The Henson Journals

[337]

Thursday, May 12th, 1921.

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A very long letter from a Joseph Blackwell, describing himself as "an old miner", arrived. It is expressed with much violence & bitterness, so much indeed that its good faith is rendered suspicious. In any case, however, it serves to disclose the spirit which exists in some sections of the miners. The following is suggestive:

"I was brought up very religiously, only to learn, after much reading & watching the ways of the world, and thinking, that all organized religion is a farce, a cheat, a lulling of the working man's mind, keeping him quiet under any conditions & content to be any kind of beast of burden. Organized religion has fooled the working man, wasting his spare time & energies that ought to have been used in better days. And because the present generation of miners are not willing to repeat the life of the old, they are railed at by you, & those who are dressed in fine linnen [sic] & fare sumptuously every day".

Of course this kind of ranting is the common form of the orators: but the question is, How far is it affecting the men's minds? The writer of the letter before ^me^ has clearly made himself a master of the vocabulary of atheistic communism. How far does it express his real beliefs? There is strangely little power of connected thinking in these illiterate minds: and when a phrase or a thought has been admitted, it is apt to fill them altogether.

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Dear Mr Backwell

I have read your letter with much interest, and a good deal of sympathy; though I must needs think that you are mistaken in thinking that this Strike or Stoppage will bring any advantage to the miners: and I am quite sure you are wrong about Religion. Religion is the greatest power of self–respect in the world, and therefore it raises & strengthens every man who sincerely professes it.

This is a hard world, harder than we always care to remember. There are more than 45,000,000 of people in the British Islands, and they are mostly fed by the profits of a vast foreign trade, which is made possible by our supplies of cheap coal. Coal is now so costly, that our principal industries are paralyzed: and if they fail us, there is nothing but utter ruin in front of the nation, including the miners.

I have been a clergyman for 34 years, and during that time I have lived and worked among the very poorest people. The miners are, by comparison, a prosperous & well–paid population. It seems to me that they don't think enough about their fellow–citizens. Nobody wishes more earnestly than I do that the conditions of the miner's life may be improved: but I see no good in waking old quarrels, [339] [symbol] or in exaggerating present ills. The really important question is, How can we improve matters? Just now, thanks to these repeated and ruinous labour disputes, we are in danger of making things worse, not better: & I want to make them better.

Believe me, Yours v. faithfully

Herbert Dunelm:

I motored to Chester–le–Street, and called at the Union Office. Here a Committee of the Urban District Council was in session, five, ^rather rough–looking men in shirt–sleeves (for the day was very warm)^ whose manners were on a par with their appearance. I felt precisely as an aristocrat being brought before a Revolutionary Tribunal in France! The business of the iron church at Elizabethville was soon set aside, and a brisk discussion of the Strike took its place. I was immensely interested, but rather startled, by their vehement prejudices. One man, a hewer named Oliver, particularly interested me. He looked exactly like a Sans culotte. Then I went to Ferryhill, picking up Clayton in Durham. I confirmed 80 candidates in a wooden church, which was crowded to excess. The atmosphere was quite asphyxiating. There was a hostile demonstration of the miners as I left the parish. so I stopped the car, & addressed them. For half an hour I was vigorously heckled, & when I departed there was no booing.

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