On the morning of 10 March 1906, an explosion tore through the galleries of the Courrières mining company, killing well over a thousand miners. It remains the worst mining disaster in European history. Most of the victims came from the towns of Méricourt, Sallaumines and Billy-Montigny, and many were buried in a mass grave nearby. Twenty days after the explosion, thirteen survivors emerged from the darkness, having found their way through the ruined galleries, and their story became famous across Europe. The memorials in and around Sallaumines honour the dead and the rescuers, including German miners from Westphalia who came to help.
The disaster had huge consequences. Anger at the company's handling of the crisis led to strikes across the coalfield, and it pushed France to improve mine safety and labour laws, including the weekly day of rest, made law later that year. The memorials are now part of the World Heritage listing of the Nord-Pas de Calais Mining Basin.
Sallaumines and the towns around it are part of the dense urban landscape of the former coalfield, with cités, heaps and old pits. The riding here is urban and flat, with busy roads, roundabouts and cobbles. It is not a place for a ride for its own sake, but a place to stop, reflect and understand the history of the region and its people.
The cause was never settled beyond doubt, though a fire in the workings and a coal dust explosion that swept through more than a hundred kilometres of galleries were at the heart of it. Families waited at the pit heads for days in the cold, and the funerals drew huge crowds. Today the names on the memorials, row after row, many of them boys in their teens, make the scale of it painfully concrete, and local schools still bring children here to learn what their great-grandparents lived through.
Fuel and services are easy to find in Sallaumines, Lens and the surrounding towns. Lens, a few kilometres away, has the Louvre-Lens museum, a branch of the Paris Louvre built on the site of a former pit, and the football stadium of RC Lens, whose fans are known for their passion. The memorials are free to visit and often decorated with flowers.