Factory of horrors a death trap

There are three graves in Rookwood Cemetery and two in Melbourne that all have something in common. The bodies that rest in them are remnants of workers who were employed by Cameron's Tobacco Factory, located both in Sydney and Melbourne.

How the Cameron Tobacco Factory looked in an edition of The Bulletin. Courtesy Trove.

The Cameron brothers established the business, emigrating from Scotland to Virginia and then exporting tobacco to Australia in 1865. As well as Sydney and Melbourne, they set up business in Adelaide and Brisbane.

Sadly, occupational health and safety was not as stringent as it has become in recent years and the men who died before their time were victims of this lack of due diligence.

The first was John Addy and, at the tender age of 15 years old, had been employed by Cameron's to work on their hydraulic pumps for the past 4-5 years. It was a Friday morning in 1883 and John had been working the hydraulic pumps, a job he was very familiar with.

As John stood near the pumps on the first floor, he somehow got entangled in the shaft belts that connected to the engine in the basement. He was dragged up between the shaft and the flooring above, then his head banged onto the joists in the ceiling with each revolution. The young man's skull was shattered with portions of bone and brain smattered all over the floor.

William Arnold's final resting place in Rookwood Cemetery. Courtesy Findagrave.

In 1889, William Arnold, 20 and Henry Terry, 40, along with a man named Charles Honnes had been in a lift, raising bales of tobacco leaf to the upper storey of the factory. A hitch occurred when the cage of the lift jammed and the men tried to jerk it free from the guy rope. Charles had managed to step out of the lift just as the frame suddenly freed itself and crashed to the ground below with Arnold and Terry still inside. Arnold died from a fractured skull and Terry died later in hospital from his injuries. The lift had fallen 56 feet or 17 metres.

The most gruesome of deaths would have to be that of William McDonald, 40, in 1893 who, it seems, had been locked inside the factory overnight. It was the custom of the foreman to lock the place up about 5.30pm. From the position of the body, it was ascertained he was on his way to get his coat, but he may have suffered a heart attack and died. The next morning, the foreman opened the door where the body was discovered, only to see a great crowd of rats scamper away. McDonald's face had been eaten away, including the eyes, and flesh had been torn from him.

Robert Warnock's grave in Melbourne General Cemetery. Courtesy Findagrave.

Robert Warnock was a 43-year-old fitter who worked at the Cameron tobacco factory in Melbourne in 1910. On the day prior to his death, he fell from the top of a boiler and was admitted to hospital in an unconscious state. While there were no external injuries, except for a lacerated wound on the palm of the right hand, the coroner said the final cause of death came from a laceration of the brain caused by Warnock striking his head as he fell from the boiler.

References

• 'Accident at Cameron's Tobacco Factory', Evening News, Tues 27 Jun 1876, Page 2

• 'The Fatality at Cameron's Tobacco Factory', The Daily Telegraph, Sat 6 Apr 1889, Page 10

• 'Fatal Accident at Cameron's Tobacco Factory', The Sydney Daily Telegraph, Mon 23 Apr 1883, Page 3

• 'The Fire at Messrs Cameron's Tobacco Factory', The Sydney Morning Herald, Sat 25 Sep 1886, Page 11

• 'Extraordinary Fatality', Western Star and Roma Advertiser, Wed 6 Dec 1893, Page 2

• 'Another Machine Accident', Bendigo Advertiser, Mon 9 Jun 1902, Page 3

• 'Town Talk', Geelong Advertiser, Wed 27 Nov 1878, Page 2

• 'News of the Day', The Sydney Morning Herald, Fri 7 Jul, 1882, Page 5

• Greenhalgh, EM. In Greenhalgh, EM , Scollo, MM and Winstanley, MH [editors]. Tobacco in Australia: Facts and issues. Melbourne : Cancer Council Victoria; 2019. Available from https://www.tobaccoinaustralia.org.au/appendix-1/a1-6-history-of-tobacco-in-australia/a1-6-timeline.html

• 'Messrs Cameron Bros and Co.'s Mammoth Tobacco Factory', The Bulletin, December 13, 1884, Page 13