Denaby Aftermath

2,000 Men Now Working

Unemployed Anxious

Distribution of Relief Pay

During the past week old and new hands have been daily signed on by the Denaby and Cadeby Main Colliery Company, bringing the total working strength up to the present to about 2,000, or practically half the full complement of men required to work the pits when in full swing.

The evicted families that were temporarily sheltered in the Mexboro’ and Denaby Primitive Methodist Chapels have all been cleared out, but the Goldthorpe Chapel is still full of men, women, and children, who will be probably removed within the next fortnight.

The unemployed on Friday attended at the Denaby and Cadeby branch lodge rooms to receive the usual weekly financial assistance, which passed out at 7s. per man, another drop from preceding weeks, and one that makes the situation of those who are waiting until the collieries can take them back again a very difficult one, for such a small sum is not by any means sufficient to feed and clothe a healthy and growing family.

In several cases distress and poverty are prevalent, and the bitterness is felt by those who as yet have not been fortunate enough in securing work that they were ever led into a strike that has gained them nothing and lost so much. The Central Committee are making big efforts to help the needy families as much as possible, and the most satisfactory feature of the whole business is that such cases are gradually growing less as the Colliery Company sign on more men.

As has been pointed out before there are many, however, who will never get back to the pits again, and those who have realised they have no chance have been casting round seeking work elsewhere, with more or less success. Now that the strike is over, practically all the old-time workers would prefer returning to Denaby and Cadeby again, and about 1,000 are waiting their opportunity, hoping to be “signed on” before very long.

It will be quite two months, however, before the pits can possibly be got in thorough working order again.

The relief money was distributed at eight o’clock in the morning to allow a large number of the men to journey to Doncaster to hear the trial of Humphries and others for assault on workmen, the result of which appears on another page.