Old news from Armidale and New England

The Armidale Chronicle, Wednesday April 3, 1895

ACCIDENT AT HILLGROVE.

A miner named Michael O’Neill died on Saturday from the effects of an accident in a mine. While engaged lining the main shaft of Baker’s Creek mine in the morning he slipped off the staging and fell 30ft into a cleft between the timber and the solid rock. His left arm was broken, and his body severely bruised. He never recovered consciousness, and died in the hospital at 2 o’clock in the afternoon. Dr. Massie held a post mortem examination, and found that the base of the skull was fractured. The funeral took place on Monday and was very largely attended. Deceased, we hear, leaves a wife and three children.

Michael James O’Neill married Jane Elizabeth Mutton in Sydney in 1888. They had three daughters, Madeline May (Minnie), Ellen Gladys, and Ivy Pearl Mary (Peggy). Jane remarried in 1900, and died in Newtown in 1928.