A collector of historic postcards has uncovered a mystery about a long-forgotten memorial to the 168 miners who died in the area's worst peacetime disaster.

George Nairn discovered two postcards of a wooden gospel mission hall built in memory of the men and boys killed in the 1909 West Stanley Burns Pit explosion.

Mr Nairn knows the long demolished memorial hall was built in Witton Gilbert, near Durham City, but cannot find out any other information.

He said: "It's a real mystery. I've been involved with local history for at least 25 years and I've never heard anything about this hall and neither has anyone else I know.

"The postcards say the hall was built by Jack Allen but sometimes you just itch for more information."

Mr Nairn attends specialist postcard fairs across Britain. However, he says one of the most productive areas is in Shropshire because solders from that county were posted to north Durham in the First World War. He has also discovered many historic postcards of the Chester-le-Street area in Belgium because there was a First World War Belgian refugee camp near the town.

Among Mr Nairn's most interesting postcards are a number of cards depicting the old Chester-le-Street Shrove Tuesday ballgame which stopped in the Thirties.

The amateur historian is also trying to find out about a tiny hamlet of wooden miners' houses called Claytonville in the Sacriston area. The hamlet was built at the turn of the century but no longer exists.

The Advertiser and The Northern Echo are raising money to erect a graveside tribute to 56 of the 168 people killed in the 1909 disaster.

Fifty-four miners were buried side-by-side in a trench in the former council cemetery at the back of St Andrew's Church in Stanley. Two were found buried in Gateshead