Mexborough and Swinton Times, July 23, 1926
Miners Despair
Denaby Man Drowned
A Tragedy of The Coal Dispute
Being troubled by the coal stoppage probably caused a Denaby miner. Rupert Sykes, to take his own life. Aged 54, and living at 115, Tickhill Street, he left home on Wednesday morning with the intention of going to the welfare hall about a relief ticket, but he did not go there, and later the same night his body was found in the River Don at Sprotborough.
The inquest was held at the Three Horse Shoes hotel, Bentley Town End, on Friday by Mr Frank Allen.
Evidence of identification was given by the dead man’s son, George Rupert Sykes, a joint maker, employed at the Carr railway sheds, Doncaster, and living at 1, Trent Terrace, Conisborough. He said he last saw his father alive on July 13, between 9-30 and 10 pm. He was out of work on account of the stoppage. He was not short of money. The coroner: Had he spent his savings? – He had drawn all his savings out of the bank.
Was he troubled? – Yes, sir. He was troubled about this relief ticket. He said he had never before done such a thing in his life, but he was afraid he would have to do it this time. He did not like asking the guardians for relief, and it upset him very much. He worried over the stoppage. But we never surmised he might do anything. He had never threatened to do anything to himself. He was not actually starving. We found he had plenty of money to carry on for another six months as you might say.
The spending of his savings bothered him did it? – Yes, that’s right. He had drawn all the money out of the bank, but he had plenty left in the Co-operative Stores in mother’s name.
He was a thrifty man? – Yes he was, sir. He has always been thrifty and hard-working. Continuing the witness said his father, so his mother had told him, went out at 10 o’clock in the morning of the 14th, saying he would go up to the welfare to see if he could get a relief ticket. He was not seen again. He never went near the welfare.
Joseph Pinder, miner, of 16, Bridge Terrace. Hexthorpe, said on Wednesday, about 8 PM., He was at Sprotborough with Ernest Marsh, when a young man told them there was a man in the water. They walked to the spot indicated and saw deceased standing straight up in the water below the weir, his head was about 18 inches below the surface, and his feet were fast in about 2 feet of sludge. He was about 3 yards from the bank, from which he had apparently jumped. The police had been notified and the body was eventually conveyed by the borough, police ambulance to the Three Horseshoes Hotel.
The coroner, finding that Sykes had taken his life while of unsound mind, said no doubt he had been driven to it by the circumstances. He appeared to have been a thrifty, hard-working man, and no doubt the prospective loss of his savings in the strike had worried him a great deal. “I express no opinion about strikes,” he went on, “except to say it is high time this one was finished. It is a lamentable thing that a man like this, with no direct control of his own circumstances, together with thousands of others, should be reduced to destitution and despair because he could not work as probably he wanted to.”
He tendered his sincere sympathy with the widow, whom he understood was an invalid, and to the relatives.