Dolgarrog disaster

The Dolagarrog disaster in 1925 affected the whole community and was cause for lamentation for decades. It is still remembered and memorialised. Stories, old photos and memories of Dolgarrog.

Richard Roberts and his family. Mr Roberts saved his family at the risk of his own life.

 On Monday 2 November 1925, after two weeks of heavy rain, a breach in a small gravity dam occurred at the Aluminium Corporation's Llyn Eigiau reservoir, up in the hills near 735 m high Craig Eigiau. This was claimed at the time to have been caused by inadequate foundations and lack of maintenance.
This breach released thousands of gallons of water which flowed down along the course of the Porth Llwyd river to another small reservoir, the Coedty. This reservoir could not contain the extra water and breached also, releasing an even greater quantity of water, possibly some 350 million cubic meters, which carried huge boulders and pieces of pipeline down the mountain through Porth Llwyd hamlet and the village of Dolgarrog a mile below, sweeping houses and villagers away as it went. Sixteen people died.
 The water poured like a river down the streets and among the great boulders until the reservoirs were emptied. The church was swept away, its bell tolling as it went. Villagers were swept away, one family clinging to debris and singing hymns as they battled for their lives.

 Mrs Elizabeth Brown, a victim of the disaster.

Betty Brown, also a victim.

Glyn Borwn, who survived.

Douglas Bown, survivor.

Nellie Brown

Nellie Brown was swept away from her father but survived, along with her brother Fred, aged 17. They climbed over coke wagons to escape, and found shelter in the ruins of the village school - according to the newspaper Nellie clung to the roof of the wooden building, which had been swept a mile away, and in the morning was too exhausted to speak.Her father and the other children escaped by running up the hill. Little Betty was torn from his arms by the water, but he was able to climb an electricity pole.

Fortunately many of the villagers were on higher ground at the Assembly Hall for the weekly picture show, and were away from path of the torrent.
The curate-in-charge at Dolgarrog, William Evans (pictured at left below), along with James Hunter, was reported as having been involved in the rescue, working up to his neck in water. He was also reported as having organised a rescue party to get workmen out of the furnace house. 

On the way to the funeral of members of his flock.

The funeral procession of four of the victims.

Onlookers arrived, and police had to erect a road block to stop them obstructing relief operations. It was reported that on the following Sunday twenty thousand sightseers converged on the area, some from as far away as the Midlands, travelling by car, bicycles and motor cycles, buses and charabancs, causing extensive delays due to congestion caused initially by charabancs trying to turn on the narrow road.

Photographers recorded the scenes of devastation and these were published as postcards at the time. They can now be found at www.oldphotos.co.uk/dolgarrog.htm.

The scar that was caused by the disaster can be seen today down the side of the mountain together with the huge boulders it carried with it. The river has been diverted since then, and flows over the old town.

Margaret Sinnott, her daughter Catherine McKenzie and a granddaughter were all lost, though Mr McKenzie and their two sons were at the picture house when it happened. Margaret Sinnott's body was the last to be recovered. According to a newspaper report, Mrs Sinnott's daughter, a nurse in Bangor, had intended to move her mother and sister, Mrs McKenzie, from Dolgarrog to a new home.
A seventeen year old survivor told of the church bell tolling as the church was swept away, and of a family clinging to debris, and singing hymns as they were swept along.

THE HATFIELD FAMILY
Albert and Nellie Hatfield from Yorkshire were living in Dolgarrog at the time of the disaster. Albert was working on the dam as an electric linesman. The morning after the disaster Nellie went out to look for Albert, but couldn't find him. She must have feared the worst. However, she met the district nurse, who told Nellie that Albert was all right, but was still helping to search for people.
 
Gillian Dansby of Kamloops, British Columbia, Canada, Albert and Nellie's grand-daughter says: 'My Grandma was pregnant with my mother at the time the dam broke. Grandad helped with a lot of the rescue work as he was one of the few men who could swim.'

Albert and Nellie Hatfield in 1923

Albert and Nellie Hatfield were married 9 June 1923 in Batley, West Yorkshire, and not long afterwards they went to live in Dolgarrog. At the time of the disaster Nellie was pregnant, and her daughter Margaret June Hatfield was born in Dolgarrog on 23 April, 1926. They lived at 22 Taylor Avenue, Dolgarrog, for another four or five years. They then moved back to Yorkshire and lived at Thornhill, then Ravensthorpe for a short while. They then moved to Potter Avenue in Lupset.

Nellie Hatfield with her only child, Margaret, while living in Dolgarrog.

Margaret met Peter Danby of Wakefield, and married him in 1949. Their two children were Simon John and Gillian Susan Danby. The family emigrated to Canada in 1970 and lived in North Vancouver, British Columbia.

The wedding of Margaret Hatfield and Peter Danby in Yorkshire 23 April 1949.

  Albert and Nellie lived in Potter Avenue in Lupset until Albert retired. After his retirement the couple moved to Scarborough, Yorkshire where they lived until Nellie's death in 1979 at the age of 78. Margaret, who was an only child, then brought her father, Albert, to live with her family in Canada. He died in 1983 aged 85.
Margaret's daughter, Gillian, says: "My Mum, now 81, and my Dad, 80, now live in Vernon, BC. My Dad was a mechanical engineer and was in charge of many design and construction projects in the grain handling, coal handling and mining industries in British Columbia and across Canada. My Mum was a teacher of the blind and deaf, and also of mentally challenged children and adults. My brother Simon is a retired Royal Canadian Mounted Police doghandler and has two children who are grown and married with children of their own. I have spent many years in various fields of health care including Nuclear Medicine and Cytogenetics. I have two children, both in their teens and three stepchildren also in their teens."

Peter and Margaret Danby (nee Hatfield) at their grandson's wedding in 2006.

THE TAYLOR FAMILY
Dorothy Buddug Taylor (formerly Hughes from Llandudno) and her husband Stanley John Taylor were victims, along with their daughter Sylvia Doris Taylor, eighteen months old. Dorothy's father was a journalist with the North Wales Weekly News and the Llandudno Advertiser, and had the unenviable task of reporting on a disaster which had claimed his daughter and her family.
A Frank Kenyon of Rochdale had a share in the family business at The Princess Theatre in Colwyn Bay, and he shot about six minutes worth of film of the disaster, showing the empty dam and the water rushing through the streets.
 This can now be accessed online at  www.gtj.org.uk/en/filmitems/29132

In April 2004 a memorial project to the victims of the disaster was dedicated at Dolgarrog. A £60,000 memorial trail up to the mountains was constructed along the river and among the boulders, a pathway to explain the tragedy to walkers. Fred Brown, a 93 year old Dolgarrog man, was present to open the project, and was said to be the last of the survivors still living. Fred was 14 when he lost his mother Elizabeth and four year old sister Betty in the flood. He reported that his father and elder sister rescued themselves from the flood waters by crawling over coke wagons.
A few years ago Janet Roberts of Llanrwst knew an old man nearly a hundred years of age who had lived through all this.
Most of the victims are buried in the churchyard at Caerhun.

The small gravity dam was not built across the end of a narrow river valley as one might expect, but stretched over a kilometre along the side of the reservoir. The water leaked under this wall, likely causing an outfall there, scouring soil and stones away from the dam bottom at the site, weakening the base of the dam wall until a whole section gave way, thus releasing the water along the natural course of the Porth Llwyd river. Inadequate foundations were blamed for the leakage. It has been speculated that the water level of the reservoir when in use would have been only three or four metres higher than the lake left behind, and did not itself hold a great quantity of water as reservoirs go. However, when the water leaked out and joined the smaller Coedty reservoir, the excess water caused that dam wall to breach, thus releasing water from both the Llyn Eigiau dam and the Coedty dam itself. A photograph of the Eigiau breach taken at the time shows the massive break in the dam wall. Modern photographs show that the resulting freed rocks have been arranged in a dome-shaped mound near the breach. A second breach may have been created later to ensure the dam does not fill up again. Photographs of the area can be found at www.geograph.org.uk

The dam was comparatively new when it failed in 1925. The plant and hydro station started operations in 1907 and 1908 to serve the aluminium reduction works in Dolgarrog. This process requires a great deal of electricity, and would need to be sited near an abundant source of water to turn the generators. The reduction process continued only until 1943, but the factory continued drawing power from the renovated Coedty reservoir to serve the specialist rolling mill which operated thenceforth.

A Henry Joseph Jack, born Swansea 1869, moved to Maenan Manor, Llanrwst, some time after 1912 and became a councillor, later Chairman of the Caernarvonshire County Council. In 1918 he was Managing Director of the Aluminium Corporation and on the board of the Porthmadog, Beddgelert and South Snowdon Railway in which it had a controlling interest. He foresaw a good future for the railway in slate transport and tourism, and in 1922 became director of the Snowdon Mountain Railway. In April 1924 he was blamed for its lack of success, and resigned his position. After the Dolgarrog disaster he was blamed for even more, and left for Tunbridge Wells, where he died in 1936 after having changed his name to Henry Jack McInnes.


THE VICTIMS

TAYLOR, Stanley John, 1 Machno Terrace

TAYLOR, Mrs Dorothy Buddug, Wife of Stanley, Daughter of A R Hughes, Llandudno Advertiser

TAYLOR Sylvia Doris, 18 months, daughter of Dorothy and Stanley.

EVANS, Mrs Susan, wife of Mr William Evans 3 Machno Terrace

EVANS, Ceridwen, 5 - found Tuesday morning 3 November near the ferry in Conway Estuary by John Ellis, fisherman, yacht skipper, of Conway.

EVANS, Bessie, 3 - found Tuesday 2.30 pm just below Conway Bridge by Mr John Craven, yacht skipper.

EVANS, Gwen, 4 months. Daughter of William and Susan Evans.

TWYNHAM, William, Tai'r Felin. Washed into Conway River.

TWYNHAM, Jennie, wife of William Twynham

News clipping with photo of Mrs Elizabeth Brown, a victim.
She had eight children.

BROWN Mrs Elizabeth, 46, No 1 Bungalow. Married, a mother of 8 children. Body found by P C Smith and some other men half a mile below the works on Tuesday at 3.30 pm.

BROWN, Bessie or Betty, daughter of Elizabeth.

SINNOT, Mrs Margaret, Porthlwyd Cottage. Her dog was found safe lying on the bed upstairs; her house was damaged but standing, but she was swept away.

McKENZIE, Mrs Catherine, of 2 Dolgarrog Cottages, daughter of Mrs Sinnot, and wife of Mr Donald McKenzie, former employee at the works, who was working away from home. They had not seen each other since March. Her body was found by Mr John Roberts of Hendy, Roewen, between 9 and 10 am on Tuesday near the Carbon Factory.

McKENZIE, Mona, 5, daughter of Mrs McKenzie. Found on day of enquiry.

HIGGINS, Mr Henry Victor, 30, childless widower of Sarn Bryn Caled, Welshpool, Linesman, son of Edwin Higgins. Lodging at 2 Machno Terrace.

WILLIAMS, Mrs Mary, 66 yrs, 2 Machno Terrace. Body found near Carbon Factory between 9 and 10 a.m. Tuesday by Owen Jones, Bryn Hyfryd.


SURVIVORS

BROWN, Mr, husband of Elizabeth, No. 1 Bungalow. Water dragged him away from his daughter and carried him down the valley for 500 yards. He was reported to have clung on to an electric pole. This daughter also survived and got to safety in the ruins of the village school; his then 14 year old son Fred when in his nineties said that they both climbed over coke wagons to escape. 

EVANS, Mr William, furnace man. Last saw his wife and children at a quarter to six on Monday night

A newspaper clipping of some of the Brown family.

There were also many other survivors, such as Mr Richard Roberts, pictured at the top of the page, who saved his family at the risk of his own life.

 Furniture and other artefacts were swept down the river to the sea. Much of it was recovered by fishermen, but a great deal was carried out to sea by the strong tide. The font of the church was also salvaged from the water, and a couple of bells were retrieved in due course. 

Read more Dolgarrog memories in separate posts here and here.