A murder underground is the subject of this script by Antony Ellis. An accident in a South Wales coal mine traps four miners. Other miners escaped to the surface. The mine’s private phone line to the surface is still working, and the mine’s superintendent learns three men are alive. The fourth, Evan Williams, is reported dead, murdered, and a police inspector has been called to investigate. Williams was reported as having stomach problems, making it seem likely he was poisoned. It seems Williams was a womanizer and his reputation with the wives of the miners made some of the men happy he was dead. This means there are many suspects, and one of those suspects may still be trapped in the mine. The inspector is told that there may be as many as a dozen men who wished him dead. A miner suggests that it may be easier to say that Williams died in the cave-in rather than disrupting so many lives with an investigation about a murder.
The inspector decides to go into the shaft. After digging down they hear a sound that assures them that the trapped men are still alive. After taking turns digging, it is the inspector who reaches them first, but there is another collapse that closes off the newly created escape tunnel. The inspector is now trapped with them, and the mine’s telephone has stopped working. As the men talk among themselves, it gossiped that Williams’ wife might be the poisoner, adding a new dimension to the suspect list. They sit together after nearly two days, without water, usually in the dark, taking turns trying to tunnel out with their hands, chattering about what might have happened, and the dead man in a corner. One of the men turns out to have some tea in a bottle from when he entered the mine and refuses to share it with the others. He refuses to drink it himself, which becomes an admission that it was that tea which was used to administer the poison! Knowing that may have solved a crime, but they’re still trapped! Will they use the poison on themselves rather than wait to die if they can’t be reached and rescued?
The script was used earlier on 1952-03-04 on the series Pursuit as episode #61: Pursuit at the Clynewidd Mine.
The network recording and an Armed Forces Radio Service (AFRS#817) have equivalent sound quality. There may be a preference for the network recording because it is the complete and original broadcast.
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https://archive.org/details/TSP550705
THE CAST
Ben Wright (Inspector Glidd / Emlyn Thomas), Jay Novello (Evan Lewis), Joe Kearns (Mr. Flowers), Richard Peel (Will Vaughn), Tudor Owen (Dave Owen), John Dodsworth (Hugh Davies), Charles Davis (Constable), Larry Thor (Narrator)
It appears from the script cover that Antony Ellis may have been originally cast as Hugh Davies but was replaced by John Dodsworth. Ellis did play that role in the Pursuit broadcast.
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