Earliest reference I can find regarding this colliery is the death of Robert Purvis aged 13, from the effects of Blackdamp, Dec 1849:
On Tuesday last, the 25th instant, an inquest was held at the house of Mr John Dryden, innkeeper,
Acklington, in the parish of Warkworth, before Thos. Adams Russell, Esq., coroner, on the body of Robert
Purvis, a lad 13 years of age, who worked in Acklington Colliery, and on the morning of the preceding day
had, in company with five other persons, gone to his work between four and five o'clock. One of the others
who was also working in the pit, about 70 yards from the shaft, left the place where he was working for the
purpose of sending the coals to bank, and found the deceased lying at the bottom of the shaft, and quite dead.
There was foul air in the pit, and he had died from suffocation; the other person at work with him
got out without any injury, Verdict—Accidental death
[The Newcastle Courant, Friday, December 28, 1849]
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