b. 06/1854 Whitehaven, Cumberland. d. 25/09/1911 Matlock, Derbyshire.
DATE OF EM ACTION: 11/05/1910 Wellington Colliery, Whitehaven, Cumberland.
Richard was born in 1854, one of six children of John and Anne Moore (nee Dewhurst). Little is known of his early life in Whitehaven, until he decided to take a career in mining. He gradually moved up the ranks and trained to become a mining engineer. In 1897, he married Alice Dora Jones in Lewisham, London, though they had no children. Following the fire at Wellington Colliery, Richard was struck down with ill health for a number of months. In an attempt to regain his health, he travelled to Matlock, Derbyshire where he stayed at the Smedley Hydropathic Institute. He passed away at the Institute on 25th September 1911 aged 57, and his body was returned to Whitehaven, where he was buried in Whitehaven Cemetery.
EM CITATION:
On the 11th May, 1910, a terrible fire occurred in the Wellington Pit, Whitehaven, at a point about 4,500 yards from the shafts. Various rescue parties, with great courage and self-devotion and at considerable risk, descended the mine and endeavoured to extinguish the fire and penetrate to the persons in the workings beyond the same. Thorne and Littlewood, fitted with breathing apparatus, reached within a distance of 150 yards of the fire, but were driven back by the great heat and effusion of gases. The others got to within about 300 yards of the fire, working in the smoke backing from the fire. It was found impossible to penetrate to the scene of the fire or to rescue any of the entombed miners. Had an explosion occurred — a by no means unlikely eventuality, seeing that the mine is a very gassy one — they would undoubtedly all have been killed. Special gallantry was shown by John Henry Thorne, to whom the Edward Medal of the First Class has already been awarded, and by James Littlewood.
BURIAL LOCATION: WHITEHAVEN CEMETERY, WHITEHAVEN, CUMBERLAND.
WARD 4, SECTION H2, GRAVE 196.
LOCATION OF MEDAL: UNKNOWN.
