Now! Then! 2024! - Yorkshire On This Day

Excerpt

Mr J.A. Hall, president of the Yorkshire Mineworkers’ Association, has written to the Prime Minister and to Mr T. Williams (minister of agriculture) protesting against the proposal to get opencast coal under the gardens at Wentworth Woodhouse, the seat of Lord Fitzwilliam, who, as announced in The Times yesterday, has offered the house, the park, and gardens to the National Trust. He said the gardens were among the most beautiful in the country and it would be vandalism to proceed with the scheme. He was confident that within six months this coal could be got by other methods more economically and without defacing the surface. A conference of local authorities at Rotherham approved a resolution asking the prime minister to receive a deputation on the matter and regretted that Mr Shinwell did not meet the local authorities when he visited the estate on Saturday. The Yorkshire Mineworkers’ Association, whose president has threatened a 48-hours stoppage if the proposals are put into effect, is to be asked to support the local authorities’ protest.

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To facilitate reading, the spelling and punctuation of elderly excerpts have generally been modernised, and distracting excision scars concealed. My selections, translations, and editions are copyright.

Abbreviations:

• ER: East Riding
• GM: Greater Manchester
• NR: North Riding
• NY: North Yorkshire
• SY: South Yorkshire
• WR: West Riding
• WY: West Yorkshire

Comment

Comment

Catherine Bailey covers the affair extensively (Bailey 2007). The parkland was generally open to the public and formed a major community resource, but, despite claims that the coal was of poor quality and attempts to enlist the ex-Yorkshire miner and minister, Tom Williams, Rotherham and the Fitzwilliams lost out to alleged class prejudice and genuine fuel shortages. However, Shinwell, who forced the issue, lost his job after his failure to deal with the energy crisis caused by the hard winter of 1946-47.

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Original

Mr. J. A. Hall, president of the Yorkshire Mineworkers’ Association, has written to the Prime Minister and to Mr. T. Williams (Minister of Agriculture) protesting against the proposal to get opencast coal under the gardens at Wentworth-Woodhouse, the seat of Lord Fitzwilliam, who, as announced in The Times yesterday, has offered the house, the park, and gardens to the National Trust.

He said the gardens were among the most beautiful in the country and it would be vandalism to proceed with the scheme. He was confident that within six months this coal could be got by other methods more economically and without defacing the surface.

A conference of local authorities at Rotherham approved a resolution asking the Prime Minister to receive a deputation on the matter and regretted that Mr. Shinwell did not meet the local authorities when he visited the estate on Saturday. The Yorkshire Mineworkers’ Association, whose president has threatened a 48-hours stoppage if the proposals are put into effect, is to be asked to support the local authorities’ protest.

180 words.

Tags

Tags are assigned inclusively on the basis of an entry’s original text and any comment. You may find this confusing if you only read an entry excerpt.

• Attlee ministry (3) ·
• Class conflict (11) ·
• Class discrimination (3) ·
• Clement Attlee (2) ·
• Coal mining (24) ·
• English country house (1) ·
• Garden (1) ·
• Hall, Joseph "Joe" Arthur (1887-1964) (1), Yorkshire miners' leader ·
• Labour Party (UK) (17) ·
• Manny Shinwell (2) ·
• Mining (3) ·
• National Trust (1) ·
• Peter Wentworth-Fitzwilliam, 8th Earl Fitzwilliam (1) ·
• Rotherham (21) ·
• Strike action (9) ·
• 📌Wentworth Woodhouse (4), huge country house, park and estate in the village of Wentworth near Rotherham, Jacobean original rebuilt and expanded in the mid-18th century, a centre of Whig influence, later profited greatly from coal mining ·
• Williams, Thomas "Tom" (1888-1967) (1), Baron Williams of Barnburgh, Yorkshire miner and Labour Party politician ·
• Winter of 1946–47 in the United Kingdom (1) ·
• Yorkshire Miners’ Association (2) ·

All tags.

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