Mexborough & Swinton Times – Friday 21 October 1892
Serious Floods.
Consequent on the heavy rains last Friday and Saturday the rivers Don and Dearne both overflowed their banks, doing much damage.
The floods reached their greatest height about Mexborough at six o’clock on Saturday night. The traffic on the M. S. and L. Railway between here and Sheffield was diverted to the Barnsley and Chapeltown branch on Saturday night, information being sent from Rotherham that it was impossible to get trains through there.
Mr. Halmshaw, district superintendent, and Mr. Lees, stationmaster at Mexborough, were engaged all the night in directing the vast amount of goods traffic there is at Mexborough Junction to the new course. The flood was the heaviest there has been for over six years.
At that time part of the embankment between Mexborough and Denaby was washed away, and Doncaster and Eastern counties traffic had to be sent round by Wakefield.
On Sunday it was found that several of the old barges chained into the river for the protection of the banks had been washed out by the force of the current, and had got down to near the railway bridge, just below Mexborough Station.
The shocks of corn that stand in a field near the river at Swinton have been entirely spoilt by the rain and the flood. The chimney of a cottage house in High street, Mexborough, which was over-weighted by the rain, fell on Saturday, breaking through the roof, and covering the bedroom floor with debris. The house is occupied by people named Bunting, who escaped injury.
At Denaby the water rose above the road to height of two feet, and pedestrianism was entirely stopped. The occupants of the old tollhouse were flooded out, while Mr. Duke, the keeper of the canal lock, at the point where river and canal unite, was cut off from the outside world altogether, having a great expanse of water on every side, while the water filled the lower part of his house.
At Mexborough tollbar house, occupied by Mr. Cadman, much inconvenience was caused by the water flooding the living rooms. The pastures were entirely submerged, and the communication by them with Cadeby was stopped.
At the Cadeby new colliery some little damage has been done by the water to the sidings, while lower down the river the water spread out and flooded the lower rooms of mast of the houses on the near side of the Conisborough Gas Works. The keeper of the lock here was also hemmed in.
It is reported from Bolton that some pigs were washed away on Friday night from a farm adjacent to the Dearne, while it was with considerable difficulty that the cattle were saved. Some miners at Bolton had a novel experience on Saturday morning, having to ride in carts from Bolton to Wath to receive their wages at the Manvers Main Colliery.
On Saturday forenoon the men employed oil the nearly-constructed Houghton Main branch of the M S. and L. Railway, not far from the Houghton Main Colliery, noticed that the line was subsiding, and giving timely notice, traffic was stopped and any possibility of accident from this cause prevented.