MINERS' HOUSING IN SCOTLAND.

extracted from Chapter XIV Report of Royal Commission on the Housing of the Industrial Population of Scotland, 1918

(1) HISTORICAL INTRODUCTION.
Special Importance of the Problem.
As already indicated, the origin of the Commission was directly due to the representations made to the Secretary for Scotland by the Scottish Miners' Associations. Our Remit includes the housing of all classes of the Scottish population; but, as the result of the preliminary Reports prepared for the Local Government Board at the request of Lord Pentland, it was decided that the case for an investigation into the housing of miners was so overwhelming that we were directed to make special inquiry into housing in the mining districts. Accordingly, we considered it our duty not merely to obtain very full evidence on the conditions of housing in the mining communities, but also to inspect personally typical areas in the chief mining counties - Midlothian, Linlithgow, Fife, Lanark, Ayr, and Stirling. The evidence laid before us by witnesses we have thus been able to confirm by direct observation. Our visits of inspection were made principally during the six months before the War. The masses of evidence adduced and the records of observations made constitute a valuable body of evidence on all the problems connected with the housing of miners, and, in order to convey a substantive impression of our investigations, we are compelled to devote to the mining section an exceptionally large proportion of space.

But, as will be shown later, the amount of space is not disproportionate to the magnitude of the industry concerned. The mining industries, including shale-mining as well as coal-mining, necessarily give rise to special housing problems ; for the organisation of the industries is determined by the geological situation of coal seams or shale beds, not, as in many other industries, by the availability of power and accessibility to the sea. Frequently, as in the recently sunk shafts at Valleyfield in West Fife, the mine-owner sinking such shaft is the only employer having any interest in providing houses near the new shaft. Where, as in Lanarkshire, several mining shafts are within a short distance of each other, existing towns or towns resting on other industries may be in a position to provide adequate housing; but, as a rule, even in the special mining areas of Lanarkshire and Ayrshire, the houses have been placed as near as practicable to the mining shafts. The housing of miners, therefore, has a very direct and special relation to the nature of the mining industry. The industry requires considerable numbers of houses all approximately of one class. The convenient sites are not always the best drained or the most easily laid out. For these and several other reasons, the housing of miners presents a series of special problems.

Historical Development
These problems are not of recent growth. The history of the industry is not without relevance to the conditions of to-day; for, in some areas, the houses built more than 120 years ago continue to be occupied, and, in at least one place (Bo'ness), a mine has been continuously worked for over 100 years. In such an industry it was to be expected that customs should become too firmly rooted to be easily changed. Where fathers, grandfathers, great-grandfathers, and even great-great-grandfathers can be counted in the history of the same local industry, tradition naturally becomes a governing factor in the life of the villages. Here and there the shadows of the early bondage of miners seem still to affect the miners of the present generation. This seems to be the only explanation of the idea, frequently encountered all over the mining fields, that the miner's house was really a part of his wages and that half a crown a week should be the maximum rent. In the early days of the industry the "tied house" predominated. In certain localities it continues to predominate. As the industry has developed and transit has been better organised, the " tied house " has lost its general predominance ; but probably it is still, in the minds of some communities, a relic of the bondage days. The house is still very largely regarded as a piece of the mining plant, not as a place of free tenancy. There is, however, abundant evidence to show that, where the housing conditions have been improved, the personal interest of the miners in their houses tends to increase. The following historical notes, therefore, have a distinct bearing on present-day conditions.
We are informed that in the year 1592 special concessions and protection were given by the Scots Parliament to miners and salters because " they were dailie in the hasart of their lyves be the evill air of the saidis mynes". Unfortunately, certain acts of a fire raising raised a strong prejudice against the miners ; and the Act of 1592 was repealed and in 1606 an Act was passed by which colliers and salters were brought into a bondage as severe as that which existed in the fourteenth century and quite as cruel as that to be found in the wilds of Africa. This Act prohibited anyone from employing any collier, coal-bearer, or salter without a sufficient testimonial from their last employer ; and in the event of their being employed without such testimonial, the master from whom they came had power to claim them within a year and a day, in which case the employer was bound to deliver up the worker within 24 hours under a penalty of £100 Scots ; and such deserting colliers as had received " fair wages and fees " were to be held as thieves and punished in their bodies. (Acts Parliament Scots, vol. iv. p. 286.)

The existence of this state of servitude through the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries must be borne in mind in considering the social development of the Scotch coalfields. In 1775 an Act providing for gradual emancipation was passed, but proved ineffective. A young miner who had begun to work in the pits after 1775 felt that he could not leave his father, who was "thirled" to a colliery, and go to a new work. Hence it was that within a quarter of a century the Government was forced to move and bring in the 1799 measure, which declared that "many colliers and coal-bearers still continued in a state of bondage from not having complied with the provisions, or from having become subject to the penalties of the said Act." It was, therefore, enacted that from and after the passing of the 1799 Statute " all the colliers in that part of Great Britain called Scotland, who were bound colliers at the time of passing of the Act, shall be, and are hereby declared to be, free from their servitude."

Even this Act was robbed of its full effect by a rigorous system of long contracts which then grew up. In 1840 a Parliamentary Commission was appointed to inquire into the conditions of women's and children's labour in mines. Commissioners visited many collieries and mining towns and villages in Scotland, and in their reports, issued in 1842, they give us many interesting glimpses (1) of the housing conditions of the mining population, and (2) of the conditions of labour in the pits of 73 years ago. At many collieries the Commissioners found women at work in the pits, while boys and girls of from seven to eight years of age were daily being dragged down the mines by their parents, and were put to work for which they were quite unfitted. Strange to say, that in Mid and East Lothian, within a few miles of the City of Edinburgh, the conditions of labour were discovered to be much more revolting than in any other county in Scotland. The Commissioners found that in the Lothians women and young girls ("bearers") were engaged in the work of carrying coals in baskets on their backs for long distances underground and up stair pits to the surface. Although not so bad as in the Lothians, conditions were bad enough in other counties in Scotland, and as the result of the reports by the Commissioners an Act was passed by Parliament on 10th August 1842 prohibiting the employment of women and girls in mines, and stipulating that boys should not be engaged in pits under ten years of age. The Act became operative on 1st March 1843.

The Commissioners of 1840 found that the housing conditions in many mining centres were of a piece with the work in the pits. Mr Franks, in his report, deals at considerable length with the housing in East Scotland. He says: "The domestic condition of the collier population presents a deplorable picture of filth and poverty. I took the opportunity of examining many of the witnesses at their own dwellings, in order that I might become well acquainted with this branch of the inquiry, and it would indeed be difficult to witness a more disheartening spectacle. The hut is a wretched hovel, perhaps 10 to 12 feet square, in which a family of from six to ten individuals are huddled together ; two bedsteads, and sometimes only one, nearly destitute of covering, generally a few stools, sometimes the hanging of a chair, and some damaged crockery, fowls, occasionally a pig or jackass, dogs and whatever animals it may chance they possess, share the room with the family, and the only objects of comfort which present themselves are the pot and the fire over which it invariably hangs. The almost general absence of all furniture is to be attributed, as the women and men told me, to its giving inconvenience 'in flitting.' There is generally an absence of all drainage, and the filth, etc., of each cottage is accumulated before the door, not even in many cases placed on one side ; indeed, there is rarely any other deposit for filth except the entrance to the dwelling." (Report by Robert Hugh Franks in Blue Book, Art. I., Commission on Mines, 1842.)

In 1844 the Government appointed Mr Tremenheere, Inspector of Mines, to visit Scotland, and report on the administration of the new Act. Writing of the typical colliery village of Lanarkshire, Mr Tremenheere says: "The common form and arrangement of the colliers and miners' houses already described prevails here very generally ; that of long rows, single or one behind the other, or in parallelograms, containing from 20 to 100 houses or more together. They have no upper storey, and consist solely of a room on each side of the door. The general characteristics are crowded rooms, dirt and untidiness within and without, neglect of garden-ground, where there is any, and all other indications of a population either regardless of, or not in a position to observe, the comforts and decencies of domestic life." The Commissioner also obtained evidence from other parts of Scotland. For instance, Mr J. Johnston, Manager of the Redding Colliery, Stirlingshire, says : "One-third of our houses are single, the rest are double, or a house and a half. We cannot get them all to keep them as clean as we could wish. In 1832 we went through them all, whitewashed them, and furnished the people with bedsteads, blankets, etc., and cleared everything away about the doors. Since then their habits have greatly improved. Before that most of them slept on straw; four or five do so still." In the county of Fife, in 1843, the accommodation provided in most mining villages was meagre in the extreme. At many collieries the custom was to let houses of one room to newly married people, and two rooms to men with families. The ceilings were low and the windows small, and earthen floors were the order of the day. Little attention was paid to drainage.

At the same time, in some districts an improvement had begun to be felt. At Shotts, in Lanarkshire, about 26 houses had been built by the colliers, with a little initial assistance from the coal-owner through the agency of a building society to which they paid 2s. 6d. per week. At Coaltown of Wemyss, Fife, and Newbattle, Midlothian, improved houses were being erected ; and it is interesting to note that these two districts today possess some of the best miners' houses in the East of Scotland. It is apparent that conditions such as those described by Mr Franks and Mr Tremenheere in the middle of the nineteenth century to some extent explain, if they cannot really excuse, the persistence of the conditions which we are about to describe in the older rows in the twentieth century.

 

(2) CHIEF MINING COUNTIES OF SCOTLAND.
The Mining Population
In order to indicate the magnitude of the problem, we append the following table compiled from the Census Report of 1911, giving the number of (1) workmen below ground, and (2) total employed about the mines in the six principal mining counties of Scotland.

County	Total Population dealt with (Census)	Employees working below Ground	Total employed and about the Mines	* According to the Report for 1911 of the Government Inspector of Mines the total number of workpeople of all ages, male and female, employed underground and above ground was 138,377. ** The number of miners resident in Edinburgh and Glasgow, though considerable, is small relatively to the total populations. Thus the figure, after deduction of these two cities and Leith, is the more accurate, though it does not allow for the non-mining portions of the counties.
Lanarkshire	1,400,088	54,390	64,961
Fife	259,787	24,340	28,577
Ayrshire	261,973	13,202	15,491
Stirlingshire	155,560	10,345	12,493
Midlothian	485,756	10,260	12,567
West Lothian (Linlithgowshire)	76,542	9,768	7,260
Total Deducting Glasgow, Edinburgh & Leith**	2,639,706 1,292,326 1,347,380	122,305*	141,349

Even allowing for the fact that in many cases more than one member of the family works as a miner, it is clear that the total population of coal miners (apart from miners in ironstone, shale, etc.) with their dependants cannot be far short of half a million.

Burghal and Landward Distribution of Mining Population
This large population, amounting to about one-tenth of the inhabitants of Scotland, is housed partly in burghs and partly in landward areas. In the burghs some miners live in types of house similar to those occupied by other wage earners ; but in some others - for example, Hamilton, Coatbridge, and Dunfermline - there are to be found "Miners Rows" that are at once recognisable as of the same type as those in the landward villages. On the other hand, in some of the county districts, large aggregates of population, amounting occasionally to 15,000 persons are under county government. Such are Blantyre and Larkhall in Mid-Lanark. In those places a clear majority of the population are directly engaged in coal mining. (Dr John T. Wilson, Report on the Housing of Miners, Lanarkshire 1910) Thus, in the mining districts, the apparent distinction between burghal and landward communities is more than usually indefinite. The differences between the administrative powers of burghs and counties are not reflected in the external differences of the communities. An Inspector of the Local Government Board stated that " a Sanitary Visitor would not be able to distinguish which were burghs and which were not in Fifeshire as regards 6 their administration."

Certain Common Features
In spite, therefore, of the differences in administrative control the mining communities, whether burghal or landward, show certain common features, and this is true of the various coalfields of Scotland. In all the coalfields there is a well-marked difference between the oldest houses and the newest, between the worst and the best. But there are also great differences between the different coalfields. The differences are shown in such matters as the proportion of old houses, the prevalence of overcrowding, and the current sanitary standard. Fife and the Lothians, whose development has spread over a long period, show great varieties of housing, and broad distinctions between the older and newer villages. On the other hand, Mid-Lanark shows, in its mining villages, a uniformity of house structure, a monotony of village plan, and a congestion of houses that are probably, to a great extent, due to the very rapid development of its mines during the middle and end of the nineteenth century. In our account of the different types of miners' housing, it is inevitable that the worst conditions should receive most prominence ; but the general impression given can hardly be more depressing than the reality. It is worth recalling that Mr Walker Smith's estimate of " new houses required," on the double test of overcrowding and uninhabitability, amounts to 18.59%, in the mining districts, as compared with 9.27% in the large burghs of Scotland as a whole, and 12.11% in the small burghs.

The evidence on which the following sections are based is chiefly drawn from representatives (1) of the Central and Local Authorities ; (2) of the coalowners, by whom a large proportion of the houses are provided ; and (3) of the Miners' Unions, of which the largest is the Lanarkshire Miners' Union, with over 40,000 members. We have also used the reports by the medical officers issued in 1910-1912 at the instance of the Local Government Board. These vary from a few pages in the Annual Report of the Medical Officer of Health for Ayrshire to an elaborate and detailed volume of 242 pages, with plans and illustrations, in the case of Lanarkshire. As already stated, we have checked the various descriptions by personal observations in the counties of Lanark, Fife, Ayr, Midlothian, West Lothian, and Stirling.

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