John Belcher you are just prejudiced and it's time you

stopped bleating about subjects you know very little

about.

I do not need to know what it is like to work in a

colliery to become a free miner but I do work in a

productive mine in the Forest of Dean producing coloured

iron oxides red, brown, yellow and the much sought after

purple, also mining various other grades of iron ore.

Yes, working in a colliery is much more dangerous

than working in an iron mine, because of the very

unstable roof, in-rushes of water and bad air such as

black damp (carbon dioxide) stink damp (sulphuretted

hydrogen) Fire Damp (methane) and of course there's

silicosis (black lung).

These problems were created in the large collieries

many where production was more important than people.

My free miner uncle, Dick Porter, worked in the collieries

all his life; he took out the vacant Findall Mine from the

Crown called Findall because it was mined for both iron

and coal.

When he decided to retire he did not sell his gale to

the highest bidder. He worked to the rules of the Mine

Law Court and handed it back to the Crown where it could

only be taken out by another free miner, and Kia Warren

was the next galee thereby keeping all gales in the hands

of the free miners.

By selling gales to the highest bidder the Free miners

lost control and therefore became slaves in their own

mines and many of the bad conditions they had to work

under in the large collieries was of their own making.

Uncle Dick used to say every mine is different, each

mine has a language all of its own and you have to learn

that language. It speaks to you in a very gentle whisper, it

will also give you signs. If you do not act immediately on

these signs and whispers you do not get a second chance,

the old man of the mine will have you. The reason there

are so few accidents in the fissiles is because the Free

miners working in them practised this philosophy.

All our family have worked underground from a very

young age not because we were forced to but because we

wanted too and I know of several young families who

worked in the same way on the coal. You are just looking

for things to find fault with.Why don't you try looking for

things you can be pleased about and promote the Forest

for a change.

You need to do some more studying and get some

practical experience in to do your year and a day then,

John, you might be more interesting to listen to.

– Elaine Morman, free miner.