Author: ian wright

Richard Kear (1876 – 1949) was born in Oldcroft, West Dean, the son of a miner. In 1891, at the age of 15, he was working as a general labourer and then started work at New Fancy as a hewer. He married Martha James in 1900 and went on to have eight children. In 1921, he was working as a hewer at New Fancy Colliery and he represented New Fancy on the FDMA Executive where he fulfilled the role of auditor for several years. He was a Primitive Methodist preacher who was “known in the Forest as a clear, earnest and intelligent local preacher”.[1]

[1] Dean Forest Guardian March 1914 quoted in Averil Kear, Bermuda Dick, (Lydney: Lightmoor, 2002) 146.

Raymond S Jones (1885 – 1967) was born in Yorkley, the son of a miner. He married Susan Watkins in 1912 and had two children and lived in Pillowell. He started work at New Fancy in 1897. He was a member of the FDMA Executive from 1924. He was President of the FDMA during World War Two.

He was a member of the Forest of Dean Coal Production Committee during World War Two and worked at New Fancy until the pit closed in 1944 and then moved to Princess Royal. In 1950 he was a member of the Forest of Dean School Managers.

William David Jenkins (1903 – 1973) was born in Staunton near Coleford, the son of a miner. He married Winfred Bloxham in 1933 and worked as a miner at Cannop. He was Vice-Chairman of the FDMA in 1939 and 1940 and a member of the Forest of Dean Coal Production Committee during World War Two. In 1943 he was appointed as the Regional Investigation Officer working for the Ministry of Labour tracking absenteeism under the Essential Work Orders (EWO). In 1946, he was chair of the Coleford Branch of the WEA. In 1949, he was a member of West Dean Rural District Council representing the Labour Party for Broadwell and also elected onto Gloucestershire County Council in 1949 representing the Labour Party for Coleford. In 1950 he was the Labour Officer on the local NCB and a member of the Forest of Dean School Managers. He lived at 30 Woodville Avenue, Mile End.

George Thomas Dyer Jenkins (1898 – 1966) was born in Parkend when his father George Dyer (Snr) was 20 and his mother Nellie was 16 years old. George Dyer (Snr) did not stick around and emigrated to America.  Nellie married Frank Beddis, a coal miner, in 1900 and the couple went on to have ten children. George Jenkins married Hilda Watkins in 1919 and had four children. In 1921, Jenkins was working as an underground haulier at New Fancy colliery until it closed in 1944 and then he worked at Princess Royal. He represented both pits on the FDMA Executive and was secretary of the FDMA during World War Two. He was a member of West Dean District Council from 1946 to 1949. He was a member of the Forest of Dean Trades Council. He was President of the West Gloucestershire Labour Party in March 1949 and Forest of Dean delegate on the South Wales Executive of the NUM in 1950.

Horace Jones (1874 – 1967) was born in Yorkley, the son of a miner.  He started work at one of the Parkend pits as a teenager. In February 1889, he helped found the Pillowell brass band and was a playing member until 1903 when he helped found the Yorkley Onward band. He married Cora Biddington in 1901, but sadly she died two years later. In 1904, he married Florence Nelmes and went on to have six children.  In 1901 he was working as a hewer. However, by 1911 was working as a checkweighman at New Fancy colliery and represented New Fancy the on the FDMA Executive. He continued in these roles until his retirement.

Reuben James (1870 – 1948) was born in Pillowell, the son of a miner. He started work in the mines at fourteen. He married Alice Charles in 1890 and went on to have six children, and worked as a haulier and a hewer at Princess Royal Colliery. He soon became active in the FDMA and joined a group of miners from West Dean who opposed the existing policies of conciliation and moderation promoted by the FDMA agent George Rowlinson.

He was elected President of the FDMA from February 1918 to February 1919 and then represented Princess Royal Colliery on the FDMA Executive. He was elected a councillor on West Dean Parish Council representing Pillowell in 1919. He was blacklisted after the 1926 Lockout but returned to work at Princess Royal in November 1936 at the age of 65.  He was elected as Chairman of the Whitecroft branch of the Communist Party in 1944.

Joseph Holder (1874 -1937) started working in a mine as a boy. In 1899, he was elected as a checkweighman at Crump Meadow, remaining in this role until his retirement. He married Louisa Simmonds in 1898 and had two children. He was a governor of the Gloucester Infirmary and on the management committee of the Cinderford Co-operative Society. He also represented the mining community on social, welfare and organisations such as the Forest of Dean General Accident and Health Insurance Society, Gloucester Royal Infirmary and the Forest of Dean Council of School Managers. He was a long-standing and active member of the FDMA and a member of the FDMA Executive Committee. He was also treasurer of Cinderford Miners Welfare Hall. He suffered from miners’ lung disease in later life.

Jesse Hodges (Jnr) (1907 – 1990) was born in Cinderford.  He worked as an errand boy and then a hodder at Crump Meadow in the early 1920s for his father, Jesse Hodges Snr. In the early 1920s, he moved to Pontefract to work in the Yorkshire coalfield. In 1925 he married Naomi Hodges and had one son.

In about 1937, he moved back to Cinderford and worked in the Forest coalfield. Naomi died in 1949 and in 1952 he married Lucy Ackman in Bridgend. In 1983, during an interview, he said these prophetic words:

I have left too much of my blood in the mines to ever want to go back down, and I would not wish it on anybody … It was a pity it was ever discovered. I don’t believe God meant for a man to grovel in the bowels of the earth and to leave blood on coal …They are still doing it now dying day by day, coughing their lungs up from it. Then I look back to the days of my youth to days in the mines, to the grovelling in the bowels to earth and to the terrible work, the hard work, the sores, the bleeding, crying, the parents saying “I can’t help you son.” … I think this as I look back; I would not mind going back to those days if, there was equality for all, and we could live the life without having to grovel. In those days Spring was Spring, Summer was Summer, and Autumn was Autumn, and Winter was Winter – we knew them all. We could tell them apart. This is what I say as I have said before, the cuckoo has left us – he doesn’t want us.[1]

[1] Jesse Hodges (Jnr), interview by Elsie Olivey on 16 May 1983, Gage Library, Dean Heritage Centre.

Jesse Hodges (Snr) (1880 – 1964) was born in Nailbridge, near Cinderford and was a son of a miner. He married Annie Matthews in 1901 and continued to live at Nailbridge. They had nine children, one of whom died from laryngitis. As a boy, he worked in an iron mine. He then moved to Crump Meadow colliery where he became a buttyman. In 1920-1922, he was elected as a Labour representative on East Dean District Council.  In 1925, he was elected as an assistant part-time checkweighman at Crump Meadow colliery.[1] He represented Crump Meadow on the FDMA Executive during the 1926 lockout and was the joint secretary of the Cinderford Strike Committee with Albert Meek. He was blacklisted for seventeen months after the end of the lockout.[2]

[1] Interview with Jesse Hodges’ son also called Jesse Hodges (born 1907)  by Elsie Olivey on 16 May 1983, Gage library.

[2] Interview with Albert Meek by Elsie Olivey on 6 April 1983, Gage library.