Chapter 13.

The Leadhills Company Ltd was registered on the 25th September, 1903. Twenty five years earlier, when Peter Watson had presided over the birth of the Leadhills Silver Lead Mining & Smelting Company, he had boasted the mines at Leadhills were among the best in the country. Now, the mines could have been described as among the most run down. The miners were still regarded as an "excellent class of men", but they had demonstrated that low wages and a condescending paternalism would not do.

They were said to have been "unsettled", following the strike and the traumas which preceded the creation of the new company, and there was perhaps a need for a local director, someone on the spot so able to advise as to the labour situation. In any event Peter Watson invited James Alexander to join the board. Alexander was then 64 years of age and had retired from business.

Following Borlaise's recommendation to develop the ore in the Brow vein, a number of objectives were set out to get the mines back to profitability.

A new shaft would be sunk at Glengonnarhead and the Brow vein worked from there.

Another winding shaft would be sunk from the 85 fathom level.

Electric pumps would be installed capable of lifting all the water that might be encountered.

The new headgear and winding engine would move men as well as ore. The reason for winding

the men was not to save them from the appalling toil of climbing over 300 M.of ladders but, it

was stated, by moving them in the cages an extra 1.1/2 hours work per man would be gained in

each shift.

Material transport and handling would be mechanised as far as was possible.

And ore would be held at grass to take advantage of the market.

Although air drills were being used at the Greenside mine in Cumbria, they were not a part of the immediate plan at Leadhills. The existence of a "skilled corps of hand drillers" was acknowledged as making an investment in a compressed air plant unnecessary.

The new shaft was sunk vertically for 185 metres to meet the vein and it then followed the hade. While it was sinking the miners used the notorious Wilson shaft to reach the ore from that side.

The smelter had been refurbished in 1901 but the new company had hardly begun operations when there were more complaints about pollution. The Clyde Angling Association lodged a "serious complaint", and the farmers of Glendorch and Glencaple again claimed that valuable sheep were being poisoned. The farmers brought an action for damages and, as landowner, the Marquis of Linlithgow became involved. The Company denied liability but in 1905 a claim amounting to £1325 was settled for £725. However the Company decided to abandon smelting and closed the mill down.

Watson asserted that this was because of the intransigence of the farmers and blamed the Marquis for not siding with the Company. He claimed that, over the years, the Hopes had taken around 50% of the profits from the Leadhills mines, so should have supported the board.

There seems no reference to complaints about pollution from the smelter at Wanlockhead, where, it had been claimed, "sheep graze near the chimney", and there must have been particular problems at Leadhills. It was remarked in 1901 that it still had an "extinct" design of Scotch hearths and there is no record these were replaced. It seems likely that piecemeal alterations had achieved little, and the real reason for abandoning smelting at Leadhills was the inefficient state of the plant.

* * *

The effect of the 1898 strike, and the decline in operations, were reflected in a run down in the community, and in 1902 a correspondent to the Mining Journal had complained that the circumstances at Leadhills were "worse than at any time in living memory". As had been the case so often before, the villagers had turned to other sources of income to get by. The advent of the railway gave a boost to the business of "summer lodgings"; the village was often "thrang with visitors", and a "parlour bed-room with attendance" was bringing in £1 a week.

This seems remarkable for there was on going criticism of the insanitary state of the village. This had occupied the attention of the Crawford Parochial Board in the 1870s and 80s, and in 1900 the County Medical Officer reported that burn was little more than an open sewer, and the absence of any sanitary facilities in most of the cottages was a "circumstance difficult to realise".

A new school was opened in November 1903. The original building was beside the library, and its poor state had been depreciated by teachers and parents, and criticised by the education inspectors. The Marquis had insisted on the support of the mining company towards any new building, but the latter had excused inaction because of the "depression in trade". An account of the opening noted that the Marquis had travelled by motor car. After the demise of the railway, the motor car would be the only way the village could be easily reached.

The shareholders now had prospects of a return on their investments, and to encourage them a visit to the mines was arranged in the summer of 1904. Paull had moved to Wanlockhead so they were shown round by his successor, James White. The share price rose from 5/6 to 13/-, but in fact there was no dividend until 1906 when the Company paid 13/- in the £1, and reported a "very successful year".

In January, 1906, the members of the Reading Society "sat down to tea" to celebrate the anniversary of its founding. The Preses commented on the growth of the library since 1821, but with only around 60 members it was hardly expanding. However, there seems to have been an attempt to encourage younger readers for the books purchased at the time included both the Boys Own Annual and the Girls ditto. The library at Wanlockhead also faced a declining membership, and there are references to concerts being held to raise funds and encourage support.

The number of societies continued to multiply, and there was a broadening of interests. An example of this was an Exhibition of old mining tools at Leadhills in 1906. Those concerned can hardly have imagined that the day would come when the relics of the mining would be all there was; a tourist attraction and a source of income.

* * *

The turn of the century had found the Wanlockhead mines doing better than their neighbours. The 5th Duke of Buccleuch had died in 1884, and his son continued with development, concentrating on the Bay Mine. But prospects there proved disappointing, and by 1901 it was the generous stopes in the New Glencrieff vein which allowed the Wanlockhead miners to raise over 1300 tons of ore, 14 tons per man, in a single year. This was not due to any investment in the underground workings. Ore from the southern end was moved along an adit reported as flooded with 12 ins of water in places before being raised by an old "tom & jerry" water balance. Even in 1883 the whole arrangement had been described as "primitive".

To limit the flooding a barrier of unworked ground had been left between the north and south workings. In the latter, a water pressure engine, installed by James Stewart in the 1830s, worked pumps 60 fathoms below the adit, and an old water-wheel worked others at the northern end, together the engines lifted 139 gallons per minute. The remains of both the tom & jerry and the water-pressure engine still lie deep under the hills and a model of the latter can be seen in the Museum.

Water continued to be the major hindrance to development and at the turn of the century, an additional pump was installed, worked by an oil engine at grass. The engine was affectionately known as "Daisy Bell", and it raised another 72 gallons per minute, but it could not be more than a short term and ad hoc solution.

The mining at Wanlockhead had all the hallmarks of an earlier period, and a comment that "few of the men work fulltime" suggests they were allowed to dictate production. It was a situation which could only continue as long as there was generous and accessible ore bodies, and with an end to the reserves in sight the need for modernisation and investment became urgent and the 6th Duke was prepared to relinquish his family's management.

In 1905 the brothers Archibald & William Fraser came forward to take the lease. Their parents had been born in Wanlockhead and they themselves had made successful careers in shale mining in West Lothian and had founded the Pumpherston Oil Company Ltd, later to become Scottish Oils. William's son, another William, went on to become chairman of the Anglo Iranian Oil Company Ltd, now British Petroleum.

The Frasers arranged for an inspection of the mines by two consultants R.T.Moore & John Gemmel, who visited Wanlockhead in December, 1905, and reported that the mine was run-down with output no more than 720 tons per annum. But they considered that the dressing floor and smelter were "in good order", and claimed an investment of £7000 could make the operation profitable again. They were not in favour of a proposal to drive a "low tunnel" to Mennoch Foot to drain the ground, and recommended new and larger pumps to deal with the water.

The report was sufficiently encouraging for the Frasers to form a partnership, with capital of £25,000 held by seven partners who included one of the consultants, R.T.Moore. It was registered on the 6th November 1906 as the Wanlockhead Lead Mining Company.

One of the products of the Pumpherston Oil Co. was fuel for Scotland's early motorists and it is tempting to think the Frasers' interest in lead mining foresaw the need for the compound, tetra-ethyl lead as an anti-knock additive. However the research which led to this derivative, once the cure for the motorists' problems, now reviled as a pollutant, was many years in the future, and it is likely the Frasers only sought to diversify their mining interests.

The Company appointed John Mitchell as its manager. He had been an under manager during Paull's brief reign at Wanlockhead, and he now had the task of raising output to the 1500 tons proscribed by the consultants. Modernisation was essential and electric power, as at Leadhills but using a hydro scheme, was one option considered, but steam was the final choice. Babcock boilers were erected in a new power house at the mine head, there was a steam driven winding engine, and steam was piped down the shaft to drive pumps in the mine. A compressor was also installed so that the men could work with air drills. It was said to be the "heaviest machinery" even seen at the mines, but may not in fact have been the first compressor for excavations at the Bay Mine in the 1970s suggest one was installed there in the last years of the Duke's administration.

Mitchell knew he would have to "make a stand" against casual attitudes if production was to be raised, and he wrote to Archibald Fraser, "it will be better to get this over at once". He accordingly met with the men on the 17th November, and set out his aims. He told them he would deal with any grievances on an individual basis, and would listen to "anything that would admit discussion". Moving ore featured largely in Mitchell's plans, and he stated a bargain rate would be set for tramming material in the mine. At the same time, the surface work would be reorganised, and a better arrangement of the work-load would give the labourers higher earnings.

It was perhaps typical of Mitchell that he was prepared to make a verbal presentation to all the men, and they were encouraged to put forward points of their own. These included requests for an all-round increase in wages, monthly pays, no miners should be asked to do labouring work, and there should be extra payment for any work at weekends.

Mitchell gave all this a hearing. He refused any increase in wages, but was prepared to give extra to the washer boys, and said those miners willing to do more could earn more. He was also sympathetic to the request for a monthly pay, a long standing grievance, but if work was needed at the weekends, then it would only be at the normal rates.

Mitchell did raise the bargain rates in December, and reported that production had increased, but in June 1907 he found the labourers moving spoil in the North section of Glencrieff were cheating on their bargains by not filling the kibbles. One was subsequently sacked and the rest claimed the rate was inadequate and threatened to go over to Leadhills unless they were given an increase. Mitchell interviewed each man in turn and had them back at work by the 3rd of July.

In 1908, the Frasers gave the village a meeting place, the Fraser Hall. It was in memory of their parents, "born in the village 60 years before", and was the sort of liberal gesture calculated to establish a good relationship with the work force. It provided a community centre until it fell into disuse and was pulled down in 1974.

Accidents in the mines continued to take their toll, and with them the need for emergency attention. In 1908 First Aid lectures were held in the Fraser Hall, but mangled limbs needed better attention, and in 1910 there were complaints of the "lack of adequate surgical skills".

* * *

By 1908 the Glengonnar shaft at Leadhills was down to 85 fathoms, but operations were still centred at the Wilson mine. In that year White left, and in November W.Bawden Skewis took over as manager and instigated a regime which proved as contentious as that of William Borron nearly a century before. Unlike Borron, Skewis was an experienced mining engineer. He had begun his career in Cornwall, and before coming to Leadhills he had worked at the Nundydroog gold mine in India. By 1900 this had a hydro electric power plant which was said to be the largest in the World at that time, but the whole structure of industry in India was such that there were tiers of administration between the sahibs and the miners.

By 1909 the power station at Glengonnar was working. In it two Bellis & Morcombe steam engines drove 60KW AC generators which supplied 500 volt 3 phase electric power to the mine and dressing floor. Another steam engine drove a winder capable of moving 16 cwt (810 Kg) skips at 100 ft per minute (.5M per Sec). Below ground an electric hoist wound to the 85 fathom level, and a Pearn pump lifted 13,000 gallons (52,000 litres) of water per hour to the Gripps drainage adit.

The ore in the Brow vein was found to be 6 feet wide in places, and was worked from five levels, the deepest 100 fathoms under adit. Once raised to the surface it was taken over the railway line and an endless haulage moved the hutches up to the old Wilson mine where there was a Blake-Marsden rock breaker and picking tables. The best ore was packed and sold as potter's ore; the rest was run into bins from which another tramway ran to the dressing mill at Raikhead. Here a variety of machines, jiggers; buddles; and vibrating screens; produced a concentrate containing up to 82% lead.

Output rose to 3000 tons of ore per annum, equivalent to around15 tons per man, about 1.1/2 times what they had achieved before. The mines were profitable again and in 1908 there was a dividend of 70%. An article in the Mining Journal claimed that good leadership; the use of the latest technology; and the efforts of a "fine body of willing men", had put the Leadhills mines back among the best in the country.

But in the middle of the euphoria the price of lead collapsed from £19 to £13 per ton, and the management at Leadhills immediately looked for economies. Even as the correspondent from the Mining Journal toured the mines, bargain rates were being cut. There had already been a dispute over a bargain for work needed to install an electric pump, and this was followed by a disagreement over the rate for sinking the shaft. The miners had taken the first step on the road to the rally.

* * *

The bargain books are gone but the "Reports from the Mine" in the issues of the Mining Journal give a clue as to what may have occurred. On the 3rd April a partnership of fifteen men accepted a bargain to sink the shaft at £17-10s a fathom. Four weeks later they had made 1.5 fathoms so it seems each man only got the equivalent of 14/7 (.73p) a week. It was less than their grandfathers might have earned, and can be compared with the wage of £1 a week which Peter Watson claimed in 1877 for the old company. It was recorded that the bargain was re-set without alteration, and the affair can be seen as the crux in reactions to what may have been a more complex situation.

It was remarked that there had been "period of discontent" in Leadhills early in 1909, and it may be this had much to do with the introduction of the new technology. It would be many decades before the miners had electricity in their homes, and it must have seemed a strange and perhaps threatening source of power. At the same time, the cut in earnings coincided with a considerable increase in the cost of living. In 1912 a correspondent to Forward reviewed the prices of foodstuffs in the Glasgow shops and found they had increased by 1/3rd over the previous five years. At the same time, a visitor to Leadhills remarked on the low wages there, and had asserted the miners were "rooted to the village by feudal laws as their ancestors had been".

They may have been rooted to the village, but that did not mean they would accept the situation. Eleven years before, the refusal of a bargain and the subsequent lock-out led to over three years of hardship. The memories of those days were real, so one course of action was to petition the Marquis, asking him to look at the circumstances in which the villagers found themselves when there was only one industry to employ them. Would he consider letting ground to another mining company, or encourage some other business ?

An alternative was again to combine and join a Union. The membership of the Lanarkshire Union of Mineworkers seems to have been dropped. It had brought its members at Leadhills out in 1898 in what was perhaps the longest mining strike in Britain, but what had it achieved ? Union membership can hardly have seem attractive, but now the Leadhills men had heard how lead miners in Stanhope, County Durham, had bettered their conditions through the efforts of the Union of Gas Workers and General Labourers. As well as the petition to the Marquis, it was agreed that a letter be sent to the Union's Northern delegate, Hugh Lynas, seeking support.

The Union of Gas Workers and General Labourers had been set up by a young Socialist, Will Thorne, in 1898, and was one of the so called New Unions which sought to unite those workers outside the traditional base of specific crafts and industries. Its attitude to disputes was an aggressive one, and it demonstrated its strength with a successful strike among the London gas workers.

Encouraged by this Thorne aimed to extend the membership, and the miners with the Weardale Lead Co. joined in 1908. The Company accepted the situation and a conciliatory committee was formed to "adjudicate on questions between the Company and the men". To have such a committee at Leadhills had long been the ambition of its miners.

There is no indication of the extent to which the Leadhills men were influenced by the Union's political stance. They had The Labour Leader in the library, so must have known something of it.

Nothing came of the petition to the Marquis, but Lynas responded with alacrity and in March he and William Sherwood, the North East general secretary, came up from Sunderland, and a branch of the Union was set up in Leadhills.

In September Will Thorne visited the village when he came up to Scotland on what was essentially a recruiting drive. The Union had been represented there in the 1890s, but interest had declined and there were no Scottish branches in a list made in 1905. Thorne addressed an enthusiastic meeting in the village, and the men were encouraged to set out a resolution which looked for a minimum wage of 23/- (£1.15) a week for the miners and proportionally less for labourers and engine men. Payments were to be made every fortnight instead of every month.

Skewis refused to meet Thorne and stated that grievances would be dealt with on an individual basis only. He further claimed that the existing bargain rates gave earnings which were above 23/-. The bargain system turned on an arrangement between a group of men and their employers. The sort of hierarchy it created had once been accepted. Now, the business of mining sought to ensure optimum production from all; but at the same time keep wage levels down by individual arrangements.

To reinforce the Leadhills Company's position, Skewis asserted there was not enough work and, in October, 26 men were laid off, among them the officials of the new Branch. Those miners who wished to stay in employment now had to sign conditions which stated they would "not belong to any union". By November 40 had signed but the rest, 160 in all, had refused and been locked out. Turning a potential stoppage into a lock-out meant the existence of a strike could be denied. In view of the hardships of the strike of 1898, the miners can hardly have wanted another stoppage, but now the lock-out had thrust it on them and on the Union.

By then the new machinery in the Glengonnar mine was working and, if the results of this investment were to be realised, some way had to be found to maintain output. In India Skewis had seen how power drills could turn any able native into a miner. Drills had been proposed for Leadhills, now was the time to put this into effect and contractors were engaged to install an air compressor. It was driven by a Crossley oil engine and the whole cost £450.

The Company not only strengthened its position by the use of the new machinery, but the strikers living in the few houses owned by the Company were evicted into a severe winter. Had the Marquis sided strongly with the Company, all the strikers might have been "thrown on the highway". However, as with the previous disputes, the Marquis seems to have distanced himself from the affair.

The situation moved the influential Glasgow Herald to publish a lengthy article which not only brought the dispute to the attention of the public, but the editor's impartial assessment provided support for the miners' cause. The strikers also got the support of the Independent Labour Party, the ILP, and the Glasgow Trades Council, as well as the Liberal MP for South Lanarkshire, Sir Walter Menzies. It was said that some of the directors of the Leadhills Company Ltd were unhappy about the lock-out and favoured a settlement, but Watson asserted he would sooner close the mine than allow Union interference.

During the previous dispute, the strikers had been in a minority. Now the situation was reversed and 40 men, described as "loyal", continued at work. This inevitably gave rise to divisions within the little community. Pickets stood in the snow at the Glengonnar mine, and the working miners were escorted to and from it by strikers and their sympathisers; led by the village band and chanting a derisive ditty.

Tattie Wullie Shaw,

Silly Wullie Shaw,

Selfish Wullie Shaw.

A correspondent to the Weekly News described the demonstrations as "amusing", and noted that they were not marked by the "bitter feelings often associated with such actions". In spite of this "free and easy attitude", seven pickets including two women, were arrested in December, and charged at the Lanark Sheriff Court under the Conspiracy and Protection of Property Act. The men were fined 10/- (50p) on two counts, and the women were admonished.

In January, the Glasgow Herald published a letter signed by the members of the strike committee: John McKendrick, John Tennent, Hugh Borthwick, William Moffat, Thomas Weir, John Cameron, John Brown, David Wallace, and the Secretary, Samuel Jennings. They pointed out that the Company had promoted its shares to "the sound of trumpets and the beating of drums" and then sold them at a premium. At the same time, the Leadhills miners were being "held down", and those seeking better bargains had been sacked. At one time miners might go to Wanlockhead, but this arrangement had been stopped and, they claimed, their neighbours dare not help for they were "overawed by an overbearing and vulgar tyranny."

Of the nine signatories, five were members of the Reading Society, and one may also have been an Elder in the Free Church. The secretary, Jennings, was not a local man, having come to work in Leadhills some time previously.

In 1836 the miners had argued their case in a letter to a Dumfries paper and were later acknowledged as "sober minded". Now the letter to the Glasgow Herald was well received and the dispute got much favourable publicity. This reaction was not unique for when the lead miners in Teasdale went on strike in 1872 it was said "the public are very high in favour" of them. No public voices supported the actions of the Leadhills Company. Although the management at nearby Wanlockhead agreed not to employ any Leadhills men during the strike, Mitchell's relationship with Skewis was less than cordial, and he seems to have distanced himself from the dispute.

By March there was no sign of any capitulation by the strikers; the air pipes for the drills were in place, and Skewis was ready to bring in more men. The first such were from Tavistock in Devon, but having learnt of the situation, they turned about and went home. Twelve unemployed men were then recruited via the Glasgow Labour Exchange and housed in the enginehouse at the mine head. The Labour Exchanges were only set up that year, and their use as a source of strike breakers caused a furore. Thorne, now MP for West Ham, raised the matter in Parliament, asking "Did the men know they were being recruited as strike breakers?"

There were also angry scenes at Leadhills and these led to an-other case in the Sheriff Court. This time five women were among those arrested. Three were described as "housekeepers", perhaps a legal euphemism for housewife, one as a widow, and the other a "domestic servant". After a lengthy hearing, the case was dismissed amid scenes of jubilation. The arrests led the ILP paper, Forward, to proclaim "Scotland should be proud of the women of Leadhills". It was a time when the Suffragette movement was be-coming increasingly militant and getting much publicity. But it is unlikely that the women in the dock in Lanark saw any parallel between themselves and those ladies who appeared in the English courts.

The years prior to the 1914 war were a time of industrial strife, and the strike at Leadhills has to be seen against a background of labour unrest in the West of Scotland. Many disputes turned violent; the Socialist, John McLean, declared the country was "approaching the rapids of revolution", and the editor of the Glasgow Herald wrote the situation was the "gravest in one hundred years".

The paper was not always sympathetic to labour disputes and a key to its attitude in relation to Leadhills is perhaps found in a leader about the strike of Glasgow tramway workers. In it the editor remarked on the "indiscipline of forces which agitators have set in motion". There was no evidence of "agitators" among the lead miners, and even though some strikers were arrested, there was no sign of the sort of aggressive tactics seen elsewhere.

The attitude of the paper perhaps echoed the comment of Sheriff Alison who was prepared to put down a strike at the Airdrie pits by force of arms, but wrote of Leadhills in 1836 that the men were "orderly and respectable".

The strike and the resulting hardships continued and a deputation visited the Rev Colin Gibb, minister of the United Free Church Albert Street Glasgow, and who had intervened successfully in other disputes. He in turn approached J. Alexander, but claimed his advances were re buffed. This apparent lack of support from the local director led Forward to liken him to the biblical Pharsee, sticking to the rules and taking his profits. The attack may have been less than fair for Alexander had the welfare of the miners much at heart. He had supported the building of the Free Church in the village, and could have been the anonymous "gentleman" who was influential in bringing the strike of 1898 to an end.

The paper may have been unaware of the nuances, but it took the strike to its own. Every issue carried a report, and through it's pages the ILP sought to advance the strikers' cause. The paper's attitude perhaps can also be seen as reflecting a dissatisfaction with the way the Liberal party was responding to working class aspirations and the ILP's desire to promote Socialism.

The attitude of the Company hardened and Skewis now drew up a declaration which had to be accepted and signed by all who wished to work in his mines. It demanded each man should

Faithfully and diligently employ himself.

Be submissive and obey all orders.

Not be a member of or join any Trade Union

any refusal not only meant dismissal, but all moneys owning from bargains being worked were forfeit.

The strike had been triggered by a dispute over bargains and had escalated to teeter on the verge of social/political issues. Now Skewis's uncompromising attitude was put the affair firmly in that arena. It was said that the "real matter" in dispute was Union recognition, and the GW&GL claimed it was now a strike for the "basic freedoms of all workers". The Glasgow Herald, in a leader on the 12th April, asserted the miners were being denied rights "accorded to all organised labour", and also suggested the "friction between men and management" showed conditions at the mines were "neither fair nor reasonable".

The Company were moved to reply and the secretary wrote to the editor claiming its cause was being misrepresented. He asserted the wages at Leadhills compared favourably with other metal mines, and if Union membership was allowed, then this would mean sacrificing the cause of the men loyal to them. He added, ominously, that business was bad and there was not enough work for all.

The publicity may have helped the Gas Workers Union to expand in Scotland for branches were set up at the Kinlochleven aluminium works and at the Ballachulish slate quarries. The men at the former comprised a variety of process workers uncomfortably housed in a settlement which was then only accessible by steamer. The slate quarries had been worked since the seventeenth century, and the men there had first combined in the 1890s. Encouraged by the Union, the aluminium workers went on strike in 1910, the quarrymen the following year. The former stoppage proved an especially disastrous affair, and led to much criticism of the Union in the pages of Forward.

* * *

In April members of STUC took time to visit Leadhills ahead of their national conference in Kilmarnock. When it met on the 30th April orders were suspended to receive a deputation from the GW&GL, and allow the case for the Leadhills miners to be presented. The Conference passed a resolution condemning the actions of the Leadhills Company Ltd, and pledging support for the strikers.

The GW&GL may have welcomed the publicity, but its wide ranging interests meant its finances were being strained by the number of disputes which affected its members. The executive cut back on expenditure and the Leadhills strikers were advised that strike pay was being stopped. The Lanarkshire Union of Mine Workers may have seen this as an opportunity to regain lost ground, for a report in Forward claimed it had agreed to "step in".

The Company's strategy seems to have been to break the strike by creating a new labour force. To this end Skewis had some disused cottages re-furbished as permanent accommodation and in May another fifteen men were recruited in Glasgow. The twelve already at the mine had gone home for the weekend and the opportunity was taken to have the new men travel back with them. Their arrival at the little station resulted in a near riot. Seeing the situation, five of the new men went over to join the strikers, but the others were mobbed. There were five constables on the train and three more had been drafted into the village but, unlike the previous disturbances, there were no arrests.

The committee of the Reading Society passed a motion to cancel Skewis's honorary membership, but he himself was no doubt encouraged by the way things were going and he wrote again to the Glasgow Herald, claiming there was enough men at work to enable mining to continue at a pace commensurate with the market and lead ore was being shipped out. He wrote that the new men had "settled in" and would soon be properly housed. If the strikers returned they would be paid any back wages but, he insisted, union membership had to be repudiated.

The committee replied in a letter which asserted that the ore Skewis referred to had been dressed prior to the strike, and the mine was only kept going by demanding the men did some surface work after their underground shift. The committee also stated that the strikers were becoming exasperated, and it would not answer for events if the new men were moved into houses in the village.

In the event all the newcomers left soon after, and the undiminished support for the strikers meant Skewis sought a compromise. The doctor at Leadhills, Allan Ramsay, was consultant to the Lanarkshire Union of Mineworkers and on friendly terms with Skewis, and he arranged a meeting between the latter and two of the strike committee, Cameron and McKendrick. As a result Skewis offered to withdraw the demand that the men left the Union, but he insisted on the rest of the conditions stood.

A settlement was probably in sight, but the strike was destined to end in a rally of support which can have had few equals in mining history. In May George Dallas of the ILP had begun arrangements for a demonstration in the village on Saturday, the 6th June. A special train from Glasgow had been arranged at 3/- return, and the South Lanarkshire Clarion Club were organising those coming on bicycles. On the day an estimated 5000 people turned up to march around the village, led by two bands, and the strikers and their supporters wore red badges or ribbons. Those men who had stayed at work kept out of sight. The window of one household was broken, but otherwise it was said that there was no mischief.

The rally was addressed by a galaxy of speakers chaired by Dallas and using a horse brake as a make shift platform. They included Robert Smillie; Tom Johnston, the editor of Forward; George Kerr, an ILP organiser; Esther Dick of the Federation of Women Workers; H.Pritchard for the GW≷ David Gilmour, Secretary of the Lanarkshire Miners' Union; and Neil McLean of the Scottish Labour Party; as well as representatives from other trade unions and the Glasgow Trades Council.

Smillie asserted the strength of the support for the rally meant it would be impossible for "Watson and his company to enforce their terms of slavery". Gilmour spoke of the previous strike at Leadhills and reminded the gathering that his union had continued to pay the strikers. Johnston and McLean referred to the militancy of a dispute at a colliery at Bo'ness, and to the "pit prop argument"; and McLean remarked "let's get some of that spirit here". Pritchard commented on the lack of trade union organisation in Scotland, and Kerr used the occasion to criticise "the capitalist system"; and expressed the hope that a "hatred of it would be promoted in the young minds" who were present.

Smillie was greeted with "Three cheers for auld Bob". The appellation could well have referred to more than his age for the tone of most of the other speeches showed how Smillie represented an older generation of trade unionists. In his Independent Miner to Militant Collier, Alan Campbell sets out three stages in the movement to union activity: the independent collier, the reformist and the militant. Campbell sees Smillie as typical of the reformist, and Kerr and MacLean can perhaps be seen as examples of the young socialists who came to the fore in the 1920s.

Two days later the directors put forward further terms which were accepted by Cameron and McKendrick, and the strike was over. There was great rejoicing, bells were pealed in Leadhills and, in a leading article, the Glasgow Herald proclaimed the outcome was a "triumph for the principals of combination".

In reality the terms proved far from clear. The Company apparently agreed to accept Union membership, but Skewis did not regard the settlement as carrying any obligation to employ its members, or to allow union officials to negotiate on behalf of the men. Peter Watson later reassured shareholders by asserting that "Peace and harmony were now the order of the day". But there was to be little evidence of either in the years to come.