Finding Rosa Mingaye, Cumbrian Artist

By Dr John Little

Like all English historical fiction authors my writing deals with a mixture of reality and truth, of actual and dreams; of fiction and fact. It is my wish to make it so that my reader may, in the style of Leopold von Ranke, walk in the shoes of dead men and women, even for just an instant. This desire is shared by every writer of historical fiction. Last year I lit upon the figure of Dr William Perry Briggs, a Cumbrian doctor who somehow found himself tending wounded Turks at the town of Plevna during a murderous siege in one of the major wars of the nineteenth century; the Russo-Turkish conflict of 1877-8. It seemed an interesting adventure story and so I set out to write it, and found that the borderline between researching for historical fiction, and unearthing unknown history is a very fine one.

Of course, any adventure has to have a back story or two; the protagonist must have a family, friends, motives, a background of some sort and some personal details. I found that Briggs married a woman called Rosa, and that he thought she was three years older than him. She was, in fact nearly eight years older. Of itself that detail is fairly quotidian for the day; many people faked their ages, particularly on marriage certificates. Rosa’s gravestone claims a birth date of 1853, whereas the census of 1851 reveals that she was born in 1849; her husband was born in 1856.  

So far, so not very exceptional, but it was enough to spark an interest in finding more. Her father was Joseph Richardson, and her brother was Augustine; both men were well known artists, and the brother in particular was renowned for stained glass windows in churches, some of which survive today. For some reason unknown, both men were using ‘Mingaye’ as their professional name; it had been the surname of Joseph’s dead wife. They were not alone in this, for Rosa was also signing ‘Mingaye’ on her own work.

Rosa Mingaye has been long forgotten, yet as I wish to demonstrate, she was an artist of flair, great talent and an extremely fine water colourist. In her day she was celebrated, and though her works sell for small amounts today, I believe that in real terms they sold for far more when she was making her living from them. Women artists are all too often airbrushed from history, and my research for my novel led me to one who deserves to be known. I have not found her name on any of the long lists of Victorian artists that may be found on the internet; perhaps it is time to revise them.

I believe that the above painting is the River Thames, near Oxford, where Rosa lived and worked before her marriage. Her work seems to comprise landscape scenes, but also some rural buildings. Human figures appear as above, small and in the distance. I am led to think that she was working to please a market of well do do town dwellers who wished to adorn their walls with such things, not only for decorative purposes, but to show their wealth. Iffley Mill (below) stood on the River Thames; it was destroyed by fire early in the twentieth century.

Rosa's work seems to comprise landscape scenes, but also some rural buildings. Human figures appear as above, small and in the distance. I am led to think that she was working to please a market of well to do town dwellers who wished to adorn their walls with such things, not only for decorative purposes, but to show their wealth.

Her work was displayed across the country; this one is from a gallery in Norwich; the spelling of her name may be put down to the reporter.

Not all of her paintings are extant. To judge from the contemporary description of this one (below) from Manchester, it was worth seeing.

She continued her career after her marriage where she and William Briggs lived in the small Cumbrian town of Aspatria. It is not very far from the English Lake district, and of course the area became her studio. These are studies of Derwentwater.

That I have come across this undoubtedly talented, but unknown English water-colourist of the nineteenth century, is an accident of writing fiction. 

Rosa Mingaye was not a fiction and it may be that a serious art historian with access to more resources than I can command, may be able to find more about this artist. It is a basic understanding of feminism, and of plain common sense, that men and women are of equal dignity. This artist deserves a place, even just a mention, in the pantheon of nineteenth century water-colour painters. Neglect, surely, is not an option.

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Dr John Little spent almost forty years teaching in various schools in London and the South East. He was head of History at Meopham School and Rochester Independent College. He gained the first History PhD  awarded in the University of Westminster. He has written ten books, mostly novels, and has settled into historical fiction as his favoured genre. His work is based on real evidence, people and events contained in plausible narratives. He also gives talks and presentations on the topics about which he writes. His novel about Dr Briggs featuring Rosa Mingaye, ‘Love and War - a Romance of Old Aspatria’ will be published early 2021, and although based on real people, and accurate in detail, it remains a fiction.

Maud Has No Statue

By Dr John Little

In these days of falling statues we have a timely reminder that such public edifices are erected for a purpose.

The Romans put up statues of all of their gods, and just in case they had missed one out, they also bought insurance against divine wrath by erecting one to the ‘unknown god’. There are lessons to be learned as well, from those people that society did not choose to honour in such a way. The First World War was the cause of many statues being subscribed for, and many of the great commanders now stand in bronze, in marble and acting as rests for weary pigeons. In Whitehall we see General Haig on horseback, whilst Foch sits outside Victoria Station. Joffre has his statues, and Admirals Jellico and Beatty have their busts in Trafalgar Square. To complete the set of armed forces commanders the founder of the RAF, Lord Trenchard, has his own likeness towering by the embankment. It is ironic that perhaps the most successful commander on the Western Front from 1914- 18 has no statue, her contribution being marked solely by a blue plaque on the wall of her former home. Equally ironic is that whilst some of the others are still virtually household names, hers has been almost forgotten.

Dame Emma (Maud) McCarthy already had a distinguished career behind her as matron of large military hospitals before the War Office appointed her principal matron of the British Army in 1910. Born in Australia, she commenced a nursing career in 1891 but then left the London Hospital to serve in the Boer War in South Africa. To say that her service was outstanding would be a small understatement as her actions won her the King’s medal for nursing, the Queen’s medal for nursing, and the Royal Red Cross. She was also very active in the setting up of Queen Alexandra’s Imperial Military Nursing Service. (QUAIMNS)

When she arrived in France in August 1914, there was no organization in place that could possibly cope with the rapid expansion  of the British Army from 200,000 to 2.5 millions within the space of eighteen months. The scale of the casualties and the accompanying medical requirements were gargantuan. To be sure the Royal Army Medical Corps (RAMC) had doctors and began to set up hospitals, but as with so many things it could have been chaotic. A casualty on the Western Front would receive their first medical attention at a regimental aid post run by the RAMC. There were no women there as essentially they were on the battlefield. From the aid post they were stretchered to Casualty Clearing Stations (CCS); here were doctors under the command of the army surgeon general, and nurses who now came under the command of Maud McCarthy. There were fifty six CCS’s in France staffed by QUAIMNS and Red Cross nurses. Later in the war, selected and suitably trained volunteers from the Voluntary Aid Detachment (VAD) were also allowed into the CCS’s.

From a CCS, casualties were taken either by hospital barge or train to a base hospital; each barge and train was staffed by nurses. The casualty would arrive at one of ninety eight general or stationary hospitals; some were Red Cross, some were QUAIMNS and some were funded privately by organizations such as City of London Guilds like the Drapers. Other hospitals were slotted into the organization as they arrived from places like Canada and Australia. All had to be kept up to numbers with staff, supplied, fed, billeted  and their comforts looked after. Procedures had to be standardized, standards had to be kept up and medical supplies had to be assured. The responsibilities attached to the task of coordinating all this were almost endless. From the Mediterranean Sea to the Western Front Maud McCarthy was directly responsible to the War Office in London and over this vast area commanded over six thousand nursing staff. She was everywhere and soon had a name for the most ferocious efficiency, though she herself was quiet and softly spoken.

One army general reportedly said of McCarthy: “She’s perfectly splendid, she’s wonderful … she’s a soldier!… If she was made Quartermaster-General, she’d work it, she’d run the whole Army, and she’d never get flustered, never make a mistake.” Her base was at Abbeville and many of the base hospitals were within easy reach, but she was no remote administrator. She toured the front and the back areas constantly and local matrons never knew when the Matron in Chief was about to descend on them. She was no shouter, but had her own quite standards upon which she insisted. She did not baulk at taking on authority either; she reported directly to the Secretary for War and regarded herself as being of equal rank to any general in her own field.

As she toured she carried on a practice which she was long used to, and kept a diary. This begins from when she was first posted to France and may be found here. It is a revealing testimonial to the ability and energy of the woman.

She did not choose to limit her visits to safe areas as this extract perfectly illustrates.

07.01.18

‘Left for Ypres – thawing and fearfully muddy. Arrived at about 11 o’clock and drove and walked all round the town, inspecting the ruins and all the terrible desolation. We were constantly stopped and asked whether we were in possession of steel helmets and gas helmets. We tried to visit the cemeteries and see the graves of some of the officers and men who fell at the First Battle of Ypres, but it was not considered safe to do so as the bombardment was considerable. ‘

Her inspections included hospital ships, laundries and facilities of any kind that were concerned with the care of the wounded, and she was determined to impose the highest possible standards wherever she went. This was especially so in the well being of her nurses, who were not always given the attention they deserved. One ongoing problem was the distance her staff were expected to walk from their quarters to their work.

‘The same difficulty exists as always here and that is the long distance the nursing staff have to go to their quarters. I asked the OC to see if it could not be arranged to transfer the huts on the top of the hill to the open space in the compound left vacant by No.30 CCS.’

Some of the abuses she had to deal with were more blatant and she did not hesitate to ring General Haig to complain in person. This was in January 1918 and the nurses must have been frozen during their mealtimes.

“The nursing staff are accommodated in small rooms at the ends of the big wards and their mess and ante-room was in a single-lined marquee in the grounds, badly lighted and with not even suitable or adequate heating conveniences, whereas the Medical Officers had a large hut, with kitchen, scullery, ante-room and mess, with fine big open brick grates in each room. Here we had lunch. I reported this matter to the General later as it is one of the exceptions in all the Armies where the Medical Officers have failed to consider the comfort and actual necessities of the nursing staff.”

She did not scruple about what she thought either and if necessary said it; this of one hospital,

‘The sick officers’ accommodation at this unit is not satisfactory. The division is at the top of the hotel and is not in any way up to the standard of other hospitals in France. There is a lack of interest and a want of knowledge of what is really required for officers.’

Of another, 

‘There is a great deal which requires improvement in this unit. The few wards I went into were not up to the mark. I pointed out that the Matron must do more inspections and must look into cupboards, etc. The Officers’ equipment had been certainly neglected and the femur wards were not satisfactory in any way.’

Sloppy nurses were interviewed and grilled as to their reasons for not doing their job properly. Dancing was forbidden, as were bicycles. Nurses were in France for a serious purpose and the job came first.

Maud was not above a touch of professional pride either. The Harvard Medical Unit was an American outfit which did some cutting edge and pioneering surgery, but it fell under Maud McCarthy’s aegis when she inspected it at the beginning of 1918. Her exchanges with the American nurses are quite revealing.

‘No.13 General Hospital (5th Harvard Unit, USA). The difference in the organisation and management was remarkable, and the American ladies kept whispering to me why was it that our units were so different to those run by American personnel. I explained that they had all to learn and get into the ways of military and active service conditions, which it had taken us many years to accomplish.’

The organization of the nursing force in France and Belgium from 1914-1918 stayed in Maud McCarthy’s hands almost the whole time save for one bout of illness when she had to take time to recover. The formidable administration she built up simply kept functioning. There can be little doubt that hundreds of thousands of wounded men, whose lives were saved because of the efficient medical care she organized and ensured, owe their survival to her. A general, as Ambrose Burnside said in the US Civil War, wins battles by getting there fustest with the mostest. That is exactly what Maud McCarthy did; as much a soldier and a warrior as Haig or any of the others, her enemies were infection, wounds, pain, suffering and disease. In a hard campaign she won many battles against them, her final struggle being against the great flu epidemic that gripped the armies in 1918 and even in this she had some success, one of hospitals even producing its own pioneering vaccine.

Maud ended the war in 1919 and went home to Chelsea; she was seen off in a ceremony where representatives of the French government and medical services did her honour. She also had a chest full of medals and had been created a Dame. It does seem strange that there are so many statues to men who organized the mass slaughter of thousands, yet a woman who organized and enabled the saving of hundreds of thousands does not have even one. Maud McCarthy never married and died in 1949 at the age of 89.

Perhaps on this one we need to examine what society’s parameters are for meriting such a thing?

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Dr John Little spent almost forty years teaching in various schools in London and the South East. He was head of History at Meopham School and Rochester Independent College. He gained the first History PhD  awarded in the University of Westminster.

He has written nine books, mostly novels, and has settled into historical fiction as his favoured genre. His work is based on real evidence, people and events contained in plausible narratives. He also gives talks and presentations on the topics about which he writes. Maud McCarthy features in his book, The Light Over The Solway

Find John's books Here

The Testimony of Sal Madge

by Dr John Little

The town of Whitehaven in Cumbria has a rich history and in it may be found local ‘characters’ who were famous, infamous or notorious, though quite why they were is no longer remembered in much detail. ‘Laal Piano’ Bobby McGhee was three feet tall and played the piano in pubs; he was much loved by children. Duck Foot Charlie Smith lost a foot in the navy and earned a living as a hobbler, tying up ships. Geordie Mitchell slept in a wheelbarrow and ‘Leatherlugs’, a seller of reddening and sill (used for doorsteps) was used by mothers to  deter misbehaviour by threatening them that Leatherlugs would ‘get’ them if they did not behave. Among the number of the local colourful characters was one woman and she stands out among them by a very long way.

Sarah Madgin, known as Sal Madge, was born in 1841 and as may be seen, she was of singular appearance for her time. In the twenty-first century the discussion of gender and the various lives lived by people who no longer conform to traditional male/ female stereotypes is commonplace.

By and large this was not so in the nineteenth century when people were regarded as male or female by most of the population and any deviation from this was regarded as monstrous. Male homosexuality was met with severe penalties and the fate of Oscar Wilde is the best known example of what could be meted out to any who transgressed the social ‘norms’ of Victorian Britain.

There were exceptions of course and lately there has been a popular television series called Gentleman Jack which is based on the diaries of Anne Lister, a wealthy Yorkshirewoman who had a string of passionate affairs with women in the early part of the century. She documented them well in her diaries which were disguised in code, an understandable caution, though lesbianism was not a criminal offence. The Ladies of Llangollen were a well born pair of ladies who lived together in Wales and numbered some very well known people among their friends, not least of which was the Duke of Wellington.

Sal Madge had hair which was cut short at the back and longer at the sides. Her dark blonde hair was always covered with a working man’s peaked cap. Her face was pugnacious and masculine and even now gives the clear impression that she was not someone to mess with. Her upper body was clothed as a man with a male style jacket, a waistcoat and a neckerchief. When sitting she was often taken for a man, yet below the waist she always wore a skirt, but given what she did for a living it was probably a regrettable looking garment. There used to be a saying in the district if you were unwashed, you were ‘as black as Sal Madge.’ For over fifty years Sal worked as a wagoner on a wagon railway, driving huge horses pulling cartloads of coal from where it was mined, to the top of an inclined plane where it was lowered down to the docks and shipped all over the world. 

Sal with horse and her dog Flirt

It was very much a man’s job; hard, tough and in all weathers, all year round. Her personality matched the job for she associated with her best friends who were all pitmen. She drank, played cards, and if anyone attempted violence upon her they would probably lose for she could fist fight as well as any man. She arm-wrestled, drank pints, smoked a pipe, chewed baccy and could throw men at Cumberland wrestling.

It’s tempting to wonder why she did not just live her life as a man since she took on many of what we today would call male privileges and held them against all comers. However if was not practical; she lived in a close knit community and was accepted with a lot of local respect. If she had started calling herself Bill or Ted then among a deeply divided working class community, strong in both Catholicism and Orange Lodge, then she might have met with a degree of resistance.

In the same measure it can be argued that her job leading horses along a railway in winter gales and rain might have been warmer in trousers; I have seen discussions as to why she kept to a skirt but I fancy the answer is a simple one. People working out of doors have to pee. It’s easy for a man, but a woman in trousers has to take them down and squat. Somewhere in the works of James Joyce is a description of a market woman in Dublin standing over a drain-hole with her legs apart and hitching her skirt up to her knees; she then leaned slightly forward and pissed straight down into the drain. It may be that this was once a common feature of working women’s lives that has simply been lost from folk memory since long skirts were abandoned as everyday wear in the early twentieth century.

It is very tempting sometimes to make of people what they are not. Sal Madge is in the census records all through from 1841 to 1891 and in many entries she is living in a house belonging to a woman; sometimes a woman who has been widowed and has children. It is entirely possible that Sal was a lesbian, but there is not a shred of proof of that. In my treatment of her sexuality I have considered her looks, her nature, her strength of character and her considerable ability to stand up for herself. I think it very likely that she looked at the way in which many of the women in her community had to live their lives, and decided that it was not for her. Childbirth, abuse, drudgery and inferior status were not something that she wanted anything to do with. It was clear to her that her world was run by men and they had privilege; she took some of it for herself and woe betide anyone who tried to take it from her. She had a reputation of using her strength to enforce her will; if she decided that to live as a woman was not her thing and that she would live as she pleased, then she probably had little interest in the whole ‘sex’ thing. In my book I have restricted myself to hints without being too definite as to her thoughts on sex. It’s in my mind that if the subject had come up, she would have told the person questioning to mind their own business and if they had persisted they might have got a thump. My Sal more or less says that, and I would think it disrespectful to do more on the matter.

The overarching question about her is to why her memory has survived  in the way it has. If she had been just another local ‘character’, half man, half woman, like something in a Victorian freak show, then she would not have been remembered with the respect and affection that she was held in during and after her lifetime. Part of her local fame may lie in the abundant charitable activity that she engaged in, collecting money for local good causes for she seems to have thrown herself into the life of her community and liked to do good. Another part of it is undoubtedly her membership of the local Rocket Brigade, a life saving organization which fired rockets carrying lines out to ships wrecked on the coast. They saved many lives and Sal Madge drove their wagon so was subject to call out when the two cannon by the harbour sounded out an alarm across the town. There is however more than this to her legend.

Sal about to lead the Rocket troop on a parade

It is rare in historical research that we find the proverbial ‘smoking gun’ that apparently explains things but I believe that I have found the answer to why Sal Madge has such a high status memory in the local community. Without giving any spoilers I discovered that Sal Madge did something rather heroic in the summer of 1887 and it is my thought that her actions elevated her from local colour to local heroine. The actual events themselves have been forgotten, lost in the minds of succeeding generations but when people speak admiringly of Sal Madge being ‘hard as nails’ there is a solid base of evidence for that opinion. It involves an incident that might have seen her receiving an award for bravery in other circumstances, a court case that caught national attention and a level of esteem that caused hundreds of people to drop what they were doing after she died just to attend her funeral. That the esteem survives is witnessed by the fact that her home town raised money for her to have a gravestone back in the 1990s and when that was smashed by vandals a few years ago, to repeat the process and give her a new stone. That sort of regard comes not from duty but genuine affection.

There is more to it that that of course; she is almost an emblem of the town as it was; working class, dirty, smoky and smelly, hard working, hard drinking, salt of the earth, strong of mind and body and no side to her at all. It is easy to see why Whitehaven remains proud of her; so they should be.

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Dr John Little spent almost forty years teaching in various schools in London and the South East. He was head of History at Meopham School and Rochester Independent College. He gained the first History PhD  awarded in the University of Westminster.

He has written nine books, mostly novels, and has settled into historical fiction as his favoured genre. His work is based on real evidence, people and events contained in plausible narratives. He also gives talks and presentations on the topics about which he writes. On 30th January 2020 his book about Sal Madge was published.

A Vicar Saves His Flock

By Dr John Little

Dearham in Cumbria (formerly Cumberland) was a mining village in the north west of England and at Easter 1894 that village received a profound shock. The world price of coal had fallen and the owner of Dearham Colliery, Mr Ormiston, could not sustain the costs of keeping the mine open. Over 260 men and boys were thrown out of work with immediate effect. They had never envisaged such a thing because there had been two generations of stable and reasonably lucrative employment; the local steam coal was the best in the world and was in demand by the navy, ocean liners and anywhere that steam engines were in use.  It was also hard to win, the seams being thin and fractured, the mines liable to flooding, and so the end product was expensive; the miners were used to earning among the highest wages in the whole of the UK and were the ‘aristocrats’ of their profession. Certainly there were other collieries in the area but at some distance; unless something happened to employ the miners thrown out of work then their village would empty, the community break up and hundreds would move away; the knock-on effects on local businesses would be calamitous.

Dearham Colliery Brick

The Lord helps often those who help themselves, but the impetus to do something about the plight of the village came from an unlikely source.

The Reverend Thomas Melrose might be seen as an excellent example of late Victorian muscular Christianity. His main claim to fame before 1894 was as an enthusiastic cyclist and he with his entire family were often to be seen bowling along the country lanes for miles around on an assortment of bicycles. He initiated the annual service for the Cumbrian Cycling Association to be held at his own church, St Mungo’s and made of it a local spectacle to which hundreds of people flocked to see what was happening. Dozens of cyclists from all over the county would gather on the outskirts of the village and then would process through the main street led by the Dearham Brass Band all the way to the church. Afterwards Reverend Melrose would bless the machines; on a good day it was a grand fete for people from miles around.

St Mungo's

Shortly after the miners lost their jobs word went round that the vicar had called a meeting in Sinkle Lonning and asked that the men who had lost their jobs would attend. They did so and Melrose announced that he was going to lead an attempt to reopen the mine as a cooperative, owned by the men who worked in it. Cooperatives were not a new idea of course, but the notion of a cooperative coal mine was rather revolutionary. It was favourably received and Melrose gave the men time to think about it by asking that any who were interested could meet in a few days at the local school. There he revealed that he had failed in persuading the colliery owner to keep the pit open, and that opinion among mine engineers was that it could not be done economically. He then offered the bright spark of Hope by revealing that he had asked a mine engineer, a Mr Heslop, to have a look at an old coalmine, the Crosshow Colliery, to see if it was a viable business proposition. On the outskirts of the village this mine had closed years before, but Heslop reported that it was not exhausted; it had closed for economic reasons. Melrose proposed the setting up of a cooperative to reopen this colliery and put forward a scheme for raising £1000 by subscription  for that purpose. The idea was supported enthusiastically. 

Unfortunately within a week or so it became apparent that the money could not be raised among the miners in the village. They did manage to subscribe over £250, a considerable sum, but it was not enough. Melrose was not finished though. The Maryport Cooperative Industrial Society was a large concern in the local area with several large stores in West Cumberland. One of these was in Dearham where it had opened in 1889; profits over a five year period had been in excess of £43,000 which was a considerable return. Reverend Melrose was acquainted to Mr Fawcett, the president of the society and put it to him that it was very much in his interests to maintain his profits. If his customers stayed unemployed then the Cooperative stores would lose customers. On the other hand if the miners stayed employed then the store would stay profitable. It would make sense for the Cooperative society to open a colliery and run it so that there would be wages to be spent. Mr Fawcett saw the point and put it to the members of his committee, who in turn were quite enthusiastic about the idea. It was agreed that the idea was good but the membership of the society would have to be balloted to see if they agreed to the venture.

The word ‘Socialism’ was well known and although this idea predated the establishment of a British Labour Party, there were plenty of people around who would not agree with a move so politically charged as Co-operativism. However because the idea came from a Church of England vicar it was much easier to regard the scheme as an act of Christian fellowship, with members of a community helping each other out in time of need.

At an open meeting of the Cooperative society it was proposed that the mine be run by a manager appointed by the 'Coop' (pronounced coh-op). Shares would be sold in a limited liability company with the aim of raising £8,000 of capital. £1000 of this would come from the Coop itself, £200 in shares and the rest as a loan. The colliery would aim to produce 75,000 tons of coal a year and would also supply coal to an associated brickworks which would yield a profit of £400 a year. The return to shareholders would be set at 6% per annum. The motion for a ballot was carried by the members and 2900 ballot papers were sent out; votes were to be placed in sealed boxes in each of the Cooperative’s five shops. Two weeks later 1,071 people had voted; 398 against the proposal and 673 in favour.

Within a very short time a management board was appointed and Mr Robert Steel, the duly appointed manager descended onto the site of the old Crosshow colliery. By late August, just four months after they had fallen unemployed, the first miners went down the shaft and began to cut coal. It quickly became apparent that the old shaft was not big enough for modern equipment so a new one would need to be sunk. New and powerful pumps were installed at a cost of £450 to cope with a persistent water problem and on Tuesday 15 January 1895 Reverend Melrose came to the colliery with his wife and a ceremonial spade. The Vicar’s wife had been invited to cut the first turf where the new shaft was to be sunk.

It was not expected that the new mine would make a profit in its first few years and it did not, a fact which caused some trepidation in the Cooperative Committee. However it had to be admitted that profits from the Dearham store had held up, so the nerve of investors held. The mine was never far short of making a profit in its first years, but never quite got there. It did however employ 111 men and Dearham village kept its heart. The only moment of real drama came in 1897 when the hewers were digging along a seam close to the surface and breached the bed of the Barley Beck, a sizable stream near the village. A considerable amount of water entered the workings causing the miners to evacuate extremely quickly, some of them almost naked. Outside it was March and a cold day; looking like a platoon of imps newly released from Hell the shivering of the miners was alleviated quickly by the shawls of their anxious wives who had heard that there had been an incident at the mine and hurried up to find out what was going on. Mr Steel the manager, a man of great pluck, descended the mine shaft on a rope to find that the bottom was dry and that the stream water was flowing down to the bottom of the works from where the pumps were expelling it. Full production was resumed within a couple of days and no one was hurt.

Dearham Coop

By 1902 the Crosshow Colliery made a handsome profit, the first year it had done so and its future looked secure. Unfortunately globalism is no new phenomenon, and mining, like all industries, is subject to the vagaries of the world market. Mines in the USA, German and Poland were flooding the stock exchanges with cheap coal produce by modern methods and machinery. However good the Dearham coal was, it was hand hewn and expensive. The world price of coal slumped at the beginning of 1903 and it became evident that Crosshow Colliery was going to swallow far more money that year than it could produce. Members of the Cooperative Society began to agitate in favour of pulling out and cutting their losses.

Reverend Melrose was no longer living in Dearham. In 1896 his ten year old son had been on the way home from school and attempted to board a moving train at the station in Maryport. He had been dragged along between train and platform and had died very quickly. Such a thing can only bring grief and sadness. Whatever the reason for his decision Melrose had moved away and was now Vicar of Westward, not far from Wigton. There was no eloquent advocate to plead the case for Crosshow Colliery. The manager did his best. Over eight years they had produced a million and a half tons of top quality steam coal. All debts had been paid off and wages of over £40,000 had kept a community alive. There was a strong case to be made for tiding the business over until the price of coal improved. There was no ballot of Coop members on the decision; this time it was voted on solely by the committee. By 39 votes to 29 the society decided to pull out; 150 men were thrown out of work again and the mine closed.

~~~~~~~~~~

Dr John Little spent almost forty years teaching in various schools in London and the South East. He was head of History at Meopham School and Rochester Independent College. He gained the first History PhD  awarded in the University of Westminster.
He has written nine books, mostly novels, and has settled into historical fiction as his favoured genre. His work is based on real evidence, people and events contained in plausible narratives. He also gives talks and presentations on the topics about which he writes. His great grandfather was a Dearham miner and John wove his tale into that of Thomas Melrose and wrote an historical novel, The Collier's Daughter, about the extraordinary venture of a Church of England vicar in the 1890s.