Catalogue Number
NMLH.2025.34.1
Object Name
Diary
Title
Miners' Strike Diary 1984
Place
Nottinghamshire, Nottingham, Bolsover, Mansfield, Sutton, Greenham Common
People
Kathleen Hall, Dennis Skinner
Events
Miners' Strike, Greenham Common Peace Camp
Date
1984
Description
Diary kept by Kathleen Hall in August 1984, documenting the Miners' Strike. Hall was staying in Mansfield with the family of a striking Nottingham miner whilst writing the diary. Discusses pickets, protests held by women and the link between the strikes and Greenham Common protests, the actions of the police including arrests of protesters, and the difficulties being faced by families.
The diary is handwritten in a Top Mark exercise book which has a dark green front cover which is ripped slightly at the top. The back cover has helpful charts and tables, including Monarchs of England, multiplication tables and temperature equivalents. On the inside cover, Hall has provided information relating to the donation of the book.
The 1984-85 Miners' Strike was called after the government announced plans to close 20 pits, at a cost of twenty thousand miners jobs, which the miners accurately saw as the beginning of the closure of all the pits in the UK. The strike lasted for over a year before ending unsuccessfully in March 1985. While letters from the NCB to strikers claimed that it was "absolutely untrue" that the government planned to ultimately close 85 pits, the NUM's speculation was correct. A second round of closures was announced in 1992 closing almost all the mines in the UK, leaving former pit towns with extremely high rates of unemployment and deprivation that last to this day.
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