Over the last eighteen months or so, as I have read and watched accounts of the coal miners’ strike, I have reflected on my own time on the coalfields during that year. I was based in Durham and had been involved in research and teaching programmes in the mining communities, which continued up to and during the strike. I was quite heavily involved in evening meetings built around the “Campaign for Coal” initiated by the NUM which has largely been forgotten. Also, to me, many of the emphases seemed to be not quite right; they didn’t feel like it felt like back then. So much so that I found myself mouthing the words of Max Boyce: “and I was there!”

Issues like these led me to start once again rummaging through the many files and boxes I have kept marked “Miners’ Strike”, aiming to check out one or two of the historical facts and to check on some of the notebooks that I had kept. Then I made a very unexpected discovery. Inside one of the boxes, I discovered an envelope containing over 300 negatives of photographs that I had taken in the communities during 1984. I had completely forgotten about these to the extent that, when asked, I would say that I had not taken any photographs during that year. But obviously I had.

Most, but not all of these, were in Easington, where I had a base, and I was there In August when the unity of the strike in the colliery was being broken by one man, bused in from a village in the centre of the county. What followed was documented brilliantly by Keith Pattison who arrived there after the riot and saw the full extent of the reenforced police presence and the harsh crack-down. His photographs have become legendary.

Keith had been commissioned by the Side Gallery to photograph the events as they unfolded. At the time I felt that I was one photographer too many and that I should let the professional take over. I wrote some text for Keith’s exhibition, and this was published as a brochure (Easington 1984). More recently Keith has published his photographs in his wonderful book (No Redemption) with text from David Peace.

Keith and I became very good friends and, unsurprisingly I talked with him about the negatives. I thought they would bring back memories for him too. He scanned them into a digital format and told me that they were important and that I had to publish them as a book.  This was obviously nice to hear and encouraging, although I was daunted by the idea of a book.

I have been spending a lot of time looking though the photos, organising them by place and time and thinking how best I could write alongside them. Many years ago, I worked with another photographer, Nick Hedges, writing a text for the book Born to Work. (see Media – Huw Beynon). I wondered whether I could follow the style I used there. The situation is different of course because here we follow a story as it unfolded, drawing on my notebooks.  Also, as I took the photographs, the story is about me as well – me and what I was doing there. In spite of these differences, I felt that Born to Work was an example that I could follow, using text to draw out the wider issues that lay inside and behind the photographs them at the time while remembering how I felt at the time

Here, I thought that I could put together some themes that may be of interest

Young Men

From the very beginning I was struck by how young many of the coal miners active in the strike were.  This was made clear from the very beginning at the gates of the miners’ headquarters in Durham when a decision was being made strike or no strike. They talked to me about the strike in 1972, all of the stories that they had heard of it, and they were looking forward, with excitement, to being on strike. They were also looking forward to a full life, working underground, as miners. During the strike, those of them who were single would be without any means of support. They came to rely on “the kitchens” organised by the women of the villages for their daily meals.   

Rallies and Togetherness

Throughout the summer there were conferences at Sheffield, picketing in Nottinghamshire and then at the Orgreave coke works. Support groups were established in the coalfields and pit villages often with kitchens providing cooked meals. There were also rallies, meetings and events. All too many to summarise or easily capture. During July, while key national negotiations were taking place, there was a rally in Durham every weekend. These were important in maintaining morale across the coalfield and revealed the extent to which women have become centrally involved in the strike.

Breaking the Strike in the North

The national talks centred on the NCB’s idea of maintaining collieries in possession of “beneficial reserves”. This was rejected by the NUM leadership. What followed was a concerted attempt to break the strike. Through a national campaign beginning in North Derbyshire and extending to Scotland and then the North East, managers were contacting striking miners – most often those living away from the collieries and travelling to work by NCB coaches – encouraging them to go back to work, offering them protection from abuse.

On the first Monday there was a relaxed feeling at the giant Easington colliery, with the lodge officials confident than no one would be breaking the strike. The calm was broken by the arrival of Gordon Parnaby with his car lights flashing. Someone was coming. One man – Paul Wilkinson – was on the bus. He had worked at the East Hetton colliery at Kelloe before moving to Easington after it closed. The Kelloe village was solidly behind the strike and Gorden explained; “he worked at the pit but he’s not a Kelloe man. He’s from Bowburn” and he was on the bus as it arrived in the village, now heading for the colliery at the coast.  All efforts were made to “defend our pit” with barricades and weight of numbers.  But Wilkinson was smuggled in through the back door and chaos ensued.