Talbot Motor Works Boiler Explosion - Walter Ernest Kinchin

Yet another accident in my family tree, we must be very accident prone, but this one was a doozy! 

It involved my Gt-Grandfather Walter Ernest Kinchin.

Walter was born in Reading Berkshire in 1875, the youngest of 10 children, which was quickly reduced to 6 with times being tough and children not so. 

He worked various jobs throughout his life. At age 16 he was a baker's labourer along with his brother Fred, 15 years his senior. It appears that they were working at the Huntley and Palmers Biscuit Factory which was located in their hometown. They seem to be a large employer in the local area, with a brother-in-law also employed there.  (Note: Female workers walked out of Reading's Huntley and Palmers biscuit factory in 1916 in a dispute over unfair treatment and low pay)

By 1901 Walter had left the biscuit factory and gone from being a baker's labourer or breadmaker to working on the railways which was a bit of a career change. When he married my gt-grandmother, 24 yr old Alice Ireson in 1905 his occupation was then listed as builder and a good fit with his house painter father.

They moved to Leytonstone and his brother lived in the same street, they were always near family. Two years later, living in Knightsbridge, they had a bouncing baby boy, my grandfather Wilfred. Wilfred was their first, last and only child born 1907.

Walter Ernest Kinchin and Alice Mary Ireson
around the time of their wedding

 

 Mid March 1909 Walter took up employment with Clement Talbot Motor Works, pictured below.

On Saturday the 27th March he and his young family were moving house from Fulham to Hammersmith. He went off to his new job that day the same as any other, he had only been working at the motor works for two weeks. I guess things were looking up and he would have been looking forward to their new abode.

Saturdays at the motor works was the day that they cleaned the gas generation machine at the plant and among Walter's duties that day was to clean out the in the tar deposits in the bottom of the machine. It was common practice, before beginning this task, to shut off the power and leave the door open for 30 minutes to let the gas build up to escape. The gas was quite visible, being a smokey grey colour and an extremely flammable and poisonous mixture of hydrogen and carbonic oxide when mixed with air. 

The Engine room at
Clement Talbot Motor Works

The workers had been warned about smoking when cleaning out the gas plant, though there were reports that they did it all the time and that their induction manual said that they could smoke in the plant. 

While Walter was in the gas generator cleaning out the tar one of the workers, a Mr. Ritchings, struck a match when the door was open resulting in an explosion and catching Walter on fire. The flames were put out and he was transported to West London Hospital with burns to his head, face and arms. According to one article, the hospital, which opened in 1856, began to admit patients that were mainly victims of industrial accidents, a sign of the times I suppose. 

West London Hospital

Hearing the news Alice went straight to the hospital. My grandfather told me that when she arrived at the hospital she went past his bed several times as she didn't recognise him, bandaged heavily.

He died a week later in hospital on 3rd April 1909, the cause listed as blood poisoning resulting from his burns. Brother Henry E Kinchin of Leytonstone identified the body. From the inquest held on April 6th the coroner returned a verdict of accidental death and added a rider that more supervision was necessary and that smoking should be banned altogether in the plant, and idea that I would have thought obvious even before he suggested it.

Death Certificate - Walter Ernest Kinchin 1909

Alice was only 26 and left a widow with a 2 year old son to take care of, and even though she had lots of extended family it was a hard life. She worked as a cook and pastry chef in London, and my grandfather lived with various people, relatives and friends of the family, so that she could go to work to provide for them. 

Many years later in the winter of 1922, Alice said to her son Wilfred (my Pop) "Would you like to go to Australia?" Her nephew worked for the Salvation Army and arranged the trip, and within a few weeks they had sold all their furniture and were on the "Benalla", leaving behind their family to make a new life in a new country. And that is the start of another story...