The method and some notes are at the end.
Tennants Chimney
Collapse and Demolition March 10/11th 1922
March 10th 1922 : Collapse
( Report in the Saturday March 11th 1922 Glasgow Herald )
Page 5
"TENNANTS 'STALK'They get the height wrong . The men , that could, turning back up to work right away.
COLLAPSE OF STRUCTURE
FOUR MEN KILLED-THREE INJURED
By the collapse yesterday afternoon of “Tennant's stalk," a conspicuous landmark in Glasgow, four workmen lost their lives and a number of others were seriously injured. The stalk, situated in the St Rollox Chemical Works, was 80 years old, and at the time of its erection was the highest chimney in the world. The structure had become dangerous, and on that account demolition had begun. A party of eight men were engaged upon the work, when the edifice suddenly gave way, Carrying with it the wooden sheds in the immediate vicinity Three of the men were trapped beneath the debris, and their bodies have not been recovered. Another man was killed, and the remaining four received injuries, which in two cases were so serious as to necessitate the detention of the men in the Royal Infirmary. The accident took place shortly after four o'clock. The chimney stalk was on the premises of Messrs Charles Tennant and Company, who are associated with the United Alkali Company, chemical manufacturers. The works occupy a large area on the westside of Castle Street, in the Townhead district. On the north side the establishment to bounded by the goods line of the Caledonian Railway, and on the south by the St Rollox branch of the Monkland Canal There are several works of various kinds in the locality, but of them all Tennant's was the best known, the great height of the chimney gaining for it distinction in the West of Scotland. For some years past,however, it had been apparent to the directors of the firm that the famous stalk was showing signs of weakness at the base. The structure when it was built reached a height of 453 feet ( ED: NOPE ) . Within the outer shell was an inner cone extending to a height of about a hundred feet. A space three and a half feet wide separated the cone from the outer brick work, while strong buttresses built across the intervening cavity gave additional strength to the stalk. From some cause which is not quite clear an ominous bulge appeared near the base of the stalk, and it was decided to adopt the prudent course of demolishing the erection, which had not been used for some time. The work was undertaken gradually. and a year ago the height of the stalk had been reduced to 280 feet. Three months ago the destruction of the chimney was resumed, and progress had been made to such an extent that only some 90 feet remained.
CRASHED TO THE GROUND
A number of workmen were engaged on the operations, which had naturally to be carried out with great care. As the bricks were dislodged they were dropped between the cone and the outer shell which was 3ft thick, filling the intervening space to a considerable depth. A telescope ladder consisting of nine sections, each 10ft long, had been erected on the outer wall of the stalk for the use of the steeplejacks. At the time of the disaster two of these workmen were seated on the top of the stalk, while the others were working on the ground below. Without warning one of the iron rings binding the brickwork gave way, but the men above apparently did not observe this dangerous development. A few minutes later another loop also burst outwards, causing the entire structure to crash to the ground with a deafening noise. The roofs and supports of wooden sheds which enclosed the chimney on three sides of the yard were shattered by the falling Masonry, and in the space of a few seconds this portion of the works was a scene of great confusion and destruction. The inner cone remained standing, with a great fissure extending a third of the way down one side, while all around was piled a tangled mass of splintered woodwork and other wreckage. Apart from the eight men engaged on the work of demolition there were no other workmen in the vicinity, but the roar of the sundered fabric quickly drew the employees from other parts of the establishment. Only one man out of the eight escaped injury. He was George Armstrong. who had been summoned to the scene by a labourer in the street outside when the first hoop burst. Armstrong anticipated the collapse and after shouting a warning to his companion he was able to run out of the reach of danger. A steeplejack named James McAulay had a miraculous escape. He was seated at the top of the stalk, and was thrown amongst the debris. Although injured on the right leg and suffering badly from shock, he managed to stagger some distance across the yard, and then fell exhausted. He was picked up by some of the fresh arrivals, and taken in an ambulance wagon to the Royal Infirmary. Messrs Tennant's employees who had hurried to the scene, at once set about rescuing the unfortunate men caught in the ruins of the fallen stalk. Two men were drawn out severely injured, and the body of a third was found beneath a block of masonry, which was suspended above him by the surrounding wreckage. This man, James Monachan, did not appear to have been seriously hurt about the body. but his mouth was, clogged with grit and ashes, which had evidently impeded his breathing and suffocated him in a very short time. No others were visible, and it was impossible at the time to excavate the mass of bricks in search of the three men who were unaccounted for. It was at once apparent that there was no hope of their being alive for they were trapped beneath a weight of several tons. A detachment of the Fire Brigade, in charge of Assistant-Firemaster Gillon, which was returning from a fire in the Springburn district, stopped at the works, and the firemen willingly othered to lend assistance. A minute's survey, however. was sufficient to show that no effort that they could make would be of any avail, and they had perforce to retire. . The injured were removed to the Infirmary by the Ambulance Corps.. THE ÇASUALTIES
The following is the list of casualties
James Monaghan ( 34 ) steeplejack, 168 Gallowate- killed,
John Henderson (34). Lochiel Street - missing.
Poter Wotherspoon (32), Gallowgate - missing
John O'Boyle (35), 174 Scotland Street, S.S. - missing
George Laukliran (37), 215 Weir street, S.S.-Injuries to both legs and severe shock (detained in Royal Infirmary)..
Frank Logan (44), labourer, 84 Main Street, Ruthergelen injuries to leg and shock(detained in Infirmary).
James McAulay (22), steeplejack, c/o O'Boyle, 174 Scotland Street, 8.8.-injury to leg. but able to proceed home after receiving treatment at the Infirmary.
The eighth man, George Armstrong, co Redmond 39 Braid Street, was unscathed.
All the men engaged on the demolition of the stalk were employed by Mr John Cumming, Rutherglen, who had the contract from Messrs Tennant for the work
WORKMEN'S NARROW ESCAPE
In the course of an interview, George Armstrong gave a thrilling account of the accident. He was working at a grindstone in another part of the works, he said, when a Labourer working in the street came to him and said that the men up above were shouting for him as one of the hoops had burst. On approaching the chimney stalk Armstrong saw another of the hoops about to burst, Apprehending the danger, he called out a warning to Frank Logan, who was standing near him, and then ran to the far side of the wall to escape the fall, which he knew was inevitable. "If it had happened a minute later," he said. "I should have been 20ft. up the chimney." A pathetic circumstance, he added, was that in another five minutes the men would have finished their work for the day. James McAulay, who returned to the scene of the calamity less than an hour after being taken to the infirmary, related his marvellous escape from death. He was standing at the top of the ladder along with Laughran. who was a little further away on the top of the stalk. They were both engaged in removing the bricks. McAulay was unaware of anything untoward happening until the crash came and he was sent headlong to the ground. His legs were buried, but he pulled himself free and staggered across the yard. He remembered nothing else until he found himself being carried to an Ambulance Wagon. McAulay is a brother-in-law of John O'Hoyle, one of the missing men, and resident in the same house at 174 Scotland Street.
HISTORY OF THE CHIMNEY,
The St Rollox Chemical Works of Messrs Charles Tennant and Co. are associated with the United Alkali Company, the headquarters of which are in Liverpool. They are situated on the north side of the Monkland Canal, with frontage to Castle Street, and occupy an area of about 50 acres. They were founded in 1800 by Charles Tendant, the inventor of the system of bleaching by means of chloride of lime a process which effected a complete transformation in the bleaching of linen and cotton. The works then established became the largest of the kind in Europe. In 1842 the firm erected their famous stalk, and for many years it was reputed to be the highest in the world, although it was afterwards rivalled by that of Messrs J. Townsend (Limited), chemical manufacturers, Port Dundas, whose chimney is a prominent feature in the northern district of the city. Originally Tennant's stalk a 453ft 8in.( ED: NOPE) In height, but at a later period it was found advisable to shorten it, and on two occasions it was reduced, the last alteration being in 1905 . Altogether above 100ft were taken off, so that latterly the chimney no longer held its previous distinction in regard to height. It was about 40ft in diameter at the base and about 13ft. diameter at the top. It was erected at a cost of about £12,000. It is a remarkable coincidence that about ten years ago another chimney in the same works collapsed. This chimney was situated on the west side of the work, and was about 300ft high. The structure fell at an early hour in the morning, and no one was injured and little damage to property was done."
( NB a 300 ft chimney fell down earlier . What was that like. It was possibly in the top 10 tallest chimneys in the world at the time )
March 11th 1922 : Demolition
( Report in Monday March 13th 1922 Glasgow Herald )
"THE TENNANTS STALK DISASTER
WALL DEMOLISHED BY EXPLOSIVES
All attempts to rescue the three men who were entombed by the collapse of Tennant's Stalk within the St Rollox Chemical Works, Glasgow, had to be abandoned until yesterday afternoon owing to the danger which attended the operations. When the stalk fell a section of the lower portion of the structure remained standing, and owing to the proximity of this unstable wall the debris could not be removed without imminent risk to rescue workers. It was decided to demolish this stump of the stalk with explosives in order that the wreckage might be cleared away. This work was undertaken yesterday under the direction of an explosives expert from Nobel's. A large charge of powder, rammed into drilled receptacles in the stalk, fired by electricity controlled from a point about 150 yards distant. Two explosions were required to raze the structure, the first one being fired at noon and the second about an hour later. The explosions were of tremendous force, and the sound carried over a very extensive part of the city. At the first discharge & large portion of the wall was lifted intact in the air and settled buck almost to its original position. The second explosion effectually demolished the structure, scattering the bricks over & considerable radius. The operations were witnessed from various points in the vicinity by crowds of onlookers, who were kept at safe distance by the police. All traffic in the adjacent streets was stopped for a time before and after the explosions. The concussion was so great that window panes were broken in a number of houses in the vicinity, and one shop front in particular was considerably damaged, Following the explosions there rose from the heap of ruin dense volumes of black smoke, which were seen from distant points and attracted & good deal of attention.
With the dangerous wall removed, the rescue workers restarted operations yesterday afternoon, but they stopped when darkness fell. There is no hope that the three men who were entombed still survive. It is conjectured that the bodies must be under several tons of brick. The three injured men who were taken to hospital made good progress towards recovery, and two of them were allowed to go home yesterday."
How i finally found this
In this 2017 Glasgow Herald article it says 1922 although no picture of the actual demolition. Then this July 1922 Edition of The Chemical Age says "Members who are familiar with Glasgow will miss a conspicuous landmark owing to the collapse in March last of the chimney at the St. Rollox Chemical Works". So i had a year and month . This may be doable.
Here is the Google Glasgow Herald Archive
Click along to March 1922 and start scanning through the tiny dark smudged print. You quickly notice a pattern though. First page is stocks, 2nd jobs, 3rd motors and the rest a mixture , some that can be skipped by reading the section name. However if you look for a heading like this;
Here is the March 12th page as an example
( I may have been able to use https://www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk/ , if anyone has a subscription there are a few articles i would like to have a look at.)
I checked through the next few days letters pages to see if there was any reaction but i couldnt find any. Gandhi was arrested and sentenced during this time period though, Glasgow Corporation in talks to buy subway and Scottish Home Rule discussion
I didnt want to type the text so i took screenshots and uploaded to Google docs. Right click and "Open With" : "Google Docs" will ocr the text. It is good but needs some editing to make it usable.
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