live in an age of progression, and we ought to leave behind us those
old and antiquated practices of practical philanthropy. Christ always
spoke the truth too. When He made a promise it was always kept."
Then he asks:
"What wrong are the workmen doing? Our only aim is the establishment
of common justice amongst mankind. We have myriads of men, women, and
children who but seldom receive an approximate sufficiency of the
commonest necessaries of life. And it is a self-evident fact that
nothing will render human existence so miserable and short as social
destitution, bringing, as a matter of consequence, mental pressure or
anxiety of mind. Even comparative want is prejudicial to physical
health. This brings care and anxiety. They act and react on each
other, often doing their deadly work ere men have passed half their
allotted threescore years and ten. That these things exist are
incontrovertible facts. And does their removal by moral and
philosophical means not _in part_ pertain to the work which this
gentleman has chosen for himself in life? History and observation
alike teach that, where a people are socially depressed, moral
culture is a most difficult matter, and, where moral cultivation is
no easy task, to spiritualise is next to an utter impossibility. So
that in reality, when rightly viewed, there is a very near kinship,
and ought to be, in working a very close connection between the Union
to which the Philadelphia Society belongs and the work in which this
reverend gentleman is engaged. Whether or not Mr Blagdon will endorse
these sentiments I cannot say; however, be that as it may, when in
future he makes a promise let him keep it, and likewise cease to give
utterance to such vehement expressions as hating and detesting that
about which he seems to understand but little indeed. By pursuing
such a course he will in future save himself the merited contempt of
his parishioners."
This quotation will serve a twofold purpose: it will give an example
of Mr Crawford's vigorous style of writing when roused and at his
best, and it will indicate the kind of opposition the young
Association was met with at this very delicate and important period of
its existence. Those who should have welcomed all effort towards
better things should have assisted instead of thwarting and
maligning.
The year 1871 found the builders of the Association untiring in their
efforts, but still meeting great discouragements. These came mainly
from the apathy of the people whom they were trying to help. Like
Nehemiah they had their Sanballats, who did their best to prevent the
work; but, inspired by the belief in the power of a united people to
better their own condition, they fought and built, making headway but
slowly. In the early part of January a Miners' Conference was held in
Manchester to consider the Mines Regulation Bill, the Trades Union
Bill, the Truck Bill, and kindred subjects. The delegate from Durham
was Mr W. Crawford, and the number he represented was 18,000.
Before proceeding further with the account of the building we will
place on record the first collective action taken by the young
Association. This was in relation to the inundation which happened at
Wheatley Hill on Thursday, the 19th of January 1871. The colliery had
been in operation about six months; there were thirteen hewers, five
putters, and three helpers up, with the necessary deputies and others,
at the time it occurred. There were five lives lost, and others had a
very narrow escape. There is no need to describe in detail the whole
circumstances. It will be sufficient to say that a man named Roberts
was in a place which was being driven in the main coal at Thornley for
the purpose of tapping some water which was lying on the Thornley side
in order that it might be run to the other colliery which lies to the
"dip." In addition to those who lost their lives, other two were
rescued after being in the mine fifty-four hours.
The Miners' Association was not slow in taking part in the subsequent
proceedings, and at the inquest which opened on the 25th at the
Colliery Office, Wheatley Hill, by Mr Crofton Maynard (whose able
services are still given to inquiries into the sad accidents in the
Easington Ward), the Association was represented by Mr W. Crawford. On
his application that witnesses should be summoned on behalf of the
workmen the Coroner readily consented to an adjournment until
Wednesday, the 8th of February. The adjourned inquest was held at
Wingate Grange, when Mr A. Cairns, Secretary, and Mr W. Crawford,
Agent, were present on behalf of the Association, with Mr Kewney,
Solicitor, of North Shields, to watch the proceedings. After a very
long and exhaustive inquiry the verdict was "that the deceased were
killed on the 19th of January by a burst of water in the Wheatley Hill
pit, through the gross negligence of W. Spencer, head viewer, W. Hay,
resident viewer, and Thomas Watson, overman; and that the said W.
Spencer, W. Hay, and T. Watson did kill and slay the five deceased
previously mentioned by neglecting to put in proper bore holes for the
safe working of the mine." On that verdict the Coroner committed the
accused for trial at the Assizes on a charge of manslaughter.
The trial took place at the March Assizes before Baron Martin. The
counsel for the Association were Mr Herschell (afterwards Lord
Chancellor) and Mr J. Edge. The writer of this history was in court,
and heard the trial, and the able speech made by Mr Herschell, whose
object was to show that there had been a violation of the Mines Act of
1860, the fifteenth rule of which was to the effect "that bore holes
should be kept in advance, and if necessary on both sides, on
approaching places likely to contain a large quantity of water." The
Grand Jury had thrown out the Bill, but the case was still proceeded
with. It was clear the judge was against the proceedings after the
throwing out of the Bill; and eventually the workmen's counsel
withdrew the case, because the judge was of the opinion that Roberts
(the hewer in whose place the water broke away) should have known as
well as the manager how near the water was to them, and because, on
the technical point, it was quite clear how the judge would direct the
jury. The accused were therefore acquitted. One little piece of funny
puzzling of the judge is very vividly remembered. Roberts was not a
native of the county, but was doing his best to train himself in the
peculiarities of a dialect which, when spoken by a Durham man, is to a
stranger difficult to understand, but more so when it comes from a
Welsh tongue. At one part of the proceedings the judge asked Roberts
what he was doing when the water broke in. The reply was: "Aw hed
getten me jud korved, and the hole marked off, and was gannen back for
the drills." With surprise the judge repeated the question, and
received the same answer. Perplexed, but not enlightened, a second
query was put: "What did you do then?" "Aw run doon the board and up
the stenton." Innocently the judge put a supplementary question: "Was
it a wide plank you ran along?" thinking the word board meant a piece
of timber laid for Roberts to walk on. Upon an explanation being given
he confessed that, in the whole of his experience, he had never been
so much puzzled before.
In our review of the building of the Association it will not be
necessary to mention the work in the county except so far as it
relates to the object we are dealing with: the raising and
strengthening of the organisation and the changes in policy and
procedure. The first Council in 1871 was held on March 25th. The
attendance of delegates was moderate, and Mr Crawford, the President
of the Association, was called to the chair.
At this meeting we have the first mention of the Yearly Demonstration.
It was moved "that the Council take into consideration the
desirability of holding a general meeting of miners in the central
district, the expenses of such to be paid from the Central Fund." The
time named was shortly after Easter. It was likewise arranged for the
agents to live in Durham. Mr Crawford at that time was residing in
Sunderland, and Mr Patterson in Bishop Auckland. This, it was felt,
interfered very much with the necessary consultation and arranging of
work. A series of resolutions was brought forward by Mr Crawford.
First, that "minerals be weighed only, seeing that measuring and
gauging are sources of endless losses to the hewers." Second, "that
miners ought to be allowed to place on the pit bank as checkweighman a
man of their own choice, whether such person be one of the workmen or
not." Third, the appointment of an additional number of inspectors or
sub-inspectors is required--the number of pits in 1869 in the whole
country being 3206, and only 12 inspectors, which gave an average of
267 pits each. The following resolution was carried:--
"We believe that to make inspection thoroughly effective, mines
ought to be inspected at intervals not exceeding three months."
The fourth resolution was "that no boy should be allowed to work more
than ten hours a day." The Murton delegate seconded the resolution,
and said: "Miners were often referred to as an ignorant set of men,
but if they received more attention than they did in the seed-time of
life perhaps better fruit would be received. At present their boys
went to work at half-past four in the morning, and did not leave the
mine till half-past five in the evening. By the time they got home,
washed themselves, and had a little refreshment it was seven o'clock.
Certainly night schools were provided for the boys, but he could not
see the utility of them, as the minds of the lads after being so many
hours in the pit were incapable of receiving instruction. Providing
schools under these circumstances for pit lads was like preparing food
for persons who had no appetite." That speech is worth quoting and
remembering, because it gives us so clearly the condition in that year
and shows so graphically the change since then. The young men at least
will do well to ponder the lesson. To them it means much, and tells
them the benefit they have (in this alone) received from the labours
of those men who so unselfishly toiled in the early days.
At this time a question arose which evoked great feeling in the
Thornley district in particular, and throughout the county in general.
This was the refusal by Mr Cooper, the manager at Thornley, to bind Mr
A. Cairns, the Secretary of the Association, who was checkweighman,
and Mr J. Jackson, one of the Executive Committee. At that time, it
should be remembered, a man to be a checkweighman must be, and remain,
a workman on the colliery, and therefore be "bound" as all other men
were. The situation is interesting for two points--first, because it
was productive of some very strong letter writing by Mr Crawford in
defence of the two men; and second, because it is the first recorded
instance of an offer from the men to apply arbitration as a means of
settling disputes between employers and workmen under this
Association. The offer was contained in a resolution passed at a
special Council held in the Market Hotel, Durham, on 8th April. The
following is a portion of the resolution:--
"This meeting strongly urges on the Thornley workmen the propriety of
offering to submit the whole case to arbitration, the members of the
Board chosen to be composed of an equal number from both sides; the
arbitrators to elect an umpire whose decision shall be final."
I quote two sentences from one of Mr Crawford's letters:
"The entire transactions both on the part of the masters, and these
perfidious hirelings [certain blacklegs] is contemptible in the
extreme, clearly showing to working men that where they have not, by
combination, the power to protect themselves they will only be
endured so long as they are passive slaves in the hands of grasping
greediness. Men need to arise, and by an active concentration of
organised power frustrate that intolerance so rampant among them, an
intolerance diametrically opposed to the spirit of the age, and one
that will not hesitate to build its own advancement on the
spoliation and desolation, and if necessary the damnation, of myriads
of immortal beings."
OUR FIRST GALA
The first in the long series of meetings was held in Wharton's Park,
Durham, on Saturday, the 12th of August 1871. For some time prior
district meetings had been held in different parts of the county, and
great efforts made to secure a good gathering. In addition, a "sum
amounting to £20 was offered in three prizes for a Band Contest, and
liberal money prizes for various athletic sports." There was a charge
for admission, and it was estimated that between 4000 and 5000 paid
for admission. The speakers outside the Association were A. Macdonald,
W. Brown, Staffordshire, and John Normansell, Yorkshire. The local
speakers were Mr W. H. Patterson, Mr Hendry, Addison Colliery; Mr T.
Ramsey, Mr N. Wilkinson, Mr Allens, Mr Young, Addison Colliery; and Mr
Ferguson, Edmondsley. The platform was decorated with the Thornley
banner, and in the arena was a banner bearing the inscription: "A fair
day's wage for a fair day's work." The chairman was Mr W. Crawford.
His first words were: "This is the first great Gala Day of the Durham
Miner's Mutual Confident Association, and I only pray that it will not
be the last." He reminded them that he and his colleagues had only
been trying to organise the county. They had met with great
difficulties, but they were still alive, and more likely to continue
alive than ever. "I can assure you," he said, "that on this, the 12th
day of August 1871, the Durham Miners' Association was never in a more
healthy position; never more healthy with regard to its feeling and
determination to carry on its great work of organising the county;
never more healthy with respect to its funds; and never more healthy
in reference to the general progressive tendency of its operations,
since the first day the Association was established." To quote the
speeches would be foreign to the purpose of this history. The speakers
were men who did great work in the Trades Union movement in the period
with which we are now dealing. William Brown had peculiar methods,
partaking more of a religious revivalist. He ofttimes at home opened
his meetings with prayer, and had a small collection of songs
(entitled melodies and poems), from which he would sing before he
commenced to speak (and he was a singer). For some months it was the
privilege of the writer to be engaged as a lecturer in the Midlands by
the Miners' National Union in 1878, three weeks of which were spent
with Brown in North Stafford, and therefore there was a good
opportunity of judging. At this first Gala Brown sang two of these
songs, and recited the following poem:--
WORKING MEN
"Think what power lies within you,
For what triumphs you are formed;
Think, but not alone of living
Like the horse from day to day;
Think, but not alone of giving
Health for pelf, and soul for pay.
Think, oh! be machines no longer,
Engines made of flesh and blood;
Thought will make you fresher, stronger,
Link you to the great and good;
Thought is a wand of power,
Power to make oppression shrink,
Grasp ye then the precious dower,
Poise it, wield it, work and think."
These men, heroes of the highest order, who inaugurated one of the
finest series of labour meetings ever held in this or any other
county, who saw the possibilities which lay within us, and who spoke
such words of hope, have all passed to the reward which awaits the
good and the true who battle for the right in whatever clime or sphere
of life. Their spirits still live and move and have being in many
to-day, bearing testimony that "the good men do lives after them."
A delegate meeting was held on the 9th of September 1871, Mr Crawford
presiding, at which three general matters were transacted. It was
decided to retain a solicitor to transact the legal business of the
Association and act as adviser. Arrangements were to be made to open a
proper banking account, and it was resolved to join the Miners'
National Association.
The next delegate meeting of importance was held in the Shakespeare
Hall, North Road, Durham. Mr J. Forman was now chairman (although
still continuing to live at Roddymoor)--Mr Crawford being appointed
secretary, Mr Wilkinson treasurer, and Mr Patterson agent. The matter
under discussion was the wage settlement, some dissatisfaction being
manifested at the difference between the men underground and those at
bank, and a report was made of the first case settled by arbitration.
This was at the Lizzie Colliery, the arbitrators being T. Taylor-Smith
and Mr W. Crawford.
THE LEADERS
With the Council meeting held on Tuesday, March 26th, 1872, by the
election of Mr Forman as president and Mr Crawford as secretary, and
the regular meetings with the employers being recognised, we have the
Association fully and solidly established. Before we proceed further
it will be in natural order if we take a short glance at the men who
were at the head of it. There is no need to enlarge upon them; a bare
outline will be sufficient. The first in prominence and force was Mr
W. Crawford. When appointed he was outside the county, but owing to
his having been secretary of the combined counties he was known to the
Durham men as an able and forcible Trades Unionist. When the
separation between the two counties took place he was engaged as
secretary of the Northumberland Association. This post, says Fynes in
his history, he filled "with great ability until June 1865, and made
himself a great favourite in Northumberland, but he then left the
Association in order to take the secretaryship of the Cowpen
Co-operative Store at Blyth." Mr Burt was elected to succeed him. In
1870, when Mr Crawford applied for the position of agent in Durham, he
was selected from a number of candidates. It was at this time that the
writer had the pleasure of making his acquaintance, and had large
opportunities of forming an estimate of his ability. Never had any man
more force of character or more executive power. His individuality
was very large. He had no love for platform work, and the love for
that sphere lessened as he grew older; but he had no superior and few
equals in his grasp of, and power to find a solution of, the peculiar
difficulties and complications which arise in an occupation like the
miners. He was a solver of difficulty and a manager of men, and in
every way fitted for the post of secretary of a trades organisation.
From his appointment to his death he filled it with a skill few men
can command.
_N. Wilkinson_, the first treasurer of the Association, had worked at
Trimdon Grange as a fireman. At the date of his appointment he was
earning a living by tea selling, having lost his employment on account
of his Trades Union principles. His first appointment was temporary,
and when elected permanently he was living at Coxhoe. As soon as the
Union was fairly started he was made treasurer permanently, and so
acted till 1882. As a speaker he was of a blunt, straightforward
order. As Othello says: "His was a round unvarnished tale and he told
it right on." At the commencement, when announced on the bills it was
as "Nicky Wilkinson," and no man could be in the least doubt but that
when he spoke to them on the Union and its usefulness it was from the
heart. As a man in those stern and trying times he was, as those who
were his colleagues would testify, a man upon whom they could depend
in any testing circumstances.
_Mr J. Forman._--He was the first regular chairman. At the time of his
appointment he was checkweighman at Roddymoor, and when spoken of it
was as "Forman of Roddymoor." He came from Northumberland to Annfield
Plain when a young man. He acted as president of the Association for a
time, and followed his occupation as checkweighman; then in 1874 he
was appointed a permanent official, and removed to Durham. He
continued in that position until his death on the 2nd of September
1900, at the age of seventy-seven. He was an ideal president. It is
not saying too much--his superior could not be found. The fact of his
appointment to that position indicated the prominent part he took in
the formation of the Union. He was more of an adviser than a platform
speaker. He preferred a quiet, retiring life in which he could be
useful rather than ornamental. Although shunning public notoriety he
was no shirker when danger demanded the presence of men, for in all
the explosions which happened during the term of his office he was one
of the foremost; and almost single-handed he stood out for the dust
theory when men of noted scientific knowledge were against him.
_W. H. Patterson._--His life's work, from start to finish, was the
most conclusive testimony as to the sincerity of his purpose. There
were men then, as now, whose motive is the loaves and fishes, willing
to gather where they strew not and reap where they have not sown; but
Patterson was not one of these. From the time when, but a mere boy
living at Windy Nook, he threw himself into the work, with earnestness
and energy, until his death, when a comparatively young man, he
devoted himself and the best he could give to the establishment of and
care for the Union. When it prospered no man was more cheerful, and
when dark times came upon it his sorrow was genuine and large. He was
not a Crawford (few were), yet for persistent plodding he was equal
to any. With youthful buoyancy, and a heart full of desire and
determination, he was the very man for the position in which he was
placed. It would have been a useful addition to our own literature if
he had placed on record the hardships he, with "Tommy Ramsey" endured
in 1870-72. They lodged many a time in a room the walls of which were
the horizon and the lamps the stars above them. Money was not
plentiful, and it was not every person who dared to take an agitator
in to lodge. It was in many quarters considered a crime almost
deserving of capital punishment.
"_Tommy Ramsey._"--What can be said of "Tommy"? He was a most perfect
type of an old school miner, and a sound Trades Unionist, one of the
heroes of '44. There are numbers of men in the county who will
remember the rugged old warrior in the noble cause, just as the
picture hanging in the Hall describes him--a rough but true diamond of
the first water. With bills under his arm and crake in hand he went
from row to row announcing the meetings and urging the men to attend.
His words were few, but forcible; not polished, but very pointed--and
they went home. Like Longfellow's arrow shot in the air, they found a
resting-place. He had one speech, the peroration of which was
something like the following:--"Lads, unite and better your condition.
When eggs are scarce, eggs are dear; when men are scarce, men are
dear." It was impossible to miss the meaning in those words. Their
simplicity was their greatest eloquence. His work was far from
pleasant or safe. The writer of this was witness of a brutal attack on
the old man by a bully who would disgrace any place in which he
lived. This antipodes of a man, to curry favour with the manager, and
to please those who bought him body and what soul he had, ill used
Ramsey, and burnt his crake. At the subsequent meeting Crawford was
wild in his denunciations. The words still ring in my ears. Brave old
"Tommy" cared not; he got a new crake, and turned it with more
emphasis. Grand old Ramsey, you are right now; if not, many of us have
a poor chance. You in your way, in accordance with your ability, tried
to open the prison doors to those who were bound, and to stir up a
love of freedom in the breast of those who were in willing slavery.
[Illustration: T. RAMSEY]
THE OPPOSITION TO THE BUILDING