Derbyshire Miners, by J.E. Williams

[p024] The Derbyshire Miners: A Study in Industrial and Social History. By J. E. Williams. Ailen & Unwin, 90s. As part of a strategy to combat an unfavourable ‘public image’ trade unions, like business organisations, are now commissioning the writing of their official histories. By establishing lucrative fellowships in University departments of history (where the lack of further regimental histories to be undertaken assures ready acceptance) the unions concerned doubtless gain prestige of a sort: Moreover, money spent in this way can be justified _ before the membership as being both a ‘saving’ on income tax and a legitimate educational expense. Serious students of labour history and responsible trade unionists will look for other justifications for such studies. To them the criteria by which such works will be measured are firstly the extent to which they show how the decisions of individuals and the activities of local groups have contributed to the successes and failures of past industrial struggles: secondly, in the clarity with which such facts are depicted for the benefit of the trade union member who has little time to spare for unnecessary reading. Additionally any study concerned with mining should attempt to show why the NUM has, over the last 50 years, declined from _ its position as one of the most militant unions to become perhaps the most reactionary and backward. On the first of these criteria Mr. Williams’ study succeeds admirably. The author has painstakingly and lucidly attempted to relate his local research to the wider aspects of national labour politics and to the general industrial struggle, and the failure of leadership at all levels is the central theme of much of the work. He records, for instance, the pathetic attempts of A. J. Cook to enlist the co-operative societies as a ‘victualling movement for the fighting forces of labour’ during the General Strike. When Cook told a TUC meeting that his mother-in-law had been taking in a tin of salmon for weeks past, J. H. Thomas replied: ‘By. God! A British revolution based on a tin of salmon.’ The extent to which the aims and policies of the Derbyshire Miners’ Union were influenced by the social background and personal attitudes of its leaders is again clearly depicted. The early leaders were mainly primitive Methodists who ‘sought to uplift men morally and_ socially without recourse to violence or upheaval’. And throughout the succeeding years there is seen to be a continuous conflict between the men and their leaders on the question of strike action. Though in more recent years it has commonly been held that the Derbyshire coalfield has enjoyed a more militant leadership than most - others, the late Area President is quoted as saying in 1946: ‘ Higher wages alone are not going to solve the problems of the mining industry. There are miners here from all over Britain. Our job is to go back into the coalfields carrying the spirit of Moral Rearmament. That spirit alone is the key to the coal problem.’ In terms of clarity this book has less to recommend it. A thousand pages of close type with half a dozen footnotes per page and a welter of trivial detail is fairly heavy going even for the keenest reader of history. But the book is worth borrowing— at this price few will want to buy it —for the chapters on the 1926 strike and on political activities 1918-39. Although the key question indi- cated above—the decline of the NUM as a militant union—is not specifically examined by Williams, many possible contributory factors emerge from his study: the successive defeats in the industrial struggle, due largely to ineffective leadership; the increasing dominance of the union area council over the individual branches and, above all, the collaboration between the union and the employers which began during the Second World War and was so effectively exploited after nationalisation, JP.

[p025] BOOK REVIEWS Princes and princelings A History of Poland. By O. Halecki. Further revised edition. J. M. Den‘ & Sons, 1961. 30s. The main purpose of Professor Halecki’s book is to enlighten the foreign reader on the ‘providential mission that Poland has. . . fulfilled in the general evolution of humanity’. Poland has made two great contri- butions: her rulers’ experiment of the ‘Royal Republic’ and her defence, against Tartars and Muscovites, of the ‘frontiers of Christendom’. This emerges from an ably written cata- logue (it covers almost two-thirds of the book) of kings, princes and princelings, their strife and conflicts, their shuffling fortunes and dynastic pre-occupations. Poland’s ruin in the 18th century is ascribed to the decay of national morals and the loss of religious faith: ‘Providence sent them a great ordeal —i.e., the Partisans—which was to purify the national soul and give their sons to behold in the humiliation of expiation a new hisioric mission, worthy of a great past’ (p. 213). This new mission Poland accomplished, Professor Halecki seems to sugest, when in 1920 she ‘saved the whole of central Europe from the Bolshevik inundation’ (p. 286). A.D.