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Archived People, Pits & Places

Tribute to Mining Community

by Mrs Jennie Messer, Easington

The PIT was at the centre of the A.B.C. streets of North, South and East, it showered it’s dirt and smoke over the houses and the people living there. The houses were of the basic amenities with an outside toilet and a sink in the off-shoot of the pantry or in the corner of the kitchen near the small window. The women cooked on an open fire of the big black range on one side and the boiler heating the only hot water in the house on the opposite side. On the hob or bar of the huge fire was the ever ready kettle quietly humming for the next brewing of tea.

Everyone was welcomed to their homes, the warmth of the welcome only outmatched by the heat of the blazing fire, with firelight shining on the black-leased stove bringing a glow to the steel fender and fire-irons turning them into silver. On such a night, still and white with snow, the doors closed, the world outside did not exist except for plumes of smoke curling up high from every chimney.

The women know of the dangers their men faced working below ground bringing up the coal from the pit, their strength was in the large families with relatives in every other street and Grandma just around the corner in the bottom house, this togetherness make it a unique community.

The pit holidays were a time of relaxation which meant a couple of days at the seaside or at best a picnic on the beach. The other social event was on a Friday morning, pay day and Saturday afternoon a time to go on the “street” to see their friends and neighbours for a gossip.

The street was a shopping area stretching just above the streets of houses, to the cinema a distance of about two thirds of a mile. The shops sold just about everything and were of the high quality – no pre-packed goods, all deliveries were made daily and orders made by horse and cart or delivery boy on his bike. The shoppers carried a shopping basket for smaller items. The days were long and hard for the mining community but hopes were always high for better times ahead.

The Street now is much different, businesses and shops have gone, the shuttered and blank stare of the premises look out on an empty and desolate street. The people have also gone and just as desolate are the streets of houses that have been demolished and in their place are the grassed areas.

The pit with it’s noisy beat has also disappeared and a descending calm settles on the surrounding green area stretching out to the sea.

Can this be progress or is it nostalgia?

Miners’ names to go online

A detailed record of a county’s coal mining past has been compiled by volunteers.

More than 100 people have spent six months filing documents held at Durham County Record Office, as part of the Mining Durham’s Hidden Depths project.

Durham County Council launched the scheme to make the archives of the Durham Miners’ Association more accessible.

The indexes will be downloaded onto the record office’s website, where they can be searched.

The index, which will include the names of 40,000 miners, will go online soon at durhamrecordoffice.org.uk.

For more information call 0191 3833575

Durham Miners’ Gala Book Project

Durham Miners’ Association are producing a book recording the history of the Durham Miners’ Gala from 1871 to 2010. It will be written by Dave Temple who worked at Murton Colliery and has produced many fine books on mining history including the Durham Miners Millennium Book.

The book will trace the origins of the “Big Meeting” to its roots in the early nineteenth century, profile the speakers through the ages and record the important historic events.

It will explain how the Gala was almost lost after the pit closure programme and how the communities of the Durham Coalfield, in true Durham spirit, rose to the occasion and kept the tradition alive making new banners and restoring the Gala to its former glory. The book will be printed in full colour with many historic photographs as well as those from recent years and will include a photographic catalogue of the banners of the Durham Coalfield old and new.

The book will be launched at the 2011 Gala. To help fund the project and determine how many copies to print, Durham Miners Association are appealing for supporters of the Gala to buy advance copies. Everyone who sponsors the project in this way will have their name recorded in the book, or if they wish, the name of someone they particularly want to remember

The book will not be on sale in book shops and can only be obtained through the DMA. Only a limited number of copies will be printed over and above the advance copies ordered so the only way to be certain of obtaining a copy is to order one now.

If you would like to help this project please fill contact Durham Miners’ Association, P.O. Box 6, Red Hill, Durham, DH1 1BB.

The Mystery of the Miners’ Medal

Philomena Gallagher met Jack Birbeck and his wife Bella at the Horden Catholic Club over twenty years ago and they became great friends. Jack and Bella lived in Horden and Philomena lived in Peterlee and they got together every week. When Jack and Bella both suffered ill health, Philomena would help care for the couple, taking Bella out for walks in her wheelchair and making the couple’s Sunday dinner. When Bella passed away, Philomena continued to care for Jack until his death ten years ago.

As a mark of appreciation for Philomena’s kind support, Jack gave her the gold medal that his father was presented with after the first world war. “he never talked much about it”, said Philomena, “but it was obvious that Jack treasured this medal and kept it on his watch chain”.

All that Philomena knows about the medal is that the Durham Miners’ Association Lodges awarded medals to soldiers for bravery during the 1914 - 1918 war. This one was presented by Horden Lodge and Philomena said, “Jack did say that there were only a few medals awarded and to receive one was a great honour”. She said. “I would dearly love to know more about the medal and would be grateful if any ‘Banner’ readers could shed some light on the history of the DMA medals, particularly in the Horden area where Jack’s father lived”.

So, can you tell us any more about the DMA medals? Any information on this subject can be sent to: The Editor, The Banner Magazine, Durham Aged Mineworkers’ Homes Association, P.O. Box 31, The Grove, 168 Front Street, Chester-le-Street, County Durham, DH3 3YH

Women of the pits

Some of our readers might have the impression that the Coal Mining Industry was always a province of 'men only', but that was not really the case.

For most of the last 160 years the contribution of females has been limited to surface work - and some of that was very hard. But even worse was the employment in earlier times of young children underground.

I'm not much to look at now but apparently I was a fairly normal baby because someone bothered to take photographs of me. One picture shows me with my 'Auntie' Sarah. She was not a family member - she was a colleague of my mother and my real Auntie Bess. The three ladies worked together at our local pit.

Those three had clerical types of jobs. We had other ladies at the pit when I started work there. One worked in the Granary, dealing with foodstuff for the ponies which were working underground and another was employed in the Saddlers' shop making and repairing ponies' harnesses and other leather equipment.

I'm sure all these mentioned would work hard but nothing in modern time can compare with the terrible conditions in which women, and very young children, worked underground in olden days. The scandalous situation was exposed by the investigation of a Parliamentary Committee established by Lord Shaftesbury in the early 1840's. In the committee's report several witnesses are recorded as giving details of shocking conditions.

The situation was perhaps worst in parts of Scotland, where mineworkers and their families were regarded as part of the mine property - virtually slavery! As to the Durham Coalfield there is sometimes an impression that no women worked underground but the interesting chronology by George Lister records that women worked as miners in Winlaton in 1581, and there were reports that a woman was one of the bodies blown out of a Wearside pit by an explosion in the early 1700's.

The 1840's investigations led to an Act of Parliament of 1842 which banned the employment of women (and boys under ten years old) from work underground. In some areas women continued to work in hard surface jobs such as removing stones from run-of-mine coal on the 'picking belts'.

Two welcome innovations in modern times led to the employment of more women at many pits. These were the introduction of Pithead Canteens, and of Medical Centres. Some of the canteens brought a distinctive feminine touch. I recall one where potted palms were placed between groups of tables; and another which became famous locally for its apple pie, attracting a wide patronage - including school children.

Perhaps these later developments represented a small reversal of the attitude to women in the pits, and ironically some of the 'Equality' laws of the recent years now make it possible for women to work underground again; but sadly any applicants would have to leave Durham to find a working coal mine!

68 years a miner

We recently received a newspaper cutting dated September 10 1919. The article related to a miner by the name of John Hall who, at the age of 75, finally hung up his lamp and retired after working in the mines for 68 years.

Mr Hall or “Aad Jack” as he was popularly known started work as a trapper boy at the age of 6 at Shotton Colliery where for 13 hours he would earn 10 pence a day.

Throughout his working life he moved from Shotton Colliery to Ryhope, Monkwearmouth and Castle Eden before finally working at North Elswick Pit in Newcastle.

Three times married Mr Hall was a firm believer in the happiness of domestic bliss and was known to state “It’s nee hoose at all without a woman”.

He mentions with pride in the article that he never required a “caller” no matter what time he needed to rise, and is also proud of the fact that he has done everything a man can do down the pit and worked through the various grades to become a qualified miner.

Throughout the 68 years of toil, he shared the dangers common to the mine and, although was fortunate to escape any serious explosions, he was unfortunate to be lamed three times.

Once retired Mr Hall was able to enjoy a more relaxed pace of life. As a keen gardener he had plenty of time to spend at his allotment and watching his favourite sport – cricket.

Mr Hall died at the age of 86.

The information and photographs in this article were provided by Mrs R Hails – great granddaughter of Mr Hall. Mrs Hails is a current applicant of DAMHA.

Courage, Coal and Codex, by George L Atkinson

Do you have a favourite book? Mine is the Bible, because of its wisdom, wonders, and the window to the future which it gives for believers. But I have other books which I value for different reasons.

One of my special books has finely tooled leather covers. I bought it in the 'used books' section of a shop in Durham. Inside the front cover it has a leather label which says it was presented to Joseph W Pease Esq, MP "on the laying of the foundation stone of the Primitive Methodist Chapel and School at Westgate, Weardale, in 1870".

This was the Joseph Pease who was persuaded by George Stephenson and Lindsay Wood to introduce steam power on the famous Stockton and Darlington Railway - a landmark in railway history. My interest was stirred because I knew a lady, descended from the Pease family, who was the wife of a greatly respected Mining Engineer Mr F W Fry. Both the Frys and the Peases were Quaker families involved in the industry as coal owners or shareholders before Nationalisation.

Mr Francis Wilfred Fry - who preferred to be known as Mr 'Bill' Fry - studied for a degree in Mining at Cambridge University. After a period as a management student at Horden Colliery he began a very distinguished career in the coal mining industry.

However, it was not all mining. During the worst period of the German bombing of Britain in the Second World War Bill Fry served as a Bomb Disposal Officer in the Royal Engineers. This was one of the most dangerous jobs in the Forces, demanding a great deal of cool courage as well as great skill.

He returned to the mining industry and progressed through a number of management posts in Durham where he is perhaps best remembered as the Area General Manager of the South East Durham Area, with his Headquarters at Castle Eden. After Mr 'Bill' Fry retired he inherited the title which had been awarded to one of his forbears, and so it is proper to remember him now as Sir Francis Wilfred Fry C.B.E.

He and Lady Fry, both now deceased, regarded themselves as part of, and contributed much to, the Durham Mining Community.

Sir Wilfred’s family background was very interesting. The Fry name, like the Cadbury’s, is of course well known for its association with the cocoa and chocolate products. But the Fry’s were also involved in some special sectors of mechanical engineering. And one of Sir Wilfred’s ancestors was a notable collector of ancient copies of the Bible and its early manuscript sources. One of this predecessor’s great possessions was a copied version of the Codex Sinaiticus - presented to him by the Tsar Alexander the First, of Russia.

The Codex Sinaiticus dates from the fourth century A.D. and is probably the oldest manuscript of the Bible. It was discovered in a Monastery on Mount Sinai by a German Visitor who arranged for it to be bought by the Russian Tsar. In the 1930’s the Russian Government sold it to the British Museum.

Thus I end where I began - back to the Bible. Perhaps that is a needed watchword for our times - 'Back to the Bible!'

Derek Hollows' Memoria

Having volunteered for aircrew duties at sixteen years of age, I was rejected because of my age and was later conscripted into the mines under the Bevin Scheme. After initial training, I was directed to the Lyme Colliery, Haydock.

Many of us had been members of the Cadet Forces and fully expected to join various branches of the Armed Services. It was therefore with trepidation and indeed disappointment that we joined our mentors, the regular miners.

It was then that our eyes were opened, for in the dark world of pre-history, we met a rare breed of men. They were courageous, hard working, possessed a great sense of humour and above all were compassionate. To the raw recruits, they were as father figures. There we found a race apart and they helped us emerge into manhood. I was proud and privileged to become a Lancashire 'Cloggie' and to be accepted into that unique fraternity.

Many years later I still retain a sense of utmost respect and admiration for those with whom I worked and this prompted me to write a book entitled 'As I Recall', which is a compilation of short anecdotes, dialect humour and verse and it is a tribute to all who are associated with the mining industry. The book was released earlier this year to coincide with the sixtieth anniversary of the demobilisation of the last Bevin Boys and proceeds support terminally ill children and abandoned animals.

Some years ago I made a point of visiting my old colliery, which had closed down. Needless to say it was an emotional experience for me. As I surveyed the scene of dereliction with a heavy heart, memories came flooding back. I recalled the sad and the happy times and the friendships formed among that band of brothers, now long gone, and I felt blessed. I stood alone in silence which was so intense that it seemed to have a sound all its own and as I turned away the seeds of a poetic tribute were sown.

MEMORIA

The pit has gone, it is no more
And one needs tap at memory’s door
To recall those hectic, distant days
That changed our lives in countless ways

From all walks we came and strode
Brother of toil down that dusty road
In a darkened world beneath the ground
Forging bonds, new friendships found
For our mentors, this life was ever so
We learned so much in the lamp-light glow
Of honour, courage, loyalty and then
We cast off youth and became as men

The mine is now bereft and bare
And I can only stand and stare
Remembering those, our long lost hosts
As silence reigns but I hear their ghosts

Derek is currently preparing a book of anecdotes about pit ponies and supporting a horse and pit pony rescue and rehabilitation centre near Pontypridd. He would welcome written contributions from any of our readers who worked with them. His contact details are:

Derek Hollows
14 Navigation Road
Altringham
Cheshire
WA14 1NF

Diversity of Enterprise

Two recent opening ceremonies of new homes at Horden and Esh Winning indicate the wide diversity of neighbourhoods which DAMHA serves as it attempts to fulfill the intentions of its founders.

Although there were small local settlements in the locality from recent times, Horden grew rapidly at the beginning of the 1900’s. This was when the shaft sinkings started for what became Britain’s biggest mine.

At it’s peak Horden Colliery, on the coast, employed more than four thousand workers and produced more than six thousand tons of coal per day. Nearby there was a Coking and By-Products plant and Electric Power Station.

To accommodate the large labour force and its families, several streets of houses were built. With the addition of supporting infrastructure of shops, school, places of worship and other community requirements Horden became, and is, a large built up area more like a small town than a village.

Esh Winning, located a few miles along the Deerness Valley west of Durham City is in the area of the ancient “Township of Esh” which was apparently the domain of the De Esh family for decades after the Norman conquest.

The “Township” covered a wider area than what we now know as Esh, and included several places which became mining settlements.

Esh Winning colliery, with less than five hundred workers, was a rather different enterprise from Horden.

It was older too, having begun production in 1866. In 1873 there were about 160 pit cottages; unusually for that time they were mostly four-roomed dwellings – but it is possible that an attic (or two) might have been counted as rooms.

A notable difference between the two mines was in the geology and the consequential effect on the depth of the workings. At the coast the Horden surface was about 200 feet above sea level. The shafts, very deep because of the strata overlying the coal seams, went down to about one thousand feet below sea level, and the workings in places eventually were thus well below the sea bed.

The surface at Esh Winning was about 400 feet above sea level and the shaft depth was about 170 feet. Despite being higher than the level of the far away sea, it was still possible to get water in the workings. In 1873 the ‘consideration’ payment at Esh for ‘working wet’ was ninepence per score of coal tubs produced; a score at this pit meant 25 tubs!

There is much more to the histories of Horden and Esh, but we have not sufficient space to deal with them here; moreover, there is a great deal of information available from the work of local historians.

To visit Esh Winning by way of the Deerness Valley means seeing a stretch of beautiful countryside - surely one of Durham’s jewels. And Horden is a treasure to those of us who have special memories of the place.

G L Atkinson

Colliery housing at Esh Winning with upturned tubs in the foreground on the site of the colliery, September 1967. Photo courtesy Beamish Museum

GALA POEMS

Durham Miners’ Gala

Banners unfurling in the summer sun
Bands turning up their music begun
Proud men marching their heads held high
Remembering friends lost in pits in disasters gone by
People clapping as they march by
Hotdogs and onions candy floss and ice cream
Speeches and rides by the banks of the river

The cathedral stands proud at the top of the hill
Peaceful inside everyone still
Bishop Tom giving his blessing to villages and banners
The band music swelling leaves goose bumps behind
Then out in the sunshine to march back through the city
Children laughing and singing the words to a ditty
Each band and banner go back to their village
Bringing the banner home for another year

Big Meeting in the Thirties

Up at six in the mornin’
Catch the bus to Easington Lane

Travel to our capital
By puffing, spitting train

Gannin’ to Durham Big Meetin’
To get our pitmans rights

Following our union banners
Flying like bonny kites

Putter, hewers, stonemen
Brickies, datal hands

United above the ground
To the music of the colliery bands

Black Prince and Hedley Hill
Closed then I moved on

In nineteen hundred and twenty eight
To deep sea pit, Easington

I look forward to this day
To crack with my old marrers

And we talk about the past
And the future of our youngsters

Unity and the future
Slogans on front and back

Pictures adorn our banners
Fatalities draped in black

Easington, Eppleton
Marsden, Westoe
Haswell, Dawdon

Murton, Blackhall
Vane Tempest, Shotton
Thornley, Horden
Marching from the station
Bands playing for all they’re worth

To pitmen’s families dancing
My heritage – gold of the earth

Stop at the County Hotel
The band plays in a merry way

To the balconies above
Heavy with big names of the day

Then on to the racecourse
Speeches in the afternoon

Inspired, incited, heartened
Our day was over too soon.

Durham Gala in the ‘30s. Photos courtesy Beamish Museum

The Mighty Atom

If you have read about the beginnings of our Aged Miners Homes movement you will know that Boldon Colliery has a special place in the history. Whilst a lot of people were talking, the Boldon men took action by converting an old mansion into apartments for some of their retired colleagues.

Boldon was a first in that way, just as later it became the first pit in Durham to have Pithead Baths. Recently two more firsts have stirred memories of the past; one of these two was of great and international interest, but the other was very small and very local.

The big story was a report that the huge Boldon supermarket of Asda recently achieved a sales record for the whole of the American Wal-Mart Group of more than 1,000 stores. The small item, but much more important in its own context – was news of a birth a baby boy to a Boldon family. His name is Samuel.

These two items of information reminded me of an older Boldon store and an older Samuel. The older establishment was the Boldon Co-op – “The Store” – which was a vibrant part of the social network of the colliery village. I believe the bacon counter was a focal point for news!

This aspect of the store was evidenced by an issue which was raised by an older Samuel – none less than Dr Sam Watson who was a famous General Secretary of the Durham Miners’ Union.

Sam Watson was a Boldon lad himself. He became a renowned figure in industrial and political circles. At one stage he was National Chairman of the Labour Party. Not tall in stature, but great in status, he was known by some as “the mighty atom”.

He was an excellent negotiator for the miners, and often used a touch of humour in his argument. Such was the case when he pursued a complaint about a reputed shortage of bad weather protective clothing for surface workers. He quoted a rumour that one or two ladies were seen in the queue at the bacon counter wearing the N.C.B. duffel coats which some of the mineworkers said they had been denied!

Sam Watson had worked hard in the pit, but his intellectual powers and his personality took him to situations where he mixed with many leaders of industry and government both in Britain and other lands. It will be nice if that new baby Sam can achieve something similar in the long life which, God willing, stretches out before him in this rapidly changing world!

Down Hill House, West Boldon

Durham Miners’ Spitfires

After reading our article on the RAF tribute to the Durham miners who bought spitfires during the Second World war, (the Banner issue 50), David Hopper, General Secretary of the Durham Miners’ Association has kindly written in to tell us that there is a plaque at the Durham Miners’ Association offices at Redhills in Durham. It was presented by the Ministry of Aircraft Production in 1941.

New banner for Crookhall Lodge

The new Crookhall Lodge Banner was delivered to, and hung in, the specially made display case in Delves Lane Junior school hall on Friday, 30th November, 2007. Members of Durham Mining Museum in attendance.

The front of the new banner is a faithful copy of the the first Crookhall banner from the 1930’s showing the ‘Emancipation of Labour’ under the logo of the ‘Durham Miners Association’. The reverse of the banner features a totally original design created by a by a collaboration between the committee of the Banner Group of the Crookhall Foundation and the children of Delves Lane Junior School with teacher Helen Lee.

The design, based on a pit wheel with six spokes and a central hub flanked by the names of the mines of the Crookhall Royalties, all under the logo of the ‘National Union of Mineworkers’. The central hub shows a miners pick and shovel crossed with a Davy Lamp above and one of the original seven Blast Furnaces below with the slogan ‘We Become One’: the idea of Delves Lane schoolchildren for the local Partnership. The six segments include images of: Crook Hall mansion, the winding wheels and buildings of the last Victory Pit with pictures of some of the players in the famous Crookhall Colliery Band, (including the conductor JJ Stobbs, cornet player JS Stobbs, grandfather and father of the Association’s Asset Manager Brian Stobbs), the opening of one of the drift mine entrances to Woodside Winnings, a typical coal miner of the 1940’s and 50’s, Ramsey Terrace, Durham Aged Minerworkers’ Homes at Delves Lane and Delves Lane County Junior Schools original building from 1930’s plus the school badge, (designed by teacher Helen Lee 33 years ago!).

The new Crookhall Lodge banner produced by John Midgley, of Chippenham Designs, Norfolk.

RAF tribute to miners who bought Spitfires for the Few

It’s a little known fact that the North-East’s pits played a vital part in the historic Battle of Britain. During the early part of the war, when the RAF was losing many aircraft and Government finances were badly stretched, someone came up with the idea of collecting funds to buy aircraft to support the war effort.

Lord Beaverbrook introduced the Spitfire Fund into which individuals, companies, organisations or towns could donate money to buy the much-needed replacements.

Despite abject poverty and their own dangerous working conditions, men from the Durham coalfield clubbed together to buy two much-needed Spitfires.

One of them - registration number P8091 - was presented to 72 Squadron, which at the time was based in Acklington. The aircraft was officially named Miners of Durham II.

After the war the unit disbanded, but in 2002 it was reformed as a reserve training squadron at RAF Linton-on-Ouse - and its pilots have brought back the aircraft naming tradition, honouring those who bought presentation Spitfires.

Harry Spence, 79, from Tudhoe Colliery, was recently invited to the base to meet the pilots and, as one of the original contributors, to see the modern Miners of Durham II, a Tucano used to train today's fighter crews.

Interviewed by Mark Foster of the Northern Echo in September, Mr Spence said, "It's wonderful to see Miners of Durham back in the skies. I'm all for it and I think it's great".

Mr Spence was 14 when he turned up for his first shift at Tudhoe Colliery in 1941.

"It was horrible," he remembered. "We often had to work in an area no more than three feet square. All we received was £2-a-week and that included the extra money for working underground."

The £10,000 to buy the miners' two Spitfires was taken from union subscriptions. It would have been the equivalent of 100 miner's annual incomes.

The original Miners of Durham II was written off following a crash landing in January 1945

Unearthing our mining heritage

The County’s mining history is being celebrated at a new museum in Durham City.

The Durham Miners Heritage centre, at Neville's Cross Social Club, opened this spring and already there are plans for the county’s schoolchildren to use the museum as a learning zone.

The centre is run by the Durham Miners Heritage Group, formed in 2006, and is home to an exhibition of mining memorabilia collected over the last 20 years by members of the group, including the model of a pit pony and cart from the foyer of County Hall.

As well as displays on the subjects of shot firing, the Mines Rescue Service and tools of the trade, there is an art exhibition by former Durham Miner Ron Gray.

It is hoped the centre will make a real difference to the community and will be used as a base for training.

The centre is in First Floor Rooms, Neville's Cross Social Club, Neville's Cross Bank, Durham. Opening times are Tuesday to Thursday 11am to 4pm and Saturday 11am to 3pm. Admission: Adults £1.50, OAPs £1, children 50p and school groups free. Call 07950 430 334 for more details.

CISWO, championing social welfare in the mining community

Despite the demise of the coal mining industry, the Coal Industry Social Welfare Organisation, (CISWO), continues to provide social welfare services to our mining communities.

Established when coal mining was privatised, the independent charity operates six regional offices throughout the coalfield areas of England, Wales and Scotland and its mission is to “enhance quality of life in coalfield communities by the promotion of social inclusion and community regeneration initiatives”.

CISWO continues to maintain 19 Miners Welfare Schemes operating throughout the North-East &' Cumbria and the organisation’s active involvement in community development schemes means that they can offer essential services such as funding advice, professional training for trustees, and expert guidance on project development.

With an exemplary record in social work service, CISWO provides a wide range of valuable support services: confidential home visits, support with health and disability issues, advocacy, benefits advice and assistance with applications, as well as general information and advice for individuals, families and social groups. They also give practical and emotional support at times of difficulty, including bereavement.

Since 1976, CISWO has, through the Coal Industry Benevolent Trust, provided grants for widows of miners who have died as a result of an industry accident or of certain prescribed dust related industrial diseases and, men who were certified as suffering from pneumoconiosis during their lifetime. The Trust also gives grants to former employees of the mining industry and their widows/partners in times of hardship and miners and ex-miners’ children with special needs. During 2006 the Trust provided financial assistance totalling £850,790.

However, CISWO is probably best known for the charity’s unique, and quite excellent, holiday and residential convalescence facilities for ex-miners and their wives and widows and former female coal industry employees.

The Banner featured the impressive Sam Watson Rest Home for women, in Richmond, North Yorkshire, (Winter 2006/2007, Issue number 47), pictured below. CISWO also run homes at: Low Hall in Scalby, the Derbyshire Miners Holiday Home in Skegness, and the aptly named Vitalise at Sandpipers in Southport.

So, if you feel that CISWO can help you, your family or neighbours in any way, you can contact the local office at:

CISWO
6 Bewick Road
Gateshead
Tyne & Wear
NE8 4DP
Telephone: 0191 477 7242

The Great Northern Miners

When Ken Smith, a sub-editor on The Journal in Newcastle, and his wife, Jean, decided to write a book on the Durham and Northumberland miners they were determined to dig deep at the grassroots. Instead of spending all their time ploughing through dusty volumes in the region's libraries or poring over old books and newspapers, they went out into the communities of the North-East and talked to former miners and their families to find out about the subject first hand.

The result of the couple's hard work over two years is a well-illustrated volume entitled The Great Northern Miners, published Tyne Bridge Publishing.

It is a fascinating mixture of memories and history which together give a sweeping picture of the immense cultural and social heritage left by the pitmen.

It also documents the miners' early struggles for better pay and conditions, the numerous disasters which took a heavy toll of life, the Great Lockout and General Strike of 1926 and the Great Strike of 1984-85 against pit closures.

In addition, a short account of DAMHA is included.

Co-author Jean talked to ladies in the pit communities to get their side of the story. The pitmen could not have done their job without the support of the women.

Banner comes home

The Handen Hold Colliery made a welcome comeback at this year’s Big Meeting after it was returned to its village almost 40 years after its pit was closed.

The banner, which is believed to have been made in the early 1960s, was put into storage at National Union of Miners’ office at Red Hill in Durham when the Handen Hold Colliery, near Chester-le-Street, shut in 1968. But it was given a new lease of life three years later when it was chosen by Murton Miners’ Lodge as a replacement for one of its own. With its title put on the cloth, the banner was used for five years at events, including the Gala.

Now it has been passed back to the Handen Hold Miners’ Banner Group by those who were members of the Murton Lodge and the village’s Heritage Group, which had been taking care of it.

Keith Potts, Chairman of the Banner Group, said: “We are very proud because it is an original banner and it’s been around since I was a kid in short pants. The former pitmen will welcome this and there’s a lot of interest.”

The banner will go on show alongside a new one at West Pelton Primary School, 300 metres away from where the colliery stood.

Pictured at formal handover of the banner at the Colliery Inn, Murton, back row: Keith Potts, chairman of Handen Hold Miners’ Banner Group; A Marshall Wylde, former secretary of Murton Miners’ Lodge & DAMHA committee member; Dave Hopper, general secretary of NUM (Durham area); Alan Young, last lodge secretary of Murton Miners’ Lodge. front: Maureen Potts, treasurer of Handen Hold Miners’ Banner Group and Elaine Hindmarsh, secretary of Handen Hold Miners’ Banner Group.

End of an era as the last pit pony dies

The end of another chapter in the North-East’s coalmining heritage was announced recently, with the death of the last surviving pit pony.

Sparky died at the age of 36 following a short illness at his retirement home in Wakefield, West Yorkshire.The sad news was relayed by staff at the National Coal Mining Museum for England, where Sparky has been a resident since his retirement from Ellington Colliery, in Northumberland,in 1988.

Day after day for more than 13 years, the tough little workhorse toiled underground at Ellington, moving materials and carrying out salvage work. He worked with fellow pit pony Carl, who died last October aged 29. Keepers at the museum said at the time they felt Sparky would struggle without his friend.

A spokeswoman for the museum said: “Sparky was a wonderful pony, he wasn’t particularly patient and he had a special kick for his stall door when it was time to go back into the fields.

“We know Sparky will be sorely missed, as he was loved by all who met him and his loss will be felt by all the staff at the museum, the visitors and those who adopted him.”

For generations, pit ponies were the backbone of the region’s coal industry, often spending months below ground hauling fuel and timber props to and from the coal face. At the turn of the last century, more than 70,000 ponies were used in Britain’s network of coal mines but at their final retirement there were fewer than 20 left still working.

Sparky is, however, believed to have been the oldest surviving deep-pit pony in the UK and his loss brings the end of another chapter in the North East coal mining heritage.

A Dean from “the Chapter”?
By G L Atkinson

The Miners’ Gala has continued to show an aspect of the coalfields’ history, and by way of the Cathedral service has marked the link between the Church and the industry.

It is a link which goes back to the earliest days of mining. Some say that medieval monks were among the first miners; certainly much of early mining was under the vast landholdings of the Church.

Because of this landownership an important economic aspect developed – the payment of a rental charge, or royalty, made by the mine operators to the landlord – whether the Sovereign, the Church or other freeholder.

The Durham diocese owned much land in the county – and also some in what is now known as Northumberland. In the 14th century the Bishop of Durham employed a supervisor of mines in the Bedlington area. And in the 16th century Bishop Wolsey (later Cardinal) made a similar appointment for some mines in North Durham.

These officials would have the job of ensuring that the Church received the royalties - rather than to manage mining operations. But, surprisingly there is a record in the early 20th century of a Reverend gentleman being the Agent of a coal company in Northumberland. Was it a coincidence that subsequently the 1911 Coal Mines Act said “the owner or agent of a mine required to be under the control of a manager shall not take part in the technical management of the mine unless he is qualified to be a manager”? .

The Church connection has been evident in other ways – and with other denominations. Sir Timothy Eden’s ‘History of Durham’ remarks on how the Miners’ Union developed largely from the activities of Methodist preachers. R. Page

Arnot wrote in his History of the Miners Federation of Great Britain that most of the Executive Committee were Methodists. They included Dr. John Wilson, the first President of DAMHA.

Perhaps less obvious, but no less valued for that, has been the help and support to the mining communities in times of stress from other groups, Catholic Churches and the Salvation Army among them. Another expression of this was in the involvement of Industrial Missions in our Mining Training Centres, and the nomination of Colliery Chaplains at some pits.

A different indication of the link was in the name of some pits. The first large pit in South Shields was called Chapter Main (the Dean and Chapter of Durham being the landowners) and the later and bigger colliery at Ferryhill was named Dean and Chapter.

Dean and Chapter colliery employed at one stage more than two thousand men. Such an undertaking required a large community to sustain it. Inevitably they produced many remarkable people – including at least one who was a great gift to the church.

In November last year the Daily Telegraph newspaper published a most impressive Obituary of the Reverend Professor John McManners, CBE. Born at Ferryhill, the son of a miner, (presumably at Dean and Chapter) John became a student at Oxford University, a soldier in the second world war, then a priest, and withal a highly distinguished academic during a most productive life.

Professor McManners achieved many things – and for some years was Dean of St. Edmund Hall at Oxford. Perhaps it might be said, of that post, that he was a Dean from “The Chapter” ?

New Mining Museum unveiled in Sunderland

One of the North’s most impressive mining archives was unveiled recently on Wearside. The North East England Mining Archive and Research Centre (NEEMARC) at the University of Sunderland is home to some of the region’s most important mining information.

The new centre, which received £270,000 from the Heritage Lottery Fund, houses trade union records, health and safety information, technical reports and legal records relating to mining legislation.

University of Sunderland academic Dr Stuart Howard, a social historian who is responsible for the creation of the archive, said: “Most families from the North-East will have some kind of link to the mining industry. Mining is an unbroken thread that runs through the region's modern economic, social and cultural history. Mining shaped and sculpted the region's industrial geography, created many of its cultural forms and produced or influenced its institutions. The region cannot be understood outside an appreciation of it.”

Material for the archive comes from the Durham Miners' Association (NUM North East), the Institute of Mining and Mechanical Engineers and the National Association of Colliery Overmen Deputies and Shotfirers (North East) as the project reflects cooperation between the institutions, which have at times not seen eye to eye.

Accidents in the mining industry were all too common and the archive includes everything from minor incidents to large scale disasters like the one on May 29, 1951, at Easington Pit in County Durham, which resulted in the death of 83 men including two rescue workers.Working people of all ages suffered in the mines, including the young George Bell, a screener who was killed by a runaway wagon in August 1877 when he was only 13 years of age.

Dr Howard, said, “The archive is accessible to all and serves a range of people from school children through to family historians and university researchers. This is stage one of the project and further funding will be sort to establish resource centres at Redhill in Durham and the Mining Institute at Newcastle.”There is a raft of vital information for researchers interested in trade union proceedings, minutes, and debates, health and safety records, geology and mining technology reports and legal records relating to mining legislation. There are also records of terrible incidents like the one at Easington in 1951.

Dr Keith Bartlett of the Heritage Lottery Fund said: “Mining is an important part of the heritage of the North East and impacted on so many lives here. Making these once separate resources available to the public in one place is a fantastic way to make it to easier for people to bring to life events that impacted on so many of us.”

The university’s main library, The Murray Library, has played an important part in the archive process. Dr Stuart Halliday will project manage the archive at the Murray Library.

Back to Double Row

I could hardly believe it – for there in the pages of the national magazine “Inside Housing” was a headline which began with the words “Double Row”. Did it mean that my one-time home location was to become officially remembered? It was only a few weeks earlier that an old friend had said to me that there should be a memorial on the site, saying, “Double Row was here”.

But I was mistaken, for as I read on I found that the headline did not refer to the “Row” which rhymes with “Bow”, it was about that “Row “ which rhymes with “Cow”. And the story was not about my home area. It was about somewhere near that of John Constable the painter, mentioned in the last issue of The Banner.

That previous issue reported on the excellent new bungalows built for DAMHA at Gateshead. I had been at their official opening and then, later that day, whilst musing about the difference between those new houses and the old pit cottages, I walked to our local shops.

My daydreaming was suddenly interrupted by a loud shout of “Double Row” a few yards in front of me. It came from an approaching figure whom I recognised as an old friend from the days when, as children, we lived at that address.

How the memories are stirred, and how merciful that the good ones seem to predominate over the recollections of the hardships. Memories of happy games of marbles, aiming them at three holes scooped out from the dirt back lane; and the games of football using the doors of the coalhouses as goals, often with a ‘football’ made of old newspaper or an empty tin can.

Our Row was built along a main road, with other rows at intervals, but in some colliery villages miners houses were build as very long street. One of the longest I’ve seen was, I believe, at Oakenshaw. I have an impression that the longest in the country was at a pit in Yorkshire.

They certainly had some rough conditions in Yorkshire in the old days. Jim Bullock, O.B.E. became President of the Union representing Colliery Management, but he began life in the pit village of Bowers Row. In his book “Them and Us” he mentions some of the living conditions in those early days. No paved roads or footpaths. No hot or cold water in the houses, just one tap in the middle of the long streets. No electricity, no gardens.

There were similar places in Durham. I could tell of worse; but it would be indelicate to go into detail!

Double Row was not as bad as Bowers Row. We did have our own cold-water tap, gas lighting, and gardens. Water could be heated on the cast iron range in the kitchen/living room where the fire was kept going day and night. It was needed to heat the water for the ‘tin’ bath where the miners washed away the dirt, which collected on their bodies from the mine.

The introduction of Pithead Baths was a major improvement in living conditions – but not every pit had this welfare facility. And even when the working men and boys could benefit from those showers, the rest of the family needed the tin bath. However, there was a certain comfort about relaxing in the bath and then stepping out onto the clippie mat to get dried in front of the glowing coal fire.

How things have changed. And what a difference in the lives of wives and mothers. We are glad that DAMHA can contribute by the provision of modern or modernised housing. Long may our residents enjoy it!

The Woodhorn experience: from colliery to world class visitor attraction

A massive £16 million redevelopment has transformed the old Woodhorn Colliery site in Ashington, Northumberland into a stunning new museum, archives and country park. It offers a great day out for anyone interested in the history of mining and Northumberland.

At the heart of the attraction is the ‘Cutter’ visitor centre which boasts a stunning roofline inspired by the giant coal cutting machines.

The ‘Coal Town’ exhibition takes you back through time, starting in 1918, for a unique time travel experience of life through the eyes of the Ashington community. And the colliery experience employs state-of-the-art computer simulations in big screen shows to ‘rebuild’ the old Woodhorn Colliery featuring pit buildings and even takes you to parts of the pit ‘off limits’ to get an impression of what it was like to be trapped underground.

There’s also a café and a shop, study centre and an and exhibitions centre. For active visitors there are cycle trails and nature walks in the QEII Country Park.

Entry is free, but there is £2 charge for parking.

Woodhorn is halfway between Newcastle city centre and Alnwick Castle.

By car - follow A189 and the Northumberland Coastal Route to the east of Ashington. Then watch out for the signs.
By public transport - take the A6 bus from Ashington Bus Station and it will bring you direct to the door.

Opening times
Open all year Wednesday - Sunday (and Bank Holidays)
April to October: 10am - 5pm.
November to March: 10am - 4pm

Special needs
The ‘Cutter’ visitor centre is wheelchair friendly. But the old colliery buildings, access is restricted.

Beamish Lamp Cabin

Beamish, the North of England Open Air Museum has announced the construction of an authentic period style 1913 Lamp Cabin building.

The lamp cabin will stand at the entrance to the drift mine. It will hold the museum’s internationally important lamp collection and other remarkable historic mining items. An exhibition area will illustrate the daily routine of miners a century ago.

Beamish staff would like to hear from members of former mining communities who remember using lamp cabins in earlier times, and who may have accounts of incidents involving lamps, mine safety and rescue, which would assist them in developing the new displays. Chris Scott, Curator of Industry at Beamish is also always interested to hear of surviving lamps, or other related equipment, which might help to fill gaps in the large and nationally important collection that the museum already owns. Chris can be contacted by telephone on 0191 370 4000.

The Lamp Cabin is part of the £40 million project at Beamish. A £6 million landmark visitor centre will also be developed to provide the highest possible standards of welcome for everyone at Beamish.

"Scene on a navigable river" at Flatford Mill by John Constable

By Horse To Etherley
by George L Atkinson

When John Constable, the famous landscape artist, was producing his pictures of scenes in the agricultural area of East Suffolk two hundred years ago he probably knew nothing about the coal mines in South West Durham. And yet whenever I see a reproduction of his painting of the "Scene on a navigable river" at Flatford Mill, I am reminded of the old print of Thomas Hair's sketch of Old Etherley Colliery.

Perhaps the reason for this mental connection is that both pictures include a very large horse with what seems, to me, an abnormally big head.

A lot of horses were used in the early days of the coal industry. The ancient shaft winding device, the whim gin, required a total of as many as ten horses! Other horses were employed to move wagons, or as pack-horses. And even when railways were introduced horses sometimes provided the haulage power - as they did on some sections of the famous Stockton and Darlington Railway of 1825.

That railway was important in enlarging the market for coal produced at the many mines in South West Durham, including those at Etherley. The pits which comprised "Old Etherley Colliery" are mentioned as being the Success, the Phoenix, the George, the Jane, and the Rush. Others, in different ownership, were Etherley Grange, and the Etherley Dene Pit and Quarry Drift.

The records of exploratory Borings and Sinkings has some interesting comments about the Etherley Dene sinking in 1856. It quotes an alias, "Dabble Ducks", for the name; it says the pit is behind and close to the Boat House at the side of the Wear; and that the exploring roadways have a strong roof "requiring no timber (supports) in narrow work".

Thomas Hair’s sketch of Old Etherley Colliery

Of the pit names mentioned above only the Quarry Drift survived as a mine to be taken over by the National Coal Board in 1947. The drift closed in 1955, with the 82 miners being transferred to other mines in the area.

"Small mines" were excepted from nationalisation and the "Old Etherley" name lived on for a while in three of them. One of these, "Old Etherley No 2" had, in 1951, 2 men employed underground and 1 at the surface, "Old Etherley No. 3" had at that time 16 underground and 4 at the surface; "Old Etherley No. 4" was said to be "developing".

These numbers of employees contrast sharply with those at Old Etherley nearly fifty years earlier when the Colliery Manager was Mr R Kellett. The Manager at the nearby Saint Helen's Colliery was Mr M H Kellett. I wonder if they were brothers?

Mr M H Kellett moved to become the Agent for some other pits in the area and he well deserves at least a mention because he was a benefactor who provided six houses at St Helen's Auckland for the fledgling DAMHA.

Another kind of generosity was shown by the miners of Etherley during the periods of economic hardships in the 1920's and early 1930's. In the 1920's they began to clear some leased ground to form a recreation facility. This effort led to the establishment of what became the "West Tees, Etherley Jane and Carterthorne Welfare Scheme" for the benefit of local residents:

Over the years further work was done to expand the project and, as the Etherley and District Welfare scheme, it continues to operate under the auspices of CISWO.

One of the facilities there is the cricket pitch, which is the home ground for the Etherley Cricket Club, which began in 1850 and has a proud record of achievement. Long may it, and the spirit of the old mining community, continue!

"Scene on a navigable river" at Flatford Mill by John Constable

By Horse To Etherley
by George L Atkinson

Perhaps the reason for this mental connection is that both pictures include a very large horse with what seems, to me, an abnormally big head.

Thomas Hair’s sketch of Old Etherley Colliery

Over the years further work was done to expand the project and, as the Etherley and District Welfare scheme, it continues to operate under the auspices of CISWO.

of Murton, and Murton

I never thought that a bottle of beer would affect me so much - but this one certainly got my mind going. I hasten to add that I did not, and do not, drink it, beer is not my cup of tea, so to speak.

mr joe clark

No, it was not the content or the bottle that caught my eye - it was the name on the label "Sneck Lifter". It took me back more than twenty years to an occasion when I had been meeting some Union Officials at Murton. When we finished, the Lodge Secretary, Joe Clark, (pictured left), kindly invited me to join him for a "sneck lifter" which, politely I hope, I declined.

Until I recently saw that label I had forgotten about the term. But I do not forget Joe Clark. He was in my view a fine example of the Durham Miners and their local leaders. He was kind too, because he often called me "young un" which even then was a slight exaggeration. It would be his concern for the "old uns" which was more important and led to the DAMHA Sheltered Housing Scheme at Murton being named "Clark House".

Murton Colliery has a special place in the history of coal mining - and mining communities. The sinking of the first shaft began in February 1838 and it was more than five years before the Five Quarter seam was reached at a depth of 250 feet. The sinking continued until the Hutton seam was found - a total depth of 1450 feet.

Meanwhile the sinking of the Middle Pit and West Pit shafts had commenced in 1840 and finished in 1847. The historian Fordyce in 1860 wrote that winning Murton was the most difficult and expensive mining undertaking on record. The great problem and consequential expense arose from the huge quantity of water encountered in the limestone stratum which overlies the workable coal measures in East Durham.

Certainly the expense would dwarf the cost of sinking the other Murton - on North Tyneside - which began in 1796. But though much different in size and cost, the two Murtons had the common feature that they produced some remarkable people.

The Northumberland Murton was the birthplace of Thomas Burt - the first miner to be elected to Parliament. He became a Government Minister and a Privy Counsellor. His father, Peter Burt, a Primitive Methodist and a Union activist, was victimised and obliged to move from pit to pit for work. Around 1850 he was living at South Hetton; whether he and young Thomas found work there or at the newly opened nearby Murton before they returned to Northumberland in 1851 is an interesting question!

Certainly our Durham Murton has made great contributions to Politics, Trade Unions, Mine Management, Miners Welfare and the Church. It is no coincidence that there is a strong Murton background among those now responsible for the governance of DAMHA.

Go to the news archive.

Archived People, Pits & Places

Tribute to Mining Community

by Mrs Jennie Messer, Easington

Miners’ names to go online

Durham Miners’ Gala Book Project

The Mystery of the Miners’ Medal

Women of the pits

68 years a miner

Courage, Coal and Codex, by George L Atkinson

Derek Hollows' Memoria

Diversity of Enterprise

GALA POEMS

The Mighty Atom

Durham Miners’ Spitfires

New banner for Crookhall Lodge

RAF tribute to miners who bought Spitfires for the Few

Unearthing our mining heritage

CISWO, championing social welfare in the mining community

The Great Northern Miners

Banner comes home

End of an era as the last pit pony dies

A Dean from “the Chapter”? By G L Atkinson

New Mining Museum unveiled in Sunderland

Back to Double Row

The Woodhorn experience: from colliery to world class visitor attraction

Beamish Lamp Cabin

A Dean from “the Chapter”?
By G L Atkinson