Delight as Bevin Boys take their places among heroes

The Bevin Boys monument was officially dedicated in what had been a long-awaited moment of recognition to the former coal miners, both living and dead.

In a touching moment, the Countess embraced the memorial’s designer Harry Parkes, 87, among those who had waited more than 60 years for recognition. In return he gave her a small brass miner’s gas lantern on a keychain, which she told him she would wear as a necklace.

He said the day also reflected his delight at the memorial’s location opposite a monument to the fallen of Gallipoli in the First World War.

“Dare I say we are among heroes and it is amazing to think so,” he said.

The Countess unveiled the four stone plinths of the monument at the National Memorial Arboretum in Staffordshire. The memorial is hewn from grey Kilkenny stone from Ireland and will turn black like the coal the miners extracted.

The Bevin Boys were so called after Ernest Bevin, Minister for Labour and National Service, who came up with the idea to conscript workers into the mines and supply vital coal to British industry from 1943 to 1948.

During the Second World War conscripts who had signed up believing they would fight the Nazis were instead drafted to work in more than 1,800 pits.

At the time, none knew why they had been selected for the mines rather than the frontline, said Mr Parkes.

“If you were left-handed you couldn’t fire a .303 rifle, so they’d say ‘send him down the pits’,” he said. “The same if you were flat-footed and so it went on – we thought we were almost third-class citizens.”

Winston Churchill said the miners would be able to stand as equals with the fighter pilots, seamen and soldiers, for recognition of their efforts but many felt their contribution was overlooked and in some cases they were stigmatised amid mistaken claims they had sought to avoid joining the Forces.