Bevin Boy honoured decades later

Prime Minister Gordon Brown has paid tribute to the men who were conscripted as miners during World War II. However, David Nicoll, from Arbroath, has been telling BBC Scotland that the "Bevin Boys" have waited too long for this recognition.

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David Nicoll ended up working for more than three years as a miner

The number of miners fighting in World War II had left a manpower shortage in the pits.

So, Labour politician Ernest Bevin, minister for labour and national service, devised a plan that saw 48,000 young men conscripted to work down the nation's mines.

Mr Nicoll was 19 years old in 1944 when he was called up to be a Bevin Boy.

He spent four weeks training at a redundant mine on the outskirts of Dunfermline.

Mr Nicoll, now 83, told BBC Scotland that a lot of time was spent trying to make sure all the men were fit enough.

He said: "Many days were spent taking fairly large pit props from pile A and piling them up in pile B and the next day going back and taking them from B and back to A again.

800ft is enough to get the ears popping and for the very first time you've done it in your life it's quite an experience, not a thrill David Nicoll

"The last week of the four weeks we were taken down to the pit bottom and taken into be shown the coal faces and what we might be expected to do, such as helping in the haulage ways and taking in props to the men who were working at the face.

"But it did give us a start the first time we went down, even though that one was quite a shallow pit, 800ft is enough to get the ears popping and for the very first time you've done it in your life it's quite an experience, not a thrill."

Mr Nicoll was then sent to a pit in Cowdenbeath and spent three-and-a-half years as a Bevin Boy.

His boss asked him to stay on as a miner, but he was keen to get back to Arbroath and left in May of 1948.

He said: "There was a ceremony that night, all the electricians and engineers got together and took me out to one of the nearest howffs.

Mr Nicoll went down the pit when he was 19

"I remember going into that howff that night but I'm sorry to say I can't remember coming out because although they were engineers and electricians they still had that miner's thirst.

"It was a grand night out."

Mr Nicoll is now a leading member of the Bevin Boys Association and is angry they have had to wait so long for their commemorative badges, which were awarded at a ceremony at Downing Street.

"It's been very bitter," he said.

"I think it's been more bitter because there have been so many attempts to get something done and nothing has happened.

"A few years ago when celebrations were being held, 60 years since the war finished and so forth, it just seemed it surfaced again.

"This idea that other people were getting rewarded for various things but the Bevin Boys no, simply because it was considered it wasn't a fighting service it was just a change of occupation.

"It's 62 years that we've been waiting on this and now we've got it. I'm just concerned that perhaps after the dust has died down after the awards ceremonies, that there might just be a drift away from it again."