Group of Loftus miners with children, Skinningrove

This photograph shows a group of miners outside the ‘Travelling Way’, the workers’ entrance to the Loftus mine in Skinningrove, in the late 1800s. The Mines and Collieries act of 1842 made it against the law for women and children under the age of 10 to work in mines. The age of the children in this photograph is not known.