An Ushaw Moor lad's experience in the Cumberland Coalfield 1 of 2

Less than a year after leaving secondary school I moved with my parents to live in Seaton, near Workington, Cumberland. I was destined to live there for seven years. The name Workington is not very inspirational – perhaps one notch above Grimethorpe - and for me it has a tone to match much of my experience there. Those seven years were meant to be character forming, memorable and fun mixed with a bit of teenage angst and uncertainty.  I experienced all of that but the positive aspects were in such pitifully small doses that they hardly compensated for the remaining big blocks of my time -which were filled with inertia and progressively mind dulling experiences.

I suppose I could have paraphrased the above by describing my time in Workington during the 60s as ‘mostly excreta’ [forgive my too rounded edges].  I did not have much going for me - what with a basically caring stepfather, whom by that time had a job that gave him little time to care, and an equally caring mother who had, with a degree of personal justification, despaired of life long before moving toWorkington.

I found myself living in an avenue about a hundred yards from a road that, by turning left, lead to Workington - which was about a mile away. We lived two doors from Keith Burkinshaw, who later became well known for his management of Tottenham Hotspur, and one door from Dave Carr the ex Darlington forward. They were both plying their trade for Workington Football Club.

My first job was a casual one working as an assist for Lipton’s Ltd in Workington – I was a sort of Granville character if you like. I recall that the hardest task at the shop was lifting and moving very big boxes of butter. I only had one serious lapse in concentration during my short period at the Lipton's shop; on opening the large fridge I caused a tray of mixed meats to fall on the floor; understandably Mr Robinson the manager was not at all happy about that.

My next sally into the job market involved an interview at the National Coal Board Area Headquarters for the post of junior wages clerk. Three middle aged men earnestly questioned my suitability for the job and gave me an arithmetical test. They marked it there and then and told me that I had got one of the sums wrong. In my youthful enthusiasm I broke protocol my walking round to their side of the desk to look at their answer to my supposedly incorrect solution. I put them right! Whatever problems I had with my lack of impressive certified education the Harry Barlow influence came to the fore and I triumphed. The arithmetical test was followed by what appeared to me to be an innocent question: ‘have you any relatives working for the NCB?’ I replied that my grandfather was a colliery overman. Looking back it may well be that the family connection sealed the job offer.  I was fortunate enough to get a brilliant reference from Harry Barlow but the NCB went and lost it! It must have been a good one because one of the interviewers, without a trace of a smile, asked me whether I had written it.

The job as a wages clerk was interesting for a while and every Thursday about three dozen wages clerks, including me, worked together to fill the wage packets for all those employees working at collieries in Cumbria: St Helens, Haig, Solway, Lowca and others. There was a simple knack to it but it had to be done quickly. If for example a worker’s wage was ₤ 18  6 shillings and  4 pence -  his or her packet was filled with the highest denomination of notes and coins possible – typically three five pound notes, a one pound note, two half crowns, a shilling, a three penny bit and a penny. The ten pound note had been withdrawn years earlier because of the war and fears of Nazi fraud; its reintroduction came as late as 1964. The notes had to be presented in such a way that they could all be seen in the window of the pay packet.

Periodically, on a Friday, it was my duty to pay the miners after their late shift at Solway Colliery; I used my Lambretta to get there and back. The only memorable incident occurred because one of the miners, obviously tired from his weekly work, had lost his pay ‘chitty’. I refused to pay him – after all he could have been anybody. He went away and brought his union representative to identify him - but as I did not recognize the union man and more importantly, the ‘chitty was still not presented, I still refused to pay out. I locked his wage in the safe and he collected it the following day from the Manager’s Clerk.  It was much ado about nothing but it sticks in my mind.

After a while I decided that I wanted to earn much more money and found that I could achieve that by working as the Weighman at Lowca Colliery. The trouble was that to achieve the increase in money I had to work double shifts – 6am to 6pm. I did it for a year and I would like to tell you more about it in part 2, which will also include my experience during a 5.20 am interview with the police during a murder enquiry, a description of my admiration for some of the workers at Lowca Colliery and an assessment of the causes of my despair in Workington.

Wilf Bell