The death of UK coal mining
Being born and raised (until the age of 6) in a mining community makes me someone with a clear link back to an industry that has now completely gone.
By the time I was born (1958) it seems coal mining was already in decline. Both of my grandads were originally miners but both finished their working years doing other work – one had a fruit and veg horse & cart round in Kirkby-In-Ashfield the other worked in Boots the Chemist factory in Nottingham. Of my dad’s generation, amongst my family, 2 of the men were miners but 3 were not. Of my generation (all born 1950’s) none of the 3 males became miners.
Frankly, mining was a dangerous job which many fathers clearly did not want their sons to follow on to, if there were other employment opportunities available. However, for generations alternative employments for men were few as mining communities had been developed to provide miners for local pits. The railways were the obvious alternative as wherever there was a pit there was a railway working to it. My uncle Ken Calladine took the railway route to employment.
I recently came across a YouTube video from June 1968, which I link below:-
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=00PpizDxVG4 *
The video is of a Nottinghamshire NUM Miners’ Gala/Demonstration through Mansfield. What particularly took my eye was the white ‘coffin’ regarding the demise of Kirkby (Summit) Colliery (closed 1968) as that was where my grandad Walter Calladine had worked many years ago. He died of pneumoconiosis, I might add.
So only 10 years after I was born the decline in coal mining was clearly deepening. Add another 40 years on and UK coal mining was all but gone with mining communities suffering great hardship due to the lack of alterative employments; some still struggle to this day! Friday 10th July 2015 saw the last Nottinghamshire coalfield mine close – Thoresby.
Many of us, if we think about coal mining at all these days, will look back to the miners' strike of 1984/85 and probably see it as the defining moment in the run down of the UK coal industry. In many ways it was, however, more mines were actually closed during Harold Wilson’s governments than at the hands of ‘Thatcher the milk snatcher’.
The video is a wonderful piece of social history as much as it’s a record of proud but declining mining communities. Just imagine if we were expecting our present generation of young men to go down a pit; there’d probably be demonstrations against such dangerous work and the wording on that ‘coffin’ may change to:-
‘***** Colliery - Don’t send our sons to be murdered down a pit’
* Acknowledging the MuBu Miner YouTube channel/original recording by Ken Smith
Archive footage of the 1968 Nottinghamshire NUM Gala and Demonstration passing through Westgate, Mansfield in June 1968. The theme of pit-closures is evident from the various floats, 1968 was the worst ever year for pit closures in Britain. Branch Banners, Coal Queens, Colliery Brass Bands and Carnival Bands all feature in the footage. Original footage by Ken Smith of Underwood
Archive footage of the 1968 Nottinghamshire NUM Gala and Demonstration passing through Westgate, Mansfield in June 1968. The theme of pit-closures is evident from the various floats, 1968 was the worst ever year for pit closures in Britain. Branch Banners, Coal Queens, Colliery Brass Bands and Carnival Bands all feature in the footage. Original footage by Ken Smith of Underwood
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