ABSTRACT
The social consequences of industrialization, according to Oliver MacDonagh’s theory of social progress, operated as a catalyst for the adoption of new responsibilities by government in the early nineteenth century.1 The British mining industries witnessed the application of mechanical power to winding and pumping and the introduction of chemical explosives from the late seventeenth, throughout the eighteenth and into the early nineteenth centuries that facilitated the exploitation of mineral wealth at depth and on a much larger scale. Taking MacDonagh’s assumption as the starting point for the story of mining health and safety reform, this opening chapter asks in what way and to what extent did the nature and frequency of occupational injuries and diseases change as both the coal and metalliferous mining sectors industrialized. The technological advances that facilitated mining at depth are discussed. Rather than provide a definitive history of innovation in mining practice, which has been extensively covered elsewhere, this chapter aims to set the scene in terms of underground working conditions in the early to mid nineteenth century, particularly in relation to metalliferous sectors where knowledge is sparse.2
