Pullets die laying first egg??

Anyone out there heard of that? And what it could be caused from? I lost two old English pullets - literally within a week of each other - when they laid their first egg....It was stuck in them. Seemed maybe it was too big?? I tried dipping them in a warm bucket of water with soap to relax them, and help the egg along. I was able to get the eggs out ok, but they were both dead by morning....so....sad....what is this about??

Is this, maybe, genetic? Eggs too big for the bird..? I assume it would be shock killing them.

Well, if we always hatch our biggest eggs, we're putting pretty high selection pressure on the population for egg size. There are bound to be casualties. Chicken eggs are HUGE for the size of the bird.
Likewise with people - we're pretty much at the limit of "birthable" babies now.

Soooooo....

It's not a management thing? As I am new to chicken husbandry, just want to make sure I haven't done something wrong!

Hard to say. One seems accidental; two seems. . . well, a bit suspicious. Do they have lots of calcium, available free choice?