Mexborough & Swinton Times – Saturday 04 January 1941

Caught In Quagmire

Swinton Woman’s Ordeal

Rescuers’ Difficult Task

A Swinton woman. Mrs. Mary Stokes (23), wife of Mr W Stokes, steelworker, of 77, Rowms Lane, was on Wednesday rescued from an extremely perilous position after she had become trapped by a heap of slurry dredged from the Sheffield and’ South Yorkshire Navigation canal Mexborough.

The woman was only extricated after an hour’s strenuous work by four men. She had sunk almost waist deep in the treacherous slime before her plight became known.

The woman had been exercising her dog on the Leach, a stretch of ground between the River Don and the canal, when the dog ran on to al patch of apparently firm ground and she followed it only to find herself gripped in a morass. She started to run in an effort to get clear, but only sunk deeper into the slurry, which was several feet deep at this point. Her cries for help and the barking of the dog attracted the attention of Mr.! J. Needham, of Bank Street. Mexborough, who ran to the police station for assistance.

Sergeant Appleton and Police Constables Street and Price using ladders to crawl out over the quagmire. fastened a strong rope round the woman’s waist, but their. combined efforts together with those Mr. Needham failed to extricate her.; Eventually with the aid planks a sheet of corrugated iron was placed; near the woman, and standing on this one of the constables worked with a spade to free the woman’s ‘; feet.

Sergt. Appleton meanwhile supported her and she was eventually got out, covered with slime and completely exhausted. She was suffering from shock and the effects of exposure and was conveved home in a car.

Sergt. Appleton praised the presence of mind of Mr. Needham, whose timely warning enabled the rescuers to reach the woman before she had sunk too deeply to be released. Dusk was falling by the time the woman had been got out and had her plight not been noticed when it was, she might have remained undiscovered throughout the night.