With reference to your recent article and letters about the "first female free miner" I would like to point out a few facts. The words mine, miner, mineral come from the same root. A miner mines minerals, metalliferous ores when smelted make metals. The very first free miners were iron miners. Iron was being mined more than 3,000 years ago and the coloured iron oxides, orchre being mined approximately 8,000 years ago, with men, women and children carrying out the whole process.
During these periods there was an abundance of wood and charcoal was used for smelting the ores. Coal like charcoal is made from wood trees and is not a mineral it is carbon. Although coal has been known about and used on a very small scale it was little used until the industrial revolution just two to three hundred years ago. There was always a big distinction between people who mined iron in the Forest and people who extracted coal are colliers and where they worked is a colliery the colliers who are objecting to me becoming a free miner when in the past women have always worked in the Forest iron Mines.
The English language is a living language and the meaning of words is constantly changing and the words 'mine, miner' now refer to anyone digging a hole in the ground, perhaps it will soon embrace anything dug out of the soil like potatoes because they are made of carbon.
Clearwell Mine management still work several mines in the Forest in which I work extracting the many crystallised forms of iron ore and the much sought after coloured iron oxides ochres. The nine caverns open to the general public is only a small part of the mines complex and it is not just a tourist attractions it is the Royal Forest of Dean Iron Mining Museum.
Opencast mining is another misuse of the word 'mining.' Opencast coal extraction is technically quarrying and quarry workers cannot be free miners. The 1838 act specifically says a person has to work in a mine, one assumes that must be underground. Mr Jones was allowed to become a free miner on a technicality. He has never worked underground in a Forest mine. Because the act does not say specifically underground he was allowed to become a free miner. Mr Jones can stretch the rules to suit him, but woe betide any other person who does the same, specifically a female. Because the act does not specifically say it cannot be a female the females can apply. I was able to register. So come along all you born and bred females claim your rights. If Mr Jones keeps objecting I will have to see the Deputy Gavellers about the validity of his application. The Free Miners Association have refused to let him join the association. Shows how much the other free miners think of him, but then they may not let me join! If not the females will have to form their own guild.
For over a thousand years the free miners had their own mine law court and it was only when they started to misuse abuse and continually cheating each other and anyone who tried to deal with them. The government forced the act of parliament on them. Their mining rights stand outside of the act the act of parliament is only for making regulations to control mining and quarrying operations in the Forest. It does not give them their rights it only attempts to define them.
I have not heard any complaints about the acts of parliament which wipe out hole sections of the 1838 act or about licences being impose by the coal authority or planning rules being foisted onto the free miners, all of which diminish their rights. They are all supinely accepted. Also, Mr Curly Top from Cinderford is implying only males can be born and bred Foresters. Females have rights as well as men. The males who complain about equal rights like their women to be subservient to them.
By the statements in the press I am surprised how little people know about the Forest and their rights above and below ground. When the free miners were on campaigns on behalf of the King many women would follow the long marches, known as camp followers, with the result many children were born outside the Forest like in Wales, Scotland and even in France. To allow these children to become free miners the mine law court made a ruling that they have to work seven years and a day in a Forest mine. The reason for this is they believed that after seven years and a day all the cells in the body became replaced and you then became a reborn and bred Forester. This ruling was not included in the 1838 act because time had changed and the army no longer had camp followers.
Now time has changed again the maternity hospital has been closed and women are being pressurised by their doctors to have their babies else where outside the Forest. This seven year and a day rule would fall in line with Robin Morgan's plea for the present rules to be changed to suit the circumstances. Hopewell Colliery would make an ideal training school for future free miners. Are you willing to have a go Robin? To make the training more interesting they could spend time at other mines and collieries in the Forest.
I rest my case for the time being anyway, as I'm sure some anti-male will want to reply. – Elaine Morman, Clearwell.