Introduction

Up until the C19th, the valleys of Glamorgan were noted for the pastoral beauty of their landscape. With the arrival of the mining industry, however, such scene of idyllic tranquility soon became a thing of the past. Large-scale exploitation brought in its wake not only the destruction of the rural way of life but also a new industrial society previously unknown to the tiny valley communities.

During its short history, the exploitation and extraction of mineral wealth from the coalfields of Glamorgan became a vital factor in the continuing prosperity of the nation. However, such systematic plunder was not without cost and a seemingly endless legacy of violent death was the price paid for industrial progress. The men who toiled in the bowels of the earth accepted that their lives were not only governed but could also be cut short by the hazardous nature of their work. With the rise in demand for coal, however, risks became greater and the price in terms of human life ever more costly. It is a sad fact and a damning indictment of the times that while a few reaped immense wealth, the majority lived in conditions of wretched poverty.

Irrefutably, many of the mining accidents happened as a result of a disregard of the safety rules by miners. However, it should also be taken into account that the conditions, which existed in the C19th often, forced workers to take unnecessary risks to secure even the most meagre living standard. In comparison, the owners' unceasing greed forever greater profits were guilty of gross indifference both to aspects of safety and the general welfare of their employees.

Against such a background, it is hardly surprising that the history of coal in the Rhondda is littered with the deaths of unseen generations. Only too often sons followed fathers to their graves in the disasters that swept through the coalfield with grim regularity. It was only the passing of the coal era that put an end to the legacy of death.

With such a rapid growth in the coal industry, it was inevitable that the coal owners accumulated great wealth. These men, amongst the richest in the country were, with few exceptions, hard task masters. They often looked upon their workers as objects rather than human beings, and it was generally their belief that the men were responsible for the explosions underground which occurred with terrifying regularity throughout the coalfield. The owners believed that smoking underground was the major cause of accidents and prosecuted any miner found infringing the regulations, but they were themselves powerful enough to evade those few cases laid against them for compensating accident victims.

For those who travel through the Rhondda Valleys today it is perhaps hard to imagine that the steep sides mountain were once clothed in luxurious forests. Now devoid of trees, apart from those planted by the Forestry Commission, the hillside appears lifeless and barren.

For generations the name Rhondda has been synonymous with grimy collieries and monotonous rows of terraced housing that were overshadowed by spoil heaps. Yet only 150 years or so ago the Rhondda Valleys were a sleepy rural area with a population of less than 2,000 and were known for their natural beauty.

Henry Gastineau, in his painting of 1805, shows in some detail the quiet, picturesque scenes that were so much of the landscape before the advent of mining.

In 1850 the noted Victorian topographer Charles Cliffe stated:

The advent of the Industrial Revolution saw the creation for an insatiable demand for unlimited power. Steam was the power and the fuel to supply it was coal. Within little more than 100 years over three thousand million tons of fossilised fuel had been mined in the South Wales coalfield.

By the late 1850's industrialisation had arrived in the Rhondda Valleys. During their tour through South Wales the travellers S.C. and A.M. Hall record in their journal, published in 1861 as The Book of South Wales:

The vale of the Rhondda is even more beautiful than that of the Taff, being, at all events, more wild and grand, and bearing a general resemblance to the Wye, in the cliffs, clothed with lichens and evergreen shrubs, between which it runs... Occasionally, as the reader will suppose in such a district, the picturesque is impaired somewhat by smoke from huge chimneys, and debris from mines... Yet the valley is charming in spite of all that has been done to mar its beauty.

Yet in less than a generation such singular beauty had been lost for ever. In his book entitled Glamorgan, the historian Arthur Morris recorded:

An unheard of wealth of industry and great populous has simultaneously sprung up together during the past sixty years. The industrial townships of the valley appear to be inseparably connected in one continuous series of streets of workmen's cottages to Pontypridd. Above the Vales of Dowlais, Neath and Taff, over to the Rhondda Valley and the towns of Merthyr and Aberdare, hangs a perpetual smoke cloud from the vast furnaces which are always smelting iron and steel from the neighbouring coalfields. There is nothing picturesque about this region to keep us lingering in the blackened valleys of the district.

So extensive did the exploitation become that eventually in excess of 400 collieries had raised coal from the valleys which now make up much of the county of Mid Glamorgan. Statistics show the distribution of working pits:

Such figures stand as testament to an era of immense social and industrial change - an era brought about by those who pioneered the mineral wealth of the Rhondda Valleys and the rest of Glamorgan.

From the outset, a sharp division existed between 'master' and 'workman'. While the former lived in splendid luxury, the worker existed on the margin of poverty. The owners openly expressed their belief that if kept on low wages the miner would work harder to supply his family's needs. If paid high wages, they claimed, the men became lax in their habits and squandered their money on drink.

When workers began joining the newly formed trade unions their employers countered with threats of the sack. To endorse this they began issuing unfavourable discharge notes to those who spoke out against poor working conditions. To obtain work at any pit in the South Wales coalfield, a collier had to produce a discharge note from his previous employer stating that he was an industrious and trustworthy person. It follows that any miner sacked and given no such note would be unable to find work in another pit.

In 1873, leading magnates of the industry formed the Coal Owners Association. It provided a powerful voice in dealing with demands for better working conditions or higher rates of pay. It was to become notorious for its sliding wage scale which protected coal owners from any loss of profits from depressed world prices. To ensure that profit margins were kept high, miner's wages were lowered whenever a fall in the demand for coal occurred. Inevitably, such a system lead to a great deal of bitterness amongst the workers and it is not surprising that the miners opposed the introduction of any new work patterns, such a double shift system which was common practice in may other areas.

By the turn of the century, new forces began to appear in the coalfields. Many of the coal owners united into large companies which came to be known as the 'combines'. The Cambrian Combine, owned by Lord Rhondda, employed almost 7,000 men in its collieries.

Despite being amongst the most prolific in the country, the Rhondda pits proved to be extremely difficult to mine. The deep seams which provided the highly prized steam coals were both gaseous and fiery, and consequently work was hard and always fraught with danger. All too often explosions, roof falls and other everyday accidents resulted in crippling injuries or death. Industrial diseases like pneumoconiosis caused near suffocation and almost inevitably proved fatal. A further hazard was from nystagmus, an eye disorder contracted through working in low light levels. This condition caused not only blindness but could, when untreated, cause insanity.

Other common ailments suffered by miners were ruptures, rheumatism and blood poisoning. On average, during the 46 years prior to World War I (1868 - 1914), 1 miner was killed every 6 hours, with a further 12 being seriously injured daily.

In the year 1892, it was estimated that the ratio between fatal and non-fatal accidents was one hundred to one. Inevitably, mine owners did not keep records and thus such a ratio must be thought of as an extremely conservative one. An indication as to the size of the problem perhaps can best be shown from the medical records of a valley General Practitioner who treated over 500 serious injuries in a year, 460 of those being directly attributable to a mining accident.

The causes of death underground were many and varied but about 50% of the fatalities recorded were as a result of roof falls. Explosions, though more dramatic, accounted for less than 17% of all underground deaths. Too often deaths were the result of negligence in the form of unguarded shafts and crevices and the parting of faulting winding ropes. Boiler and machinery explosions, falling debris and crushing by drams and moving machinery in a further 27% of all recorded deaths. Analysis of these figures show that some 60% of the victims were killed before reaching the age of 30, and 80% died by the time they were 40.

Living conditions were, by any standards, appalling. The hastily erected terraced dwellings, which house the rapidly growing population soon, became hopelessly overcrowded. The two and three room cottages were often home to several families, with 10 or more people sharing a room. In addition, sanitation, where it existed, was at best elementary, often with one lavatory serving the needs of an entire row of houses. Inevitably, such living condition coupled with an inadequate diet and absence of proper medical care, resulted in poor standards of health throughout the whole community. Water supplies were often obtained from a nearby well or stream and with the expanding population these soon became fouled by overflow from the communal cesspit.

Although significant improvements in living condition began to appear in the latter part of the C19th, a report by the Medical Officer of Health placed before the Rhondda Urban District Council in 1893, showed that unsanitary conditions still constituted a major health hazard:

Throughout the early years of the C20th, better facilities in the form of piped water and improved sewage disposal saw a marked decrease in the illnesses that had ravaged the valley communities.

The rapid growth of the Glamorgan coalfield brought untold misery to thousands whose living depended upon it. Yet almost as harmful were the effects of strikes and lockouts which occurred with alarming regularity. During the early part of the C20th., welfare did not exist so that any prolonged period of unemployment resulted in real hardship. Often during these times the necessities were usually only obtainable on credit, which was repayable once back at work. After a prolonged period of unemployment, miners were often forced to obtain further credit to pay off the original debt. Thus, whole communities were caught in a never-ending spiral of debt.

The 1920s saw a new era of bitterness arise between miner and coal owner. Following the war which saw the nationalisation of the coal industry, mines were returned to the owners. Employers immediately set about lowering wages, arguing that the Government had been too generous. To enforce the new wage levels miners were given an ultimatum - either new scales of pay were accepted or offers of employment would be withdrawn. Risking confrontation, the miners refused to accept the deal and the owners resorted to a lock out throughout the coalfields of Britain. At a stroke, over 1 million miners were out of work.

The dispute lasted for 3 months and ended with a humiliating defeat for the miners who were forced to return to work and accept the reduced wage scale. Over the following years a small measure of prosperity returned to the Rhondda Valleys as coal production gradually increased to meet the demands of a post-war economy. Soon however, the owners who also demanded an extra hour's work a day again proposed pay cuts. Such actions, they maintained were necessary to protect dwindling profits. Again, a bitter dispute arose which resulted in the pit gates being closed for a second time. The recently formed Trades Union Congress who called for a national strike promised support for the miners. But within a few days, such support vanished and the miners were left to face the consequences of their actions alone. Despite this betrayal, the mineworkers remained steadfast and refused to return to work. With hardly enough money for even the most basic necessities, they were forced to accept charity in the form of food and clothing parcels. The onset of winter compounded the hardship, especially as fuel was in short supply. By the end of the year, even the most resolute of men were forced back to work and 1926 was imprinted on the minds of a whole generation.

Slowly life returned to some sort of normality, although poverty remained widespread. To outsiders who visited the mining communities it was a source of amazement that people who for so long had gone without the simplest necessities, would not ask for, or indeed accept, outside help. H.V. Morton in his book In Search of Wales related a tale told him by an old collier:-

It was later discovered that during the previous week the miner had to buy shoes and clothes for his children. Out of his meagre wages, very little was left with which to buy food and the rations he had were given to his children. He and his wife had gone without for days. Such were the conditions of the time.

The outbreak of the Second World War (1939) saw some improvements in the fortunes of miners, and by 1947 the coming of nationalisation brought the promise of a new era of prosperity. Such optimism was sadly never realised. Within a few short years, pit closures began to spread through out the coalfields. During the 1960s there was a rise in militancy amongst miners. Throughout November 1971, a rash of unofficial strikes over pay disputes caused great unrest in the Welsh coalfields. This industrial action brought matters to a head and a strike was called on 9th. January 1972. The national strike, the first since 1926, resulted in the whole of the South Wales coalfield being brought to a standstill. It was to be almost 2 months before coal was again raised but the dispute, which had a devastating effect on the British economy, saw the miners returning to work as victors. To some, it was a vindication of their fathers and grandfathers who suffered such a humiliating defeat 46 years earlier. The strike had shown that despite the increased use of oil and nuclear fuel as alternative energy sources, the nation's prosperity still depended upon coal. This knowledge won a temporary reprieve for those pits earmarked for closure and underlined the miners industrial might. Further unrest 2 years later saw the union locked in a dispute which ultimately brought down the Heath Government.

However, by the end of the decade the tide began to turn with the National Coal Board (N.C.B.) again sanctioning further cute. Seeing confrontation as the only means to halt what they regarded as the destruction of an industry, the miners once more resorted to industrial action. The strike of 1984 resulted in one of the longest and most acrimonious disputes ever to affect the mining industry. In its wake came the inevitable hardship and distress which for many people rekindled memories of 1926. Locked in a battle with the intransigent Thatcher Government the miners were beaten. After a struggle which lasted over 11 months and which eventually saw a split in their ranks, the miners finally surrendered and went back to work. Soon after the N.C.B. implemented a plan of relentless pit closures which saw the spectre of unemployment hang menacingly over the valley communities. Even in decline it seemed, coal still bought despair to those who lived and worked in its shadow.