: During the eighteenth century important coal mining
: centers within Renfrewshire were located at and about
: Uplawmoor, Neilston, and Renfrew, and to a much
: greater extent, in Johnston and Quarrelton. (Brian S.
: Skillen, "The Workplace Experience of
: Renfrewshire Miners," The Renfrewshire Local
: History Forum Journal, 1989.) Proprietor John Caldwell
: owned both coal and copper mines at Uplawmoor and
: Lochwinnoch at the beginning of the eighteenth
: century. Coal had been extracted from Renfrew since
: the 13th century, initially by the Mure family. After
: acquisition of the Caldwell Estate in 1332, the Mures
: began extracting coal and lime from the Estate and
: adjacent Uplawmoor. Coal mining at Quarrelton began in
: the 17th century. (Id.)
: ...
: Where two layers coalesced, the coal was up to 100 feet
: thick.
: ...
: The coal extracted from the mines at Uplawmoor was used
: chiefly for calcining lime and in the manufacture of
: bleach used in the growing textile business. (Glasgow
: Courier, 26 May 1796; Glasgow Mercury, 27 January - 3
: February, 1780; (available at Mitchell Library,
: Glasgow); Brian Stanley Skillen. The Development of
: Mining in the Glasgow Area, 1700-1830. M. Litt.
: Thesis. The University of Glasgow, 1987.)
: ...
: The ever-increasing number of local pits intensified the
: competition for miners. The more profitable collieries
: filched labor from less well off neighbors with
: intimidation and lucrative wage agreements Proprietors
: had Parliament reimpose serfdom upon miners from 1606,
: meaning the miners had to obtain the permission of the
: proprietor to work elsewhere, but these laws proved
: relatively unenforceable in Renfrewshire during the
: eighteenth and nineteenth, especially with the ease of
: emigration to America. Proprietors turned to
: importation of workers from the Highlands and ireland,
: the vast majority of whom were Catholic. The migration
: of Highlanders to the lowlands was prominent after the
: closure of the pasturelands and eviction of the
: occupants in the highlands.

: By the nineteenth century, the vast majority of miners in
: Renfrewshire were Catholics while the majority of
: agricultural workers and sheepherders were
: Presbyterian. Inevitably this led to religious strife.
: When a muster of 100 Presbyterian men wearing orange
: sashes and mottos of the usual irritating character
: with a band at the head of the procession, approached
: Linwood Bridge in Renfrewshire on July 12, 1859, they
: encountered 300 well-armed Catholic coal miners and
: ironstone workers. The Presbyterians first retreated
: then returned with bludgeons, knives and paling stobs.
: The ensuing fight maimed victims on both sides, but
: only one fatality occurred, involving a 67 year old
: bystander who had been knifed.
: ...
: Children and women were increasingly used in the coal
: mines during the nineteenth century.
: ...
: The use by women of trousers while working in the mines
: was the first instance of widespread cross-dressing in
: Scotland. At the time that the first women was
: discovered wearing trousers in 1843, the local
: newspapers expressed shock. e.g., Glasgow Argus, 6
: July 1843; 20 July 1843. (Brian S. Skillen, "The
: Workplace Experience of Renfrewshire Miners," The
: Renfrewshshire Local History Forum Journal, 1989.)
: ...
: One observer wrote of a mining boy in 1870: "The
: wind blew open his rough coat, and the poor boy was
: seen to be without a shirt, and his skin was exposed
: to the weather. "Don't you get cold?"
: "No," he replied, "It's warm enough
: below." There was no smile registered on that sad
: countenance--it was evident that the boy of 14 was
: killed within him...subdued him early to a mere
: drudge." (Glasgow Weekly Herald 5 Nov. 1870.)
: ...
: Coal mining posed the danger of exposure to flammable
: methane gas, but both coal miners and limestone
: workers faced the dangers of falling into pits and
: flooding. There were numerous fatalities due to
: combustion of methane that accumulated without
: mechanical ventilation. 'They trusted to the winds of
: heaven; there was no artificial system." The
: fires within the mines led to frequent cave-ins and
: flooding that occasionally caused collapse of the
: ground surface, and in some instances, formation of
: shallow lakes that persist to this date. George
: Baker's poem, Miners Above Ground, begins with this
: line: "Dead men and miners go underground."

David

You have posted a well researched and informative article on the Renfrew coalmines. My information is specifically in relation to the Ayrshire mines.

Coalmining was originally a very poor profession and usually resiticted to working surface outcrops and shallow pits for local domestic use.

The increased demands caused by the Industrial Revolution and the use of steam engines revolutionised the position of the coalminer. He and his wife and children were in demand to recover the coals. More mines went underground and new pits were opened. All of a sudden the relatively small coalmining class found their services in demand.

"That the Scottish coal miners in the 18th century were able to obtain higher wages than most of those paid outside the industry is well known." [Duckham, Serfdom, 188-9] "What is also clear is that the Scottish miners' wages were higher than those paid to their English counterparts." [Duckham, Scottish Coal 262] ".. it was a matter of greatest importance for Ayrshire's coastal coalmasters that their workers could command Scotttish wage rates when they were competing in the Irish trade with coal mined by English colliers." "What is beyond dispute is that it (high wages due to collective bargaining) was perceived by many coalmasters as a major obstacle which would have to be removed if output was to be expanded for sale at competitive prices."

"By the later 1760's it appears that a crisis of major proportions was beginning to develop in labour relations at Ayrshire's coastal collieries. It was of course a period of renewed hope for this sector of the indutry, well reflected in mining in Galt's Reverend Balwhidder's reflection that in 1765 mining in the Irvine area was no longer viewed as 'gowk's errand' [J Galt, Annals of the Parish (1821, 1967 ed), 31]."

"The root of the problem, it was thought, by a growing number of coalmasters both within Ayrshire and elsewhere, was the 'stigma of slavery' and the laws which served ot restrict the entry even of 'free' miners. [Duckham, Slavery, 194]"

"The ruth of the matter is that many Scottish coalmasters, and certainly those at Ayrshire's coastal locations, wanted more, cheaper and less effectively organised coal miners."

The emancipation of the serfs legislation was a form of strike-breaking to enable the coalmasters to bring in Irish and Highland labour.

"Coal mining was seen as an unattrative industry by workers throughout Britain. In Ayrshire, periods of critical shortage continued to be resolved in ways we have already seen. In 1813, for instance, a queue of twenty vessels waiting for coal in Ayr harbour had allegedly inspired George Taylor of the Ayr Coal Company to send a man to 'entice' colliers from pits elsewhere. Taylor himself admitted that it was his custom to send 'his own servant with a horse and cart', to convey his new employees' belongings to Ayr. [SL, CSP 304; 1, William Dixon of Calder Coal and Iron Works v George Taylor, 1816] Indeed it was not until the arrival of the Irish in large numbers in the 1820's that the problem of labour shortage was effectively overcome. [Smout, Scottish People, 406-7; Whatley, 'Industrialisation', 184. Note too the importance of the employment of under employed and poorly paid handloom weavers in Ayrshire pits, notably as strike breakers.]"

My quotes are from "The Finest Place for a Lasting Colliery: Coal Mining Enterprise in Ayrshire c1600-1840" by CA Whatley AANHS a booklet of 120 pages and a very good read.

The proposition is that the original coal mining serfs were about the lowest caste in society. However the demands for coal production and their restricted numbers made them very highly paid. It was difficult to recruit new miners because of the stigma of their slavery and the fact that they resisted the introduction of new labour from outside their group. Wages rose to such a level that the coalmasters organised the repeal of the serfdom laws - not as a humanitarian guesture, but so that they could seek more labour from outside the coalmining caste. For a while the miner was one of the best paid labourers.

Eventually the introduction of Irish, Highland and apparently Weaver labour combined with the prodigious size of coalminer's families resulted in the sought after over-supply of labour and falling relative wages. By the later 1800's mining had again become a poorly paid abomination and by 1913 the survey conducted on Ayrshire Miners' Rows disclosed them to be almost invariably run-down slums and their tenants to be living in abhorrent conditions.

These later conditions were the subject of many surveys and much comment in the later Victorian era and this has led to the handing down of the legend of the terrible conditions in the mining industry.

I am not an apologist for the conditions. I doubt if they were ever good. For a while however mining must have been an attractive source of income for hand weavers being displaced by power looms in factories and tenant farmers and cottars being evicted from farms in the times of farm improvement. The mines must have been hard work and primitive conditions but at least the miners and their families would have been better paid for a while and their living conditions better than they had been used to. They responded by having large families. Wives must have been able to mind the house and children to an extent even though their children were often back down the pit by the age of eleven.

If the husband was killed or maimed as many were the wives and families were rendered virtually destitute and survived often from the contirbutions of the older children already down the mines or sewing or laundering. Poor relief was not granted to a widow who had children that could work.

This happened in our family when my GGGrandfather died aged 45 leaving a widow and eight children ages from 21 to 3 years of age. The eldest two boys aged 15 and 13 were listed in the census two years later as "coal miners" and my GGrandfather, the youngest son, was listed then aged 8 as a "scholar".

The eldest daughter never married and was a "sewer" in the census. My ancestor became a school headmaster and, much later, a prosperous businessman. Such was the sacrifice by the elder children to ensure that one family member, at least, was able to break out of the cycle. The eldest son and his fmaily lived out their lives mining coal, but on the death of the second son also at an early age, his family obviously had had enough and they emigrated to Australia.

Times did change for the worse and the families by then were locked in to their trade. In later years those that could get out did so, the less fortunate just kept mining.

The early coal mines were largely for domestic use and very small. At Saltcoats a larger industry existed to provide coal to burn next to ponds of sea water to extract salt. Later it became profitable to export coal to Ireland where there was none. The industrial revolution created demand for coal for iron works and to power steam engines. Coal was also used to burn lime to make fertiliser for the farm improving trade. The coming of railways allowed mines to be opened inland allowing coal to be transported easily to the coast for export.

Coal miners were obviously in demand overseas as the industrial revolution crossed the Atlantic. They also knew how to sink new shafts and work underground. These skills were in great demand for all ore mining including gold mines when they had to extract ore through shafts.

The depression in conditions in the Scottish coal mines and the obvious attractive offers from overseas where their skilled labour was still highly in demand would naturally lead to a high level of immigration.

This is why I think that many Scots families that went abroad to mine coal would have been from Ayrshire. I don't know how many of these families were Caldwell's but I have not yet found any Caldwell's from Ayrshire who were in coalmining who were not related to my family in some way.

There must be some, but the proliferation of coal mining Caldwell's from Allan Caldwell and Janet Guthrie's family starting in the late 1700's is quite large. There are many "gaps" in their descendents and I think that these may well represent families that emigrated.

The only ones I know for sure are Allan Caldwell and Janet Hunter who emigrated to Little Bras d'Or in Nova Scotia in the 1850's and Matthew and Johanna Caldwell's family who emigrated en masse to Gympie Australia to work in underground gold mines in 1884. Some of this latter family went back into their coalmining trade.

Tom