Colliery Band
Bolsover Area > Bolsover > Colliery
BOLSOVER COLLIERY BAND 1920’S.
Apart from the Colliery Club at New Bolsover the men had many extramural activities to broaden their minds including the colliery band.
The following photographs are of the band and in particular the relations of Jo Webley.
Top Left. Photo with instruments, grandfather Thomas Webley is seated 1st left with the base tuber, uncle Tom is standing above him 3rd left without a flat cap.
1927 Bolsover Colliery School. Some of the men are still covered in coal dust. Photo without instruments, grandfather Thomas Webley is the tallest gent 3rd right.
Top Right. Again 1927. Location Midland Station Bolsover Colliery
Bottom Left. The Colliery band. Thomas Webley far left kneeling. Tom Webley 4th left standing.
Bottom Right. Bolsover Colliery Boilers with Mr Foster who was the bandmaster at this time.
Photographs many thanks Jo Webley.
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William Foster
(1876 – 1966)
My maternal grandfather William Foster was born on 6th
November 1876 at Wakefield in the West Riding of Yorkshire. He was the first of thirteen children of
Robert William Foster and his wife Sarah (nee Lodge). His father was a joiner by trade but also a
musician and played in the band at the Theatre Royal Wakefield on an
evening. Music would also play a most
significant part throughout my grandfather’s life. William was baptized at All Saints Church
Wakefield on 4th February 1877 when the family were living at
Pincheon Street.
By 1901, aged 24, he had left home and was living as a
boarder at the home of John and Eliza Swift at The Hollins, Holloway,
Derbyshire. The Census of that year
records him as a worker and his occupation as joiner, carpenter. He had served as an apprentice up to the age
of 21 and had moved to the hosiery mill of John Smedley at Lea Bridge,
Derbyshire to be an improver and had chosen this employer as he had been
attracted by its Lea Mills Prize Band.
While working at Lea Mills he met and courted Minnie
Saunders who worked in the mill as a hosiery sowing machinist and supervisor
and came from the local village of Brackenfield. They married on 26th September 1903
at Holy Trinity, Brackenfield and the witnesses were Minnie’s brother William
and sister Emma
In 1911 William, aged 34, was now living in Bracken
Lane, Holloway with Minnie (32), Winifred (6) and Clifford (3). His occupation was recorded as a hosiery
joiner as he was still working at Smedley’s hosiery mill.
In April 1916 William volunteered for the armed services
at the age of 39 and was enlisted into the Royal Flying Corps with the service
number 44389. He trained as a rigger
where his carpentry skills could be used for maintaining the wooden structure
of aircraft and he claimed that he could also use his musical skills to test if
the rigging wires were correctly tensioned by plucking them and listening to
their note. After training he was
assigned to 38 Squadron which was equipped with the Royal Aircraft Factory FE2b
aircraft. Initially he was stationed at an airfield at Leadenham in
Lincolnshire in order to defend industrial targets in the East Midlands from
nighttime raids by German Zeppelins. On
27 May 1918 the squadron received orders to proceed overseas to become a night
bomber unit on the Western Front and William kept a daily diary from this date
to record his experiences and thoughts. The
squadron occupied a number of airfields in Flanders including flying from the
beach in Belgium when they were shelled off their airfield. Its aircraft bombed the German held port of
Ostende and targets such as ammunition dumps behind the front. During his wartime service he was offered the
position of running the RFC/RAF band but declined the opportunity as he said he
had joined up to do his duty for his country rather than taking a soft
option. He was demobilized on 5th
February 1919 and returned home to Holloway and the last entry in his diary
says “I cannot find
words to express my feelings as the train takes me towards the best place in
the world to me”.
William also returned to his job as a joiner at
Smedley’s mill and also to his involvement in its band. In July 1919 a meeting was held at Holloway
to form a new sub-branch of the National Federation of Discharged Soldiers and
Sailors for the Lea and Holloway District and William was elected as its
chairman
In 1921 the family moved to Bolsover in Derbyshire
where William had been offered the position of bandmaster of the colliery brass
band and given the job of property foreman at the colliery. The family lived in the model village of New
Bolsover, initially at number 42 and later moving to 61.
William enjoyed the challenge of taking on a band and
bringing it up to serious competition standard and after 10 years felt that he
had achieved this at Bolsover. In 1931 he moved on to Grimethorpe in the West
Riding of Yorkshire where he had been offered the position of bandmaster of the
colliery brass band and promised the job of pithead foreman. Unfortunately when he arrived to start work
he found that someone already had that job and he had to work down the pit as a
miner until the post became available.
Initially he and his family lived at 38 Ladywood Road then moved to 2
Burntwood Road in 1934. William raised
the band to championship performance and achieved significant competition
success. He also conducted the band for
numerous radio broadcasts, of which the first occasion was in April 1932. The band often played on Workers’ Playtime
during the earlier years of the Second World War and in 1941 eleven broadcasts
were transmitted.
In 1941 William reached the age of 65 and retired from
his work at Grimethorpe Colliery and
because the brass band was a colliery band he also had to give up his role as
bandmaster. During the war he took over
as bandmaster of Sheffield Transport Band which was struggling to keep going
because of losing so many men to enlistment in the armed services. Towards the end of the war he was asked to
resurrect the Royston New Monckton Colliery Institute Band which had fallen on
hard times. He accepted the challenge
and revitalized the band leading it to competition success between 1945 and
1956, notably becoming North Eastern Area Divisional Champions in 1947, 1948
and 1949. During this period William
also performed the role of bandmaster for the Grimethorpe Boys Band,
encouraging youngsters with a love for making music which would lead them on to
joining the colliery band later in life.
In 1963 William and Minnie celebrated their diamond
wedding anniversary and all of their surviving family joined them at Sleaford,
where we lived, to share the occasion with them. In November 1966 the family joined William at
2 Burntwood Road to celebrate his 90th birthday but a few weeks
later he was taken ill and died in Beckett’s Hospital, Barnsley on 11th
December.
Written by Stephen Peet 28th February 2019
and updated 3rd September 2019
Many Thanks to Stephen for this article on his family member.