ABSTRACT
Any history of mining politics in the twentieth century Nottinghamshire coalfield is necessarily dominated by two events: the decisive return to work during the 1926 lockout; and the refusal of the majority of Nottinghamshire miners to join the national strike in 1984-5. In both strikes breakaway unions were formed, and during the 1984-5 dispute the earlier history of the Nottinghamshire coalfield assumed great significance. In the heat of the conflict of 1984-5, understanding of the position of the Nottinghamshire miners and their past politics hardly progressed beyond knee-jerk demonologies or eulogies. In this account of mining politics in Nottinghamshire between 1910 and 1947, a central place is given to events of the 1926 lockout. The role of the Nottinghamshire miners in 1926 cannot be explained by simple one-dimensional accounts of their exceptionalism. Rather the drift back to work, and the subsequent formation and relative success of the Nottinghamshire Miners' Industrial Union (NMIU or the 'Spencer Union') needs to be understood in the context of the character of the coalfield. The first section of the chapter examines the context and background to that dispute in Nottinghamshire. Mining politics were shaped by the nature of the regional society, by traditions of political identification and action, by the working order within the collieries, and even, indirectly, by the geology of the coal seams. In particular the politics of the Nottinghamshire Miners' Association (NMA), affiliated
Map 4 The East Midlands coalfield at nationalisation in 1947.
