ANOTHER generous mystery donor has come forward to support the Advertiser's campaign to mark the graves of the victims of the Stanley Burns Pit disaster.

A celebrity, who wishes to remain anonymous, has given £500 to the appeal.

This follows other major but anonymous donations of £400 and £200. The appeal total is now £2,000.

It is hoped that more cash will be raised at a talk and slide show about the 1909 explosion - in which 168 men and boys died - which will be presented at Sunniside, north of Stanley, on Tuesday.

There will also be a raffle and the chance to talk to local amateur historians Jack Hair and Francis Newman who will present the talk night.

Money raised at the Sunniside and District Local History Society event, which will be at the Sunniside Club at 7.30pm, will go towards the Advertiser's appeal fund for a monument to mark the graves of 54 men and boys buried in a trench behind St Andrew's Church in Stanley.

The campaign has been made possible by Bob Drake who, despite gaps in contemporary records, has managed for the first time - and with help from Advertiser readers - to work out where each of the 168 men and boys are buried.

The recently formed Stanley Hall Community Partnership has said it wants to erect a cairn at the site of the Burns pit shaft.

Rosemary Robson, leading member of the new community group for the Stanley Hall ward in east Stanley, said she was delighted with the response to the appeal.

She said: "This is an important part of our history, our heritage, and we must preserve it, especially so younger members of the community know what Stanley was all about."