Life in Kelty

John and Jim worked to a contractor in the Mine, Peter Penman they called him. He used to come down and visit us in Cowdenbeath and he said "Why should you travel all this distance to work why don't you come up to Kelty and get a house up there?"So my Mother decided she would do that, as the boys were all working up in Kelty at the Aitken Pit, and it was a long way to travel to work. My Mother went up to Kelty, and made enquiries and we got a little house, well it was a bigger than the one we were situated in at present. It was situated better, it was a cleaner place. I think there were two rooms, a scullery, kitchen, inside toilet. There was no bathroom of course. Very few bathrooms in these days. My Mother decided to take the house, so we moved up there between 1910 and 1911. 
Sis got a job at the Lindsay Colliery at the Tables, that's were all the coal was checked for redd or stones. It was a great long table, and the women used to sit there, and pick all the stones out. That was four of them working, so there were just Kitch and I left. We were doing a little bit better than previously. 

The Miners came out on strike about this period, it was called the Billy Fairplay strike. It lasted for about three weeks. It seems the owners wanted to not pay them for small coal, only for the big coal. They had what was a thing that filled the skip with big coal, and then they had to fill another skip with small coal, using a shovel, and they were paid very little for it, and they went on strike for three weeks. The Miners eventually won their case and went back and had to fill the coal with a shovel, and got mixed up and that was what they called the Billy Fairplay Strike. These days the coal all comes small and you wonder what they were doing then. That was about 1912, and it comes to my memory that at that time the Titanic was sunk. We were out for a walk and we got this word that the Titanic had been sunk. There was an old fellow near Kirkford called McCleod, called the Miners Poet, he has been injured at one time in the Mine, and he was cripple, and he used to go to all the football matches and made up poetry. He wrote one about the sinking of the Titanic, and he was highly commended for it. The words read

"On the fourteenth of April at early break of day,
The gallant ship Titanic sailed merrily on her way.
It was her maiden voyage and all supposed that she,
Would reach her destination but it was not to be.
The Captain did his best to save the vessels human load,
But found it was beyond his power it was the will of God.
That many there should perish beneath the surging waves.
Unconscious just two hours, before that God had planned their graves"

We used to play a lot around the Lindsay Pit at their wood yard, and we used to build things where all the timber was there for the use of the Miners. We built little huts and had some fun there, and maybe boil potatoes. However this Sunday morning we took a shortcut and went through the fence and down through the railway, across the Mineral railway and up the other side. There as we went through there was a lot of money lying just through the fence. About fifteen shillings we got for four of us, and we had a grand old time. It must have been an old bloke that we knew, Penman they called him, who lived with his aged Mother, and he used to get drunk on a Friday or Saturday night, he must have been taking a shortcut. He had fallen down the banking, and lost all his money. It was fifteen bob, and we bought a football, and spent the whole lot of it. We never even let Mother know about it. 

John and Jim joined the Territorials. Quite a lot of Kelty lads joined. They joined the Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders, and their depot was at Kinross They used to go up there for Rifle practise, and once a year they went away for a camp. I remember they were going away to camp I think it was Carnoustie or Barry at the side of the River Tay, and they were there for a week or two camping, and the bloke that used to work with them, Jimmy Penman they called him, he was the Father of Willie Penman who played for Raith Rovers later, and he was supposed to be all dressed to go away to camp, and John and Jim took a look at him. His kilt was on wrongly, his sporran was in the wrong place, and they had to dress him before they went away. He was an awful bloody site. 

I don't think I've anything to talk about up to the fourteen War nothing of importance took place, however my brothers John and Jim were away at a place called Macrahanish, that's in Argyllshire at the camp, and the War was just declared there in 1914. When they came home, they were shipped right off. All the Territorials in Kelty, there were quite a lot of them, and they all went away in a brake, and there was a photograph taken of them at Kelty Cross. Of the whole lot that went, there was only about three or four returned, and my two brothers were amongst them.

First World War

At the outbreak of War, John and Jim and all the other Kelty lads, were posted right down to Bedford, and that's where my brother John met his future wife. They were only in Bedford for a few weeks, eight or ten weeks, and then they were shipped right off to France. They were in France before the end of 1914. All the soldiers that went to France before the end of 1914, got what they called the 1914 Star. John and Jim both got them. At the end of the War, Jim finished up a Sergeant, and John finished up a Sergeant Major. Through the whole lot of the War, I think they were only home twice or three times, for the four years that they were there, and one time I remember John came home and still had the clay of Flanders on his boots, and he had a sealskin coat on. Mother went and had a look at it, and it was moving with lice, and she had to burn it. His kilt was moving with lice, and she had to go over it with a candle, for she couldn't destroy it for he had to go back with it again to France, and they must have been in a filthy condition. Most of the soldiers that came home they hadn't time to get themselves cleaned before coming home, and they were lousy. All their clothes were lousy. My brother Tom joined up, I think it was the Royal Field Artillery, and they were stationed near Edinburgh near Piercehill Barracks in Edinburgh. However he had only been in a few months, when they discharged him. He had what they called flat feet. They didn't need to worry about his feet, he was on a bloody carriage with horses, and that, so they put him out. Later on he joined up again, and they accepted him, this time he joined the Royal Garrison Artillery. He went to France in that capacity. He met John and Jim when he was in France. The three of them were in the battle area, and they all came through all of it. 

My teacher asked one day if any of us had brothers in the front line, and of course I put my hand up. I gave her John's number in the Territorials, and she communicated with him, and she knitted socks and sent them to him The first time when he came home on leave, he went and visited her. Her Father was the manager of the Aitken Colliery, Beveridge they called him her name was Greta, Greta Beveridge. John went and visited her a few times when he came home, but she was a little bit older than him. She would be about thirty at that time