Register digs into mining's darkest days

THE names of miners who died in the Lothians are to be immortalised in a new remembrance register.

Hundreds of colliery workers were killed or maimed in pit accidents throughout the 200-year history of mining in the region but never before has a comprehensive record of the tragedies been compiled.

Researched by father/son team Alex and James Smith, from the former mining village of Newtongrange, the register provides an alphabetical account of mines and casualties from 1776 to 1993.

Among these is the Mauricewood disaster of September 1889 when 63 miners died.

A copy of the register has been donated to Midlothian local studies in Loanhead where much of the research for the tome was carried out.

Alex Smith, 71, said he was publishing this account after two previous attempts failed to live up to his ambitions.

"I initially planned to write it as a history book but it just didn't seem right," he said. "I then decided upon amalgamating the lists I had found of casualties for the whole of the east of Scotland."

Mr Smith said he was inspired to chart the history of the industry by commemorative stones to dead miners.

"Where I grew up nearly everyone in the street were miners, that's why I was keen to pay tribute," he said.

"There is a stone in Newbattle remembering those killed in the pits but it didn't have any names on it and I remember at the Easthouses stone (in Dalkeith] there were women there in the early 1980s with tears running down their faces reading the names and that's what brings it home to you."

Mr Smith estimates that there are between 700 and 800 names on his register.

"I class the miners the same as soldiers," he said. "I worked in engineering and always knew I would be coming home at the end of each day but these men were going down into the ground and didn't know if they would get out again."

He added: "This is not a commercial book it's a tribute to the brave men who worked in the mines."

Councillor Peter Boyes, cabinet member for libraries at Midlothian Council, said: "Mr Smith's book is a moving testimony to the dangers of work in the coal mining industry.

"Many of the names in the register are those of men who worked and died in Midlothian pits. It is fitting, therefore, that this information is available in our local studies collection where it will be an invaluable source for family and local history.

"Most importantly, it is a reminder to our own and to future generations of the human cost of mining."

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