大象传媒

My grandad decided to join the Royal Navy, he went had took all the tests and was declared A1 so all he had to do was wait to be called up. Before he had chance to go on the open sea the govenment decided to call people up by their national insurance numbers to go into the mines, his heart sank. His NI number began with AA. Still he kept hoping they would call him for the Navy and not the 'pits'. The announcement came his NI number was the first to be called in Hertfordshire as his started with AA. His mother and sister tried to cheer him up but it was no use. Fred was shipped off to the peak district where he spent all of the remaining war years. Trying to make the best of it.

His favorite mine was in Mansfield where most of his stories about that time were set. The one that stands out the most from memory is where he was responsible for the lighting down there and the men at the pit face would call for him when the lights went out. This paricular day he was doing his normal routine when asked to go and change a bulb he didn't turn the electric off as health and safety require as that's how he had been showed to do. There was a supervisor watching him doing this switch with his helmet light off. Defiantly not allowed under ground your light should always be on. Anyway unknown to grandad he did the change without putting the electric off and was told at the end os his shift that he was going to be reprimanded as he had commited an offence but his supervisor. When he went for the reprimand with his union guy and asked what he had done wrong he was told by the pit manager and his supervisor that he had been watched not turning the electric off and was a danger to himself and others in that area off the mine. To which grandad asked who was watching him. The reply came from the supervisor "me". At this point grandad had gone mad and asked where he was standing to watch him as there was no head lights around him at that time. The supervisor said "Just around the corner so I had a very clear view". Grandad then turned to the manager and said quitely "There wasn't anyone or any helmet lights on around me otherwise I would have seen them and so instead of me being here and being reprimanded it should be your supervisor who didn't have his light on! and they both left.

The response came back that his charges was to be lifted and not put on file and the supervisor was reprimanded and moved to another mine as a "skivvie".

Later on that evening the local mine band came round to his lodgings and sang the night away (most of them were also lodging there too), the following morning the landlady made grandad a celebratory breakfast with all the trimmings and all the tea he could drink. As she put it "That showed the old git he had it coming to him he did."

Grandad died last January 2004 and is greatly missed. The only thing he regretted about his 'Bevin Boy years' was never being able to show the country and world what he did for us and not being able to get in touch with others who could remember those dark days with him.

Alot of people thought miners were cowards for not fighting in the second world war but as this story shows. My grandad was just called upon by his NI number not because he didn't want to do his bit.

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