micas; when Anna Elizabeth Klumpke died in 1942 she was also placed in the same tomb.

Nathalie Micas (seated) and Rosa Bonheur in Nice in 1882. Feminine Moments.

Mine explosion at Courrières, Pas-de-Calais, 1906.

Postcard depicting a scene within the Courrières Mine in Pas-de-Calais, France, following an explosion on 10 March 1906. Jérémy-Günther-Heinz Jähnick/Compagnie des mines de Courrières/Wikimedia Commons.

Slightly after 6.30 am on Saturday 10 March 1906 an explosion ripped through the Courrières Coal Mine in Pas-de-Calais, northern France, killing 1099 miners, making it the worst mining disaster in European history, and the second worst mining disaster ever, behind the Benxihu Colliery in Liaoning Province, China, which killed 1549 people in 1942. The explosion was caused by the ignition of suspended coal dust within the mine, although the source of ignition was impossible to determine.

Methane and coal dust, both found within coal mines, both potentially explosive when they come into contact with naked flames. Coal is formed when buried organic material, principally wood, in heated and pressurised, forcing off hydrogen and oxygen (i.e. water) and leaving more-or-less pure carbon. Methane is formed by the decay of organic material within the coal. There is typically little pore-space within coal, but the methane can be trapped in a liquid form under pressure. To make matters worse, the limited oxygen supply in mines often means that fires will involve incomplete combustion, in which all the oxygen is used up, but instead of forming carbon dioxide forms the much more deadly carbon dioxide, with potentially lethal consequences for anyone in the mine.

The explosion was so violent that a lift in one of the mine shafts was blown to the surface, damaging the pit head building. The roof and windows of a building above another shaft were blown out, while a third lift was raised to the surface, but contained only dead and unconscious miners.  

Initial rescue attempts were hindered by a lack of specialist mine rescue teams. Two thirds of the miners working at the mine were killed by the disaster, with many more injured or suffering from the effects of gas inhalation, this left few people locally who were capable of entering the mine to look for survivors, until rescue teams began arriving from Paris, Belgium, and Germany on 12 March. These rescue workers were further hampered by poor mapping of the mines, with sixteen losing their lives during the work.

A rescue worker from Westphalia, Germany, wearing a Guglielminetti-Drager breathing apparatus to enter the Courrières Mine following an explosion on 6 March 1906. Jérémy-Günther-Heinz Jähnick/Compagnie des mines de Courrières/Wikimedia Commons.

Around 500 miners made it back to the surface in the immediate aftermath of the explosion, many of them badly injured. The slow progress made by the rescue workers proved to be highly distressing to the local communities, with rumours circulating that the company was prioritising protecting the coal face before looking for survivors, with only 194 bodies being brought out during March. Surprisingly, on 30 March 1906, a party of 13 living minors was found, who had survived by eating bark from crossbeams and a dead mine horse, and drinking water dripping from the walls. A further survivor was found on 4 April.

Postcard depicting bodies being brought out of the Courrières Mine following an explosion on 6 March 1906. Gaillette.

The Courrières Mine disaster was one of the first major incidents to be extensively covered by the French press, with newspapers competing to provide detailed coverage. The technology used in France at the time meant that papers did not generally include pictures, but (as with other news stories) postcards showing images of the disaster were widely available. Many newspapers also mounted appeals to raise funds for the victims of the disaster, as did at least some of the postcard-makers. 

The disaster provoked a strike across the mines of northern France, calling for better pay and conditions, which threatened the country's coal-dependent industries. The French Interior Minister, Georges Clémenceau, met with the miner's leaders and tried to persuade them to call off the strike. When this failed, he sent troops to try to force the miners back to work, resulting in a series of violent clashes, in which an army officer was killed by a thrown stone. After 55 days, following the arrival of further troops, the strike was called off.

A standoff between striking miners and cavalry troops following the Courrières Mine disaster. Gaillette.

Steam locomotive being loaded aboard the S.S. Belfri, March 1924.

 A  steam  locamotive being  loaded  aboard the S.S. Belfri at the Dalmuir Shipyard, Glasgow, in March 1924. The Railway Magazine. 

A 25-4-5-0 Passenger Locomotive built by William Beardmore & Co. Ltd, being loaded aboard the S.S. Belfri at the company's slipway at Dalmuir Shipyard, destined for the Bombay, Baroda, and Central India Railway. The locomotive works were adjacent  to the shipyard, and assembled locomotives were brought along a rail track about 300 yards long before being loaded onto ships with a 200-ton cantilever crane. Each locomotive weighed 66.6 tons.

The William Beardmore & Co. Ltd works were based around Parkhead Forge in the east end of Glasgow, which was opened in 1837 by Reoch Brothers & Co., then acquired by Robert Napier to make iron parts for the new shipyards in  Govan. Following problems with this work, William Beardsmore Snr was brought from Deptford to supervise the site, later becoming  a full  partner in the enterprise. When he died his part in the partnership was taken over by William Beardsmore Jnr, who founded William Beardmore & Co. Ltd in 1896. The company continued to make armour and guns for ships, branching into aircraft at the start of the First World War, buying out Sentinel Waggon Works, a manufacturer of steam-powered railway locomotives, railcars and road vehicles in 1917, and following the war expanded this business as well as branching into cars, taxis, and motorcycles. Despite this, the Beardmore's struggled with the post-war slump, with a 60% stake in the company being sold to Vickers, who then pulled out again. William Beardmore had his control of the company taken away by the Bank of England, and the various companies were split off and either sold on or wound down. Sir James Lithgow purchased Parkhead Forge and the surrounding iron and steel manufacturies in 1934. The site was nationalised in 1951, then sold on to Firth Brown Steels in 1957, finally closing in 1983.

The S.S. Belfri sailing from Glasgow with a cargo of locomotives for Egypt or India. Past Glasgow.

The S.S. Belfri was built in 1921 by Armstrong, Whitworth & Company, Newcastle, for the purpose of delivering 200 2-8-0 locomotives, also built by  by Armstrong, Whitworth & Company, to Belgium. It  was later acquired by Christian Smith of Oslo, who used it principally to ship locomotives from Dalmuir around the world. In 1934 it was sold to HCS Coasters Pty. Ltd of Melbourne Australia, who in 1954 sold it on to a company in the Philippines. The vessel is thought to have been scrapped in 1992.

A locomotive being loaded aboard the S.S. Belfri in Newcastle in 1921. ETH-Bibliothek Zürich.

The Bombay, Baroda, and Central India Railway was founded in 1855 to construct a railway between the port of Bombay (now Mumbai) and what was then the independent state of Baroda (now the city of Vadodara in Gujarat State). The work was completed in 1864, and the first trains ran in 1865. The company was purchased by the Government of India in 1905, but continued to operate as an independent company until 1942, when it was incorporated into the Indian State Railway system.

A Bombay, Baroda, and Central India Railway locomotive at the Indian Railways Museum. Shamim Mohamed/Wikimedia Commons.

I'm Champion at Keeping Them Rolling

Album cover, Ewan MacColl, Isla Cameron, The Topic Singers. Topic Records Ltd. – TRL.1, Workers' Music Association. Discogs. 

I am an old-timer, I travel the road
I sit in me wagon and lumber me load
Me hotel is the jungle, the caff me abode
And I'm well known to Blondie and Mary
Me liquor is diesel oil laced with strong tea
And the old Highway Code was me first ABC
And I cut me eye-teeth on an old AEC
And I'm champion at keeping them rolling
I've sat in the cabin and broiled in the sun
Been snowed up on Shap on the Manchester run
I've crawled through the fog with me twentytwo ton
Of fish that was stinking like blazes
From London to Glasgow to the Newcastle quay
From Liverpool, Preston and Bristol City
The polones on the road give the thumb sign to me
But I'm champion at keeping them rolling
You may sing of your your soldiers and sailors so bold
But there's many and many a hero untold
Who sits at the wheel in the heat and the cold
Day after day without sleeping
So watch out for cops and slow down at the bend
Check all your gauges and watch your big end
And zig with your lights when you pass an old friend
You'll be champion at keeping them rolling
So watch out for cops and slow down at the bend
Check all your gauges and watch your big end
And zig with your lights when you pass an old friend
You'll be champion at keeping them rolling.

Lyrics by Ewen MacColl/Traditional. 1956.

Playable version on the  Lomax Digital Archive.

Cambridge Market.

Cambridge Market, March 1974. Wilford Peloquin/Wikimedia Commons. 

Cambridge Market, held in the city's Market Square, dates to the Middle Ages, when boats would carry fish and other goods across the Fens from Kings Lynn (drainage of the Fens means such a journey would be impossible today). The market still operates in the city and is open every day of the year except Christmas Day.

Boat Passing a Lock - Painting by John Constable, 1824.

Boat Passing a Lock, John Constable (1824). Christie's/Wikimedia Commons.

Boat Passing a Lock is an oil painting by English artist John Constable, depicting a boat approaching Flatford Lock, close to the mill owned by his father. The design of the lock used at the time, called a flash lock or staunch gate, is different to those used today, with only a single gate, which could be opened releasing a rush of water upon which a boat upstream of the lock would be carried down in a rush. To move a boat upstream the gate was opened, and the boat was winched up, before closing the gate to achieve a flat stretch of river along which the boat could be rowed, punted, or towed more easily. These locks were first used in Europe during the Roman Empire, and were in use in England by at least 1265. 

Flash locks were often built into dams or weirs associated with mills, such as the one owned by Constable's father, and were clearly better suited to carrying laden vessels downstream and unladen vessels upstream; for much of England's history this would have meant carrying agricultural products downstream towards larger market towns or ports; from Dedham this would have meant Manningtree, Harwich, and Felixstowe. 

The Industrial Revolution created the need for a more flexible system, raw materials moving upstream to manufacturing towns and manufactured goods being shipped back towards ports, leading to the adoption of pound locks, which have two gates, and the water in the area between is raised or lowered by opening flaps on the gates, creating a flat expanse of water on either side of the lock, and allowing boats to proceed easily in either direction. Pound locks first appeared in China during the Song Dynasty (960-1279), with their invention being attributed to the naval engineer Qiao Weiyue in 984. A pound lock was invented separately in the Netherlands in 1373, with examples appearing in Belgium and Italy shortly after. 

In 1705 an Act of Parliament was passed declaring that the River Stour should be made navigable leading to the construction of a series of flash locks being built on the river, with Flatford Lock being constructed in 1708. The original lock was turf-sided, and the banks were prone to being pushed in when the gate was opened; a problem with all early locks on the River Stour, which were built without balancing beams to counterbalance the weight of the gates. The problem came about because the original Act of Parliament omitted to make provision for this, so that the tow paths were not wide enough to allow provision for such a beam without infringing on the rights of local landowners. This led to the locks deteriorating more rapidly than in other parts of the country, and a system of lintels being put in place to remedy the problem. The turf lock at Flatford was replaced with a wooden one in 1776, although this still needed lintels, with more being added over time to stabilise the structure. The Flatford Lock had nine separate lintels by 1814, although these were generally omitted from his scenes of the area by Constable because they interfered with the line of sight - in this instance removing the lintels made Dedham Church visible in the background of the image. The lintels can be seen in a painting of the same lock by John Dunthorne made in 1815.

Flatford Lock, John Dunthorne, 1815. Flatford and Constable.

The lock was designed to accommodate two Stour lighters, a type of cargo boat which could carry 13 tons, with two such boats being towed by a single horse, for a total of 26 tons. The cargo carried by these boats was typically either flour or bricks from factories in Sudbury, which were mostly shipped on from Harwich and Felixtowe to London. On their return trips the lighters would bring sewage from London to spread on the fields, as well as coal from Newcastle to be used in the brick factories of Sudbury.

The flash lock at Flatford was replaced with a wooden pound lock in 1838, in a slightly different position (to allow the flash lock to work while the pound lock was being built), and this was in turn replaced by a concrete lock in 1926 (the lintels, though no longer needed, were retained to preserve the character of the lock).

Boat Passing a Lock was the last of a series of large paintings of the area around Flatford painted by Constable, and was exhibited at the Royal Academy Summer Show in 1824, being sold on the first day of the exhibition for 150 guineas to James Morrison, an inn-keeper's son from Balham Hill, London. The painting remained in the hands of the Morrison family until 1990, when it was acquired by Baron Hans Heinrich Thyssen-Bornemisza for £10 780 000, the highest sum ever paid for an English painting at that time. The painting was placed on display in the Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza in Madrid, Spain, until 2012, when the Baron's widow, María del Carmen Rosario Soledad Cervera y Fernández de la Guerra, sold it to an undisclosed buyer for £22 441 250.