Why Almost Every Miner at Betteshanger Refused to Pay a £1 Fine — 1942

Coal mining documentary: why Betteshanger's miners in Kent almost all refused to pay their 1942 strike fines, and what the records show. In January 1942, in the middle of the Second World War, the miners of Betteshanger Colliery near Deal, Kent, went on strike over pay on a narrow, hard-to-work coalface. Striking was against wartime law. Three union officials were sent to prison, 35 miners were fined £3 and 1,050 were fined £1. Of those sentenced, only nine are recorded as paying. This film follows the village behind the strike: the first shaft begun in the Kent farmland in 1924, the Mill Hill colliery estate bought in 1929, the pithead baths that opened in 1934, and the community that grew up around the pit. It looks at what the surviving records say about the dispute, what they do not say, and how the government eventually remitted the fines in July 1943. Betteshanger was the last colliery in Kent to close, in 1989. Its story is kept today at Betteshanger Park and the Kent Mining Museum. Sources and further reading: Dover Museum, "Coal Mining in Kent: Betteshanger Colliery" Kent Mining Museum, Betteshanger Country Park "1942 Betteshanger miners' strike", Wikipedia Kent Mining Museum and Dover Museum archive photographs, used with permission or under licence where credited #CoalMiningHistory #BritishHistory #PitVillageBritain