Eight new life-size steel figures have been unveiled as part of a memorial to miners who lost their lives at Markham Colliery marking 80 years since the first disaster at the site.

The figures were unveiled as part of the ‘Walking Together’ memorial, which we led on, and will eventually feature 106 figures stretching between the village of Duckmanton in Chesterfield and the former pithead.

Each figure is part of a walking trail which symbolises a miner’s journey to the pit and back home again and represents the 106 men who lost their lives in three accidents at the site.

On 21 January 1937 an underground explosion claimed the lives of nine men and in 1938, 79 miners lost their lives and 40 were seriously injured in a second explosion.

Eighteen miners died and 11 others suffered serious injury in the third disaster at the colliery when the mechanical brake on a lift carrying them to the coalface failed on 30 July, 1973.

Derbyshire County Council have reclaimed the former colliery site with Henry Boot Developments and it’s now home to the Markham Vale regeneration scheme which is working to create 4,100 jobs for local people.

Councillor Tony King, Cabinet Member for Economic Development and Regeneration at Derbyshire County Council, said:-

“Markham Colliery was at the heart of Derbyshire and a place where great friendships were made and generations of families worked.

“The miners were a very close group who had a strong bond and supported each other through the good and bad times.

“This memorial is a place where the miner’s community spirit can be remembered and where families, friends and future generations can come together to pay tribute.

Councillor King added:-

“The site is now home to 42 businesses and more than 1,000 new jobs have been created so far but it’s important that we don’t forget the site’s mining history, the challenging jobs the pit workers had and the sacrifices they made.”

Each figure carries a tag with the name of one of the miners, along with their age and job role.

These most recent additions have been dedicated to Ralph Marsden, 41, Stallman, Joseph Furniss, 28, Stallman, Edward Baggaley, 34, Stallman, Edmund Smith, 29, Stallman, Frederick Roddy, 25, Cutterman, Thomas Jones, 49, Contractor, Enoch Jones, 21, Contractor and Joseph Geary, 55, Dataller.

Relatives of the miners commemorated at the unveiling also attended the event to pay tribute.

There are now 27 figures at the site − the first two were unveiled in 2013 to mark the 40th anniversary of the 1973 disaster.

The latest figures have been sponsored by a number of businesses including Noonah Experiential and GH Motors − both based at Markham Vale.

Henry Boot Developments − the private sector property partner at Markham Vale − and their consultants have also sponsored three of the figures.

A grant of £7,500 has been awarded to the ‘Walking Together’ memorial from the Duke of Devonshire’s Charitable Trust for the next phase of the project which is set to be unveiled later in the year.

The Walking Together memorial has been designed by Cheshire-based Artist Stephen Broadbent.

Ashgate Hospicecare is thrilled to announce that local parking management company, Bank Park, has chosen them as the beneficiaries for their new car park next to the Chesterfield Hotel.

Bank Park, who offer friendly, fair and ethical car parking solutions whilst raising much needed funds for local charities through it’s ‘Park and Give Scheme’, has been operating for over 4 years since they opened their first car park in Sheffield in 2013.

Ashley Kelley, Managing Director at Bank Park, said:-

“We have recently added The Chesterfield Hotel car park to our portfolio of charity car parks in the area and we have chosen Ashgate Hospicecare to be the beneficiary on this site”

“Our parking patrons choose Bank Park because we offer fair parking at reasonable prices with the added benefit of knowing they are giving to a great cause every time they park with us.”

“We are delighted to be Ashgate Hospicecare’s new charitable parking partner and hope that this is the first of many car parks across the region from which they will benefit.”

Ashgate Hospicecare will receive a percentage of the gross price of all pay & display tickets from The Chesterfield Hotel car park on a monthly basis which will go towards providing vital care for patients and their families across North Derbyshire.

Ali Ward-Foster, Partnerships Manager at Ashgate Hospicecare, said:-

“It is absolutely fantastic that Bank Park have chosen to support the hospice in this way. Support from companies like Bank Park is incredibly important; a regular income coming to the hospice will allow the hospice to plan for the future.

“Each week 16 people across north Derbyshire who need hospice care can’t get hospice care. With the support of businesses like Bank Park we can increase the number of hospice nurses in our community.”

Wingerworth and Derbyshire Epee Academy fencer Matthew Cooper recently celebrate being named British U-20 Men’s Epee Champion at the national championships held at Nottingham University.

Matt has had a great season with a number of medals at junior competitions, twelfth place at the junior European Championships in Bulgaria and a bronze medal at the British U-23 Championships. Matt is currently ranked number one junior in Great Britain and number 83 in the world rankings.

At the David Ross Sports village at Nottingham University Matt displayed a cool head, mental strength and excellent technical and tactical ability; he won all six poule fights giving him a seeding of number 3 in the competition.

The direct elimination went according to plan with a tight fight against Luke Mason the British Cadet Champion, in the last eight fight. Matt was behind 14-13 going into the last three minute period, he kept a really cool head and won 15-14 before an easy victory in the semi-final.

The final was a repeat of last year against Matt Dickinson a fellow GB squad member. Last season it was Dickinson who won the final but this year Matt brilliantly fenced this difficult opponent to win the fight 15-14 and win the Championship.

Anthony Klenczar, a representative from the Wingerworth and Derbyshire Epee Academy, said:-

“Derbyshire fencing has gone from strength to strength in recent years and we are going through a really successful period, we now have three national champions this is down to the hard work of the athletes and coaches, nothing out of the ordinary, just a desire to train hard and win.

“We are always looking for new people to come and join the clubs, if you enjoy a challenge, want to keep fit and test your tactical skills in a one to one situation then fencing is the sport for you. Five and a half years after picking up a sword for the first time Matt Coopers next competition will be a Senior World Cup in Bahrain.”

Chesterfield’s 17 year old race driver Seb Perez is looking forward to the next three rounds of the Michelin Ginetta GT4 Supercup Championship at Snetterton this weekend.

After a seven week Summer break the ever popular race series that supports the British Touring Car Championship is back in Norfolk and Perez hopes to continue where he left off after the eleven opening races of the season.

Just over a week ago Perez was at Snetterton testing for this coming race weekend where he made good headway during the day in the JHR Developments team Ginetta G55 race car.

Testing went well to plan with five fantastic sessions on track and consistently hitting around the top 5 mark of the 14 cars testing. His first session out on track saw him 4th fastest with around 0.378th second between himself and number one driver Ben Green and speeds on parts of the track of around 116mph.

After testing he commented:-

“I’m very pleased how testing has gone, during the last month or so we have been trying a lot of things and developing the car a lot”

He added:-

“We went well in the first session and then kept the pace up for the rest of the day.”

Due to regulations there was a restriction on tyres during testing hence there was a difference between teams in when they put their new tyres on. In comparison to Seb’s team mate George Gamble who was on the same strategy times were very similar, showing the pace of Perez is increasing every time.

Before the Summer break  Perez encountered a mixed weekend at Croft in North Yorkshire finding all three races difficult after several knock backs.  The Chesterfield race ace took an eighth, eleventh and seventh to remain in eighth place in the series.

The weather closed in for Saturday’s qualifying session with continual drizzle throughout and a wet to drying track in places, finishing in the top ten in 9th place.

Saturday’s Race one saw Perez have a battle with the midfield pack of cars, he had a realistic goal set for himself for the weekend opener. Wet weather again created its problems and Perez having to follow spray from the front runners, his priority was to stay out of trouble and a relatively trouble free race saw Perez take eighth.

Sunday’s two races saw brighter and drier weather that would benefit all the teams and their drivers, seeing them with faster times.

Race Two saw Seb start from 4th row 8th on the grid and after an incident on lap three a safety car spell bunched the pack together and saw Perez drop to 11th place and drop to 12th by lap 6. Again battling midfield saw problems for him and after a two car tussle Perez lost the car’s front splitter and causing major aerodynamic issues for the Simpson sponsored Ginetta. swapping He took the finish line in 11th place of the 15 lap race.

The weekends final race was a tough one for Seb, he ran wide on lap one after getting into 6th place only to see him drop into 10th for the next two laps. He made good progress through the tough field of cars for the remainder of the 15 lap race and an impressive comeback saw him finish seventh.

Perez spoke about the weekend and said:-

“I’m feeling really positive after the weekend to be honest.

“Of course there is still work to do, but I was really pleased with some of the passes I made and the lap times are tumbling too. We had a bit of misfortune in race two but I can see the progression in my pace this season and that’s the important part”.

The season finishes at the beginning of October with still a long way to go.

Perez travels to Norfolk at the weekend in 8th place in the Professional Driver class with 159 points and his team JHR Developments lead the Team Championship with 397 points.

You can follow Seb and all the action on Sunday on ITV 4 where races are televised live alongside the Dunlop MSA British Touring Car Championship.

Editorial and photography by Paul Horton