The Big Meeting: A History Of The Durham Miners’ Gala (From The Northern Echo)
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The Big Meeting: A History Of The Durham Miners’ Gala by David Temple (Durham Miners’ Association, £19.50 hardback, £14.50 paperback)
6:10pm Wednesday 14th December 2011 in History
THE title doesn’t do this book justice because, as well as being a history of the Durham Miners’ Gala, it is a history of coal-mining in the county and a social history of our towns and villages.
The first gala was on August 12, 1871, when the inhabitants of Durham’s deep countryside mines invaded the city, much to the trepidation of its residents.
“Durham’s pit folk were a race apart, living in isolated villages, cheek by jowl with the constant clatter of winding engines, engulfed by the sulphurous fumes of the ventilation furnaces and the ever-present wind-borne dust,” writes David Temple, introducing the miners as heroes.
That first gala passed without the drunken unruliness that the cityfolk feared, and it cemented the Durham Miners’ Association as a union that was not going to crumble as previous workers’ attempts had.
The second gala the following year was possibly the happiest of all the 127 Big Meetings. As many as 70,000 miners paraded behind bands and banners to the racecourse, celebrating that the hated bond, that tied miner to colliery, had been broken, and that wages had risen 30 per cent.
Plus, the long-promised Mines Regulation Bill, which would improve underground conditions, was only weeks away.
All achieved in a year or so by the power of unity.
Compare that to the 1926 gala – perhaps the lowest of all 127 Big Meetings. The miners’ opposition to a proposed increase in the working day of more than an hour and a reduction of 30 per cent in wages was summed up by the slogan: “Not a penny off the pay, not a minute on the day.”
The TUC called the General Strike to support the miners’ action, but after nine days it was called off leaving the miners to fight alone.
The betrayal permeates the book, and gives it a rollercoaster feel that was so typical of a miner’s life: boom and then bust, strike and lockout.
Written by a former Murton Colliery lodge official, who was victimised for his union membership, it is a very political book. The Tories have “selfish and antisocial policies” and Tony Blair is little better. That, though, adds a rhetorical realism that the those attending the first Big Meeting would have understood.
• The book is only available from the Durham Miners’ Association, PO Box 6, Red Hill, Durham, DH1 4BB.
Cheques or postal orders made to the Durham Miners’ Gala Book Project, including post and packaging, for £23.50 (hardback) or £17.50 (softback). Phone 01833- 640574 for further details.
