The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1879-04-26 00:00:00

THE DURHAM MINERS,

The counting up of the ballot papers was completed
on Saturday night. The masters' terms have been re-
jected by a majority of 21,278. The votes in favour of
accepting the coalowners' terms were 222; tor con-
tinuing the strike, 21,500. Great meetings of miners
were held on Saturday at Waldridge Fell and Bishop
Auckland. It was estimated that from 15,000 to
20,000 persons attended each of them. Arbitration
was the key note of the various speakers, and the de-
termination to adhere to that principle was unanimous.
The proceedings were orderly and very enthusiastic.
A large number of the Durham Lodges were not in-
cluded in the plebiscite of Saturday, but the officials of
the Union say that a continued strike is certain, as
the men are determined to let the worst come to the
worst, while the coalowners are equally resolute.

The Durham colliers who were continuing at work
at the old 'prices decided on Monday by a large
majority to join the strike. This will have the effect
of closing every colliery in the county in about a fort-
night.

A mass meeting of wives, mothers, and daughters of
miners residing in the districts of the western portion
of the county of Durham was held on Monday on
Pelton-geeen, near Newcastle. There was an immense
gathering, the day being fine. There were several
bands of music, and many of the women carried
banners and pictorial emblems of " Arbitration,"
"Charity," and "Plenty," while smaller bunting
intimated that no reduction of wages would be sub-
mitted to by the men. Amongst the speakers were
Mrs. Scott, Mrs. Sharp, Ms. Beamside, Mrs. Alison.
The speeches were enthusiastically cheered as the
women detailed the sacrifices and sufferings their
families had undergone during the last two years.
"Now," they said, "as things had comes to a crisis,
rather than allow their husbands to show the white
feather they would submit to voluntary starvation."
Resolutions in favour of resistance to the owners' de-
mands were unanimously passed, and the large crowd
dispersed.

On the subject of the dispute The Times of Wednes-
day published a long and interesting letter from their
Special Correspondent at Durham, from which we
make the following extracts :

"The refusal of the employers' terms by the miners, and
the consequent continuance of the strike, have induced
throughout the whole of the north of England the greatest
anxiety and apprehension. Eager interest was manifested
to know the result of the ballot, and when it was
made known on Saturday afternoon that the die had
been cast In favour of war, people at once began to calculate
the probable result of the struggle. That it was a bad job'
was vaguely enunciated by everybody, and in the streets, the
taverns, the reading-rooms, and other places of public resort
on 'Canny ' Tyneside, and throughout the district generally,
little else has been talked of since the result was announced.
The immediate prospect is, indeed, one of the most
gloomy and inau‘picious character. The men have
taken up an unusually firm and determined attitude. Tho
employers, on the other hand, have not shown any disposi-
tion to make further concessions. Negotiations between
the parties have practically come to an end, and it is diffi-
cult, in the meantime, to discover any means of compromise
without concessions on the one side or the other that neither
party, in its present temper, appears disposed to make.
There can be little doubt that the owners committed the
great initial error of underrating the firmness and the
strength of the men. A large number of them enter-
tained the idea that with weakened resources and a
band-to-mouth fight for very life, the miners would be
much more pl able and easily dealt with than they had
proved to be. The power and popularity of the Union were
also undervalued. It was, no dotibt, a probable enough pre-
sumption that, with the many and heavy calls recently made
Upon it, the Union would be but ill-prepared to enter on
a serious struggle, and that its leaders on that account would
be much more ready to counsel sacrifices and concessions
than they would be when it was flushed with a full exchequer
and enjoying the plentitude of numerical strength. But in
these calculations the employers have been deceived. It
Is true that the Union had not the adhesion of the whole
body of the men—probably not more than one-half; but now
that the strike has fairly commenced there is a remarkable
community of feeling and action among Unionists and non-
Unionists alike, and if the cause of Unionism is not com-
pletely shattered by the issue of the struggle it will be likely
enough to reap considerable gain. The Durham Miners'
Union has probably enjoyed as prosperous a censer as any
In the country. Its membership has seldom fallen below
30,000. It has in its time done much useful work, and it ex-
pects, now that it has fallen upon evil days, to receive its
•reward in public sympathy and in the support of other com-
binations. Whether this hope will be to any extent realized
remains to be seen. The depression of the coal trade is now
so universal that no unions of its own class can extend a great
deal of financial help without making special levies for the
purpose. . . .

"The strength of the rival armies which now confront
each other with hostile intent in the great arena of strife
bounded by the geographical limits of the Durham coalfields
is very unequal. The coalowners are a compara.tively
limited as well as a very wealthy and 'powerful body. . .
Against these enormous resources the miners oppose a
phalanx of earnest, determined, and long-enduring, but
ill-furnished and almost resourceless, men—the greatest
army, numerically, which has ever yet engaged in an
industrial war The support likely to be received
from the other unions of the North cannot but be
trifling; for the stoppage of the collieries, if long
continued, will practically mean a stoppage of all other
industrial operations, and workmen otherwise engaged will
thus require for themselves all the aid that then' own
unions can afford The lean kine' of recent years have
a'most entirely swallowed up the fat kine .f former years,
so that only a very small proportion of the men are prepared
financially for the preeent struggle. 1 hat the strike will
entail the most greivous misery and dfssater upon the miners
is, therefore, self-evident, and the latter can hardly contem-
plate their prospects without feelings akin to dismay.

"It would not, however, be safe to conclude that the men
will be the first to yield, or that the owners are likely to
escape without great, and, perhaps, permanent, injury.
Apart altogether from the losses inevitaole to the stoppage
of collieries, the owntrs are beset with other difficulties and
complications They will be unable to fulfil important con-
tracts, their shipping will be laid up, their customers will go
elsewhere—peradventure never to return—and many minor
evils will assuredly accrue. For some years past the great
northern coalfield has found it increasingly, difficult
to hold its own agsinst the competition of Scotland
on the one hand, and Wales, on the other. In re-
gard. to the home market, it has had to confront a for-
midable rivalry on the part of Yorkshire, Lancashire, and
other coalfields which have recently been developed very
largely. Abroad it has found rivals not to be despised in
Westphalia and Belgium. From each of these directions the
competition will now be more than ever difficult to meet. It
Is infinitely more easy to keep a market, even in the face of
superior odds, than to recover a market again after it
has been occupied by a rival. This fact is already being
brought home to the Durham coalowners by every-day ex-
perience. The coal shipping trade of the Tyne and Wear
Is gradually contracting, and in another week it will vir-
tually be suspended. Vessels that were accustomed, after
bringing jute to Dundee, corn or other freights to Leith,
and to on, to take in a cargo of coals on the Tyne as
a return freight, are now going either to Scotch or Welsh
ports for that purpose. The damage done to the shipping
interest is not the least serious part of a business which has
many malign aspects

"Relatively to other coalfields in this country the miners
of Durham have never been underpaid. Until recently
they were allowed a standard rate of 4. Bd. per shift of 51
hours, as compared with ss. per shift of 7i hours, in West
Yorkshire, 45. 4id. per shift of eight hours in South
Wales, and 4s. sci. per shift of seven hours in the east
of Scotland. When the shift was lengthened halt
an hour, they secured, of course, a rather higher daily
average. Taking the average rate of wages per hour,
we fled that the Durham miners realized• 9 77d.; the
Scotch miners, 7•5 d. ; the West Yorkshire miners ;
the Lancashire miners B•sd • the South Staffordshire
miners, 94.; and the South Vales miners, 6 sd. The only
miners in the country receiving a higher hourly average
were those of Northumberland, with is. 0/d., and those of
South Yorkshire with Hid. But, in addition to this rate of
payment, the Durham miners have been allowed free houses
and coals, which have almost from time immemorial been
regarded as a part of their earnings. These privileges,
although very general, are not at all invariable in
the coalfields of the United Kingdom. In West Yorkshire
the miners have not free houses, and they are required to
pay for coals either one-half the selling price or the cost of
production. In South Wales, again, no cottages are found
for the miners, who are compelled, moreover, to purchase
their coals, the value of which is stopped from their wages.
In the Warwickshire coal-field, 3cwt. of coal is allowed to
each man, and licist. to each boy per week. In the
Cannock-chase dibtrict the custom is to allow 16owt.
of coal for 24 turns, and in Shropshire tile miners are
allowed one ton of coal per month when they are house-
holders. In most of these cases the custom of allowing the
colliers free coal originated no doubt in the feeling that it
was ungenerous to 'muzzle the or that treadeth out the
corn ' ; but it is now regarded by the miners as an inalienable
right, and those who evjey it are prone to conclude that it
ought not to be reckoned in any estimate at their earnings.
But this is obviously an unfair conclusion. The cartload of coals
(about 16 cwt ) supplied to the miners in the north of England
every fortnight in winter and every three weeks in summer
would make a large addition to an artisan's income in town or
country, and to secure the same house accommodation as
that gratuitously supplied to the Durham miners, other work.
leg men would require to pay at least 3s. to 4s. per week.
For the counties of DurhafmoratnhdeNcohrarthaucmtebreorlfanthdeddesweerlvligli
a high reputation es
of Lye
pitmen. in many cases the h,ous.ts of the man are
built on the soundest sanitary principles, with font food