New project celebrates Baddesley Ensor's mining heritage

Themes of camaraderie, heritage and community spirit are the focus of Your Lamp Lights The Way, a new short film featuring the former pit village of Baddesley Ensor.

As part of a project to explore the concept of 'togetherness' during the ongoing pandemic, the award-winning northern folk music and storytelling collective Harp & a Monkey were twinned with the historic mining settlement.

The two main shafts were sunk at Baddesley Colliery in 1850, and the pit soon went on to become the leading source of income and welfare for the local community.

Since the closure of the mine in 1989, the village has mainly become a residential settlement and commuter town, although many of the former mine workers and their families still live there.

The Lancashire trio Harp & a Monkey felt that there were a wealth of untapped stories amongst the former mining households, and they were also keen to see how incomers to the village viewed its historic role.

They duly invited the locals to share their thoughts and memories.

The result, Your Lamp Lights The Way, features the visuals of Simon Jones - an international award-winning photographic artist and animator as well as 'the harp' in Harp & a Monkey - original music by the folk trio and the words, photos and audio of local residents.

Martin Purdy, Harp & a Monkey's front-man who is also an historian, author and researcher, explained: "We wanted to try and collect a snapshot of what the history of the community means to the residents in 2020 and to see if that old sense of 'colliery comradeship' still exists.

"What we found was a great deal of pride and human warmth, and we really wanted to do that justice."

Harp & a Monkey hope that the project, funded by Warwickshire County Council and the Arts Council organisation Live & Local, will help to further interest in a fundraising drive to create a permanent memorial to mark the worst disaster in the mine's history in May 1882 - when 23 men lost their lives attempting to rescue nine workers trapped by a fire.

Harp & a Monkey have previously made a short documentary film featuring the Washington 'F' Pit in Tyne and Wear – this as part of a project to mark the centenary of the First World War and the role that miners and mining communities played.

It can be viewed here.