00:01
[A CHOIR SINGS AR HYD Y NOS]
00:14
[NARRATOR] This film traces the development of a typical Welsh coal mining community which sprang up during the latter half of the nineteenth century, in the valleys of South Wales. It looks briefly at the history of coal mining, the many disasters which occurred and contains interviews with ex-miners, who spent their lives toiling in the local collieries. Visits to the Big Pit mining museum and the Cambrian Lamp Works are featured, together with examples of the children’s work, in the form of art, poetry and drama.
00:50
[NARRATOR] The first signs of industry in the Aman Valley probably date back to the sixteenth century, when ironmasters from Sussex moved to South Wales and a number of small blast furnaces were built. One such furnace stands at the top of a valley, built to take advantage of the wood, water and iron ore which could be found close by. The following piece of film shows the Aman Valley today, which has changed greatly from the days when the first iron masters arrived in our district. The development of the present day villages of Glynhafod, Cwmaman, Godreaman, and a large part of Aberaman, can be traced back to the middle of the last century, when coal mining began at the foot of our valley.
01:34
[YOUNG BOY – ‘LEE’] Here we are, at the bottom end of the Aman Valley, where the first coal mine was sunk by Crawshay Bailey in 1845. He also opened his iron works in the same year, when the coalfield mines used to smelt iron.
02:04
[YOUNG GIRL] We’ve moved further up the valley from where Lee told us about the sinking of the Aberaman Colliery by Crawshay Bailey. We’re now looking at the site on which once stood the Cwmneol Colliery. The colliery was developed between the years 1847 to 1851, by men from Northumberland and Gwent.
02:28
[YOUNG GIRL] Bedwlwyn Colliery and coke houses were established in 1865 in this area of Cwmaman, by a man called James Kenway of Neath. Although there’s very little trace of the original berthings, the tips around this area serve as a reminder of the amount of work that went on.
02:51
[YOUNG GIRL] We’ve moved further up the valley to a point where it is possible to see the original site of Fforchaman Colliery, which was developed between 1852 and 1858 by a number of businessmen from Gwent. As you can see, the pithead buildings have been removed and houses have now been built on the site.
03:11
[YOUNG GIRL] It is difficult to picture this area as it was. There were no less than three pits around here. Cwmaman Colliery was the first to be developed by H. J. Evans and Thomas Shepherd in the 1850s, when the Fforchwen Pit was sunk in 1897 and the Trewen Pit in 1910.
03:51
[NARRATOR] Having looked at the way the coal mining industry took off in our valley, we thought it would be a good idea to find out more about what coal mining was like when people began to go underground. The first kind of pits were called ‘bell pits’. A shaft was dug down until it met with a band of coal, miners then worked outwards as far as they dared, before the roof fell in on them. Both the coal and the miners were hauled out in baskets, in much the same way as buckets of water in an old fashioned well. When the bell had become too big to be safe, the pit was left and another shaft was sunk.
04:13
[NARRATOR] During the early years of the last century, children started work young and worked hard in the coal mines of South Wales. In 1841, the government sent inspectors to South Wales to look at the conditions in which children worked in the mines. The following statements are taken from the inspectors’ reports.
[VOICE OF YOUNG BOY] “My name is Phillip Jones, I started work when I was 7. Sometimes when I am hungry I want to go home for some bread and cheese. Nearly a year ago there was an accident and most of us were burnt. I was carried home by a man, it hurt very much because all the skin was burnt off my face. I have 7 brothers and sisters but only 5 of us can find work. None of us have ever been to school.”
[VOICE OF YOUNG BOY] “I am Aled Dodd, I am 8 years old. I have to work the doors that let air into the mine. I have to do this without the light and I’m scared. I go at four and sometimes half past three in the morning and come out at five and half past. I never go to sleep, sometimes I sing when it’s light but not in the dark, I dare not sing then.”
[NARRATOR] Eventually, when the Government Inspectors published their report, an Act of Parliament was passed which made the employment of women and children underground illegal. But far too few inspectors were appointed to check that these rules were kept and many mines kept employing young children underground.
05:50
[YOUNG BOY] Having looked briefly at the history of coal mining, it seemed to us that working underground must have been very dangerous. That led to Anne, Sasha, Simon and Paul to look at the dangers involved in working deep, down under the ground.
06:07
[NARRATOR] Most coal gives off gas; newly cut coal gives off a great deal, this gas is called Firedamp. The miners used candles to give them light, sometimes the miner put his candle near the coalface and set light to gas, often this caused an explosion.
06:23
[YOUNG BOY] To find out more about safety lamps, our class visited the local Lamp Works at Aberdare.
06:31
[YOUNG GIRL] Here we are at the Cambrian Lamp Works in Aberdare, which was established in 1860.
06:53
[NARRATOR] Simon, our reporter on the spot, interviewed Mr Hill, the Lamp Works’ manager, who showed us how lamps were developed and how a modern lamp works today.
07:03
[MR HILL] The principle on which the safety lamp works was discovered by Sir Humphry Davy in 1813, which is a very long time ago, isn’t it? What he found out was that when gas is present it’ll pass through a tube of gauze. This gauze surrounds the flame in safety lamps, and he found out that the gas, if there was any present, would go back into the lamp, burn on top of the flame in a blue cap, then the gas wouldn’t come back through the gauze and ignite any gas that might be present in the mine.
When they were first made, they were very similar to this sort of lamp, it was simply a flame surrounded by a tube of gauze. Now, when this is used underground, if it got knocked, the gauze could get damaged and if you’ve got a damaged gauze then it then ceases to be safe, it’s broken, the gas can pass back out through the lamp. It’s also very difficult to see the flame because it wasn’t very clear because of the gauze. So, we went from this type of lamp, you came onto this type of lamp where the flame itself is surrounded by a glass. Now, this type of lamp was invented by a gentleman called Doctor Clanny. It’s just a natural progression from this lamp to this lamp, where the flame itself is surrounded by a tube of glass, the gauze above and the gas and air had to travel through the gauze, down onto the flame. Again, as you can see, the gauze itself can get damaged by a knock or a bump or if the workman dropped the lamp, so we progressed from this sort of thing to this type of lamp, where the gauze now is inside the lamp surrounded by a steel shield which protects the lamp. And the principle is the same again, the gas has to travel through these little vents, through the gauze, down onto the flame. Again it can’t come back out through the gauze therefore not igniting the gas outside.
Now, a progression from that, again, is with this type of lamp. If it went out the collier had to walk back to what was called a lighting station, where he was able to light his lamp. But the next progression was, was the type of lamp where the official, particularly, whose job it is to test for gas, was able to re-light his own lamp, just like that, so if the lamp went out he could re-light it. And he would test for gas in the normal way by holding the lamp up to the ceiling, because the methane gas which is found underground, normally lies in the roof or the ceiling of a colliery in very thin layers, and this is the type of lamp that’s used underground today.
Are they expensive? They’re not expensive when you consider what they are. When you bear in mind that the lamp has 3 purposes, firstly it will supply light, obviously there’s a flame there, the second function and most important, is that it tests for gas. Now, its third function is the fact that it will indicate that there’s a lack of oxygen underground. If, for some reason, there’s bad ventilation or there’s been an explosion or this sort of thing, because the lamp is burning and the flame is burning, it needs oxygen and if there’s a lack of oxygen the lamp then goes out. So, when you consider the number of lives that the miners’ safety lamp has saved, you wouldn’t think that it was expensive, they’re not very expensive.
10:48
[YOUNG BOY – ‘SIMON’] Thank you for answering our questions.
11:14
[NARRATOR] Here we are holding the finished safety lamp. These lamps are not only supplied to mines in our country but also packed and sent to other parts of the world. Although safety lamps were developed and used in the mining industry, explosions still occurred. This was mainly due to the increasing use of explosives, which were not always used in a safe way. This drama shows how a disaster occurred at Gresford in North Wales, killing more or less, 265 men.
11:51
[NARRATORS] On that fateful morning, the men were happily walking to work, telling the odd joke or story. They changed into their working clothes and collected their lamps. As a normal procedure, they were searched for naked lights, only then were they allowed to enter the cage, to descend to the pit bottom. The shift headed to the deep section of the mine, everyone began work in the usual way. All of a sudden, an explosion occurred.
[LOUD SCREAMS]
12:45
[NARRATOR] An anonymous poet tells us the whole story and leaves us with no doubt who is to blame.
12:45
[YOUNG GIRL AND BOY]
You've heard of the Gresford disaster,
The terrible price that was paid,
242 colliers were lost
And 3 men of a rescue brigade.
It occurred in the month of September,
At 3 in the morning, that pit
Was wracked by a violent explosion
In the Dennis where dust lay so thick.
The gas in the Dennis deep section
Was packed like snow in a drift,
And many a man had to leave the coalface
Before he had worked out his shift.
A fortnight before the explosion,
The shot-firer Thomlinson cried
“If you fire that shot we’ll all be blown to hell!”
And no one can say that he lied.
The fireman's reports they are missing,
The records of 42 days,
The colliery manager had them destroyed
To cover his criminal ways.
Down there in the dark they are lying,
They died for 9 shillings a day.
They worked out their shift and now they must lie
In the darkness until judgement day.
The Lord Mayor of London's collecting
To help with the children and wives,
The owners have sent some white lilies
To pay for the colliers’ lives.
Farewell, our dear wives and our children,
Farewell our dear comrades as well.
Don’t send your sons in the dark, dirty mine,
Or they’ll be damned like the sinners in hell.
14:16
[NARRATOR] Having looked at the history of mining in our area, the evolution of the safety lamp and the tragic Gresford disaster, we thought it would be a good idea to get first-hand experience of being in a mine. The Big Pit mining museum of Blaenavon, closed as a working colliery in 1980 but still remains intact.
14:41
[NARRATOR] Here we are arriving at the Big Pit and heading for the underground waiting room.
14:49
[NARRATOR] There are lots of pictures and plans of the mine, there is also a television showing a video of the pit in the days when it was a working colliery.
14:59
[NARRATOR] In the lamps room, we took off our battery controlled watches and gave them to the guides, who put them in a locker together with a video camera, because it is dangerous to take battery driven equipment down underground. One spark from this could cause an explosion. The guides gave us helmets, lamps and belts.
15:20
[NARRATOR] Once we were in the cage and the doors were closed tightly, we were ready to start the descent of 294 feet to the pit bottom. It went down on the empty side and returned on the full.
15:41
[NARRATOR] The tour underground took about one and a half hours. The cage doors opened and we were once more on the surface, everyone will remember this trip.
16:01
[NARRATOR] Now for the surface tour. Joanne Evans, our very own Selina Scott, took us around the colliery buildings.
16:10
[JOANNE EVANS] The first building we see is a winding engine room. Here we have the great wheel which hauls one cage to the pit top and lowers another to the bottom.
This is the blacksmiths shop, which was installed in 1910 to maintain the first mechanical coal cutters and conveyors.
This is the pithead baths, where the lockers are, each man has 2 lockers, 1 for clean and 1 for dirty clothes, here is where they clean and grease their boots.
16:39
[NARRATOR] Back at school, after our visit to the Big Pit, the class talked to each other about the trip. Everyone had found the underground tour exciting, while a large number of children repeated stories they had been told by the the ex-miners of Blaenavon, who had acted as guides.
16:57
[NARRATOR] It is at this point, the class decided it would be a good idea to invite some local miners to the school and to talk to them about their mining days. A class questionnaire was drawn up and Mr Oliver and Mr McCue were then invited to our school and the interviews took place.
[MR JACK OLIVER] I went to see the colliery manager on a cold, bleak, January morning in 1938.
[INTERVIEWER] At what colliery did you begin working?
[MR JACK OLIVER] At the Logan Colliery, Fforchaman Colliery.
[INTERVIEWER] Did you work at any other collieries?
[MR JACK OLIVER] Yes, for a short time I worked at Aberaman Colliery.
[INTERVIEWER] Can you tell us about your feelings when you were out for work on your first day?
[MR JACK OLIVER] That isn’t difficult, I was very frightened.
[INTERVIEWER] What jobs did you do underground?
[MR JACK OLIVER] When I started, I was an assistant collier, or a collier boy, as they call them. Afterwards, I became a packer, that is to say, after they extracted the coal we used to pack the wall to keep the roof up.
[INTERVIEWER] What were the tools used?
[MR JACK OLIVER] In those days, we used what they call a curling box, that is, a tray in which we gathered the coal and carried to the dram. After that, we used a pick, a shovel and a hatchet.
[INTERVIEWER] Were horses used to pull drams?
[MR JACK OLIVER] Oh, yes, horses were used extensively in the local collieries at that time.
[INTERVIEWER] How long were the shifts?
[MR JACK OLIVER] There were three shifts, the day, afternoon and night, and each shift was 7 and a half hours each.
[INTERVIEWER] How far did you have to work underground to reach your face of coal?
[MR JACK OLIVER] It varied, it varied according to the seams. There were many seams, such as the Gellideg, the 5 feet, the 9 feet, the 4 feet, the 7 feet, all seams of coal. Some were a quarter of a mile from the pit bottom and others as much as 2 and a half miles. My wages at that time, after deductions, were 1 pound, 8 (shillings) and 9 (pence) for a 6 day week, that today would equate to £1.44.
[INTERVIEWER] What kind of stoppages did the colliery make?
[MR JACK OLIVER] Oh, they were varied, um, for example, you had to pay a penny for every pound you earned to the local hall and institute, you paid thruppence in the pound to your local doctor, you paid a penny a week for the blind, you paid a penny a week to the Red Cross, you paid 11 pence for an insurance stamp and at that time you also paid 9 pence a week for unemployment benefit.
[INTERVIEWER] What was your weekly wage spent on?
[MR JACK OLIVER] When we had our weekly wage we only handed it over to our mothers, and our mothers gave us pocket money. My pocket money at that time was 3 shillings a week, or in today’s money that’s 15 pence.
[INTERVIEWER] Can you tell us about the cost of food and did you feel you had enough money?
[MR JACK OLIVER] Well of course, no one, at that time, would say that they had enough money. Money was very scarce and our parents used to make a list every week of what they required for heat and light and clothing and food, and if they didn’t have enough money, they had to go back up through the list and cross out what they thought they could do without. As for myself, I received the equivalent of 3 shillings a week, of which I used to spend, uh, going to the cinema, I could go into a cinema for tuppence a week, I could have sweets for a penny and I could have chips for a penny.
[INTERVIEWER] What did you like and dislike about the job?
[MR JACK OLIVER] Well, I didn’t like the dirt, and the grime, the darkness of the pit, but it was compensated by the good feeling that persisted amongst the workmen, they were very knowledgeable and could speak on practically every subject you could think of.
21:30
[MR NED McCUE] We made numerous friends and that became something that you valued for the rest of your life. That friendship stood, on all occasions, when you were in need and when you played, everything else outside, after coming home, too tired to walk.
The entertainment that I was interested in was, certainly singing at that particular time, because as we grew a little older we were attached to Glee Parties, the Cwm Gleemen, because prior to that you had 3 male voice parties here and that was the Troubadours, the Druids and the Cwm Gleemen and one was associated with a gentleman of the name Mr Meredith. Whatever little time we had we certainly spent it in that fashion and playing billiards and snooker.
[INTERVIEWER] What were your favourite spots in the area?
[MR NED McCUE] Now that is a very difficult question, but I would say my favourite spot in the area was to get to the top of the mountain and walk across to the other side of Aberdare, walk back and look down beyond Graig higher, down into the village itself.
[INTERVIEWER] We found out from the last interview, that Mr McCue, was, began mining in 1920s, we thought it would be very interesting to ask him about the strikes in the 1920s.
[MR NED McCUE] During the 1926 strike, which was certainly brought to the attention of the whole of Britain, I was certainly involved in that, in the fact that we helped people, who were a lot older than I were, to ensure that everything possible would be done for the village that we resided in, and for the children and the families to have food because they had nothing else whatsoever coming in, such as soup kitchens, which everyone participated in, in helping. Then, you had some of the elderly miners, and middle-aged miners, and young miners indeed too, who helped to tap shoes and get their own shoes going. They also started to learn to cut each other’s hair, the barber’s shop, in them days, they had no money to pay for to cut their hair or anything of any description.
It brought a little nastiness into the villages, right throughout the whole of Britain, when 1 or 2 people who we referred to as black legs, were going back to work whilst their fellow members were outside trying to ensure that they would have a better standard of living, which they felt they were entitled to.
[INTERVIEWER] Were there many men who worked through strikes?
[MR NED McCUE] Right around the whole of South Wales, I would say they were few and far between, but the few that did do it was never taken out of the memories of the ones who still were on strike, never were, and that still prevails in our villages today when we refer to them.
[A CHOIR SINGS AR HYD Y NOS]
25:12
[NARRATOR] The whole film took a term to produce and was the result of an environmental studies based project with Class 4 pupils of Glynhafod Junior School, Cwmaman, Cynon Valley. It was made by children who had no previous knowledge of the techniques needed for video film production and many re-takes resulted. The children must be commended for their hard work and perseverance in producing the final result.
[A CHOIR SINGS AR HYD Y NOS]
27:04
ENDS