THE OTHER SIDE OF THE LINE - The Police's Story

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DESPITE the friendships which were made during the year, there were many that were destroyed.

Marriages buckled under the pressure while others cemented their commitment with new babies as a lasting symbol of hope.

Families had to deal with additional pressures as father and son collided at the pit gates.

The miners strike also created a wedge between the police and the community, one which has not been fully healed after two decades.

One former police officer from Auchinleck was a woman who saw both sides of the divide. Her father had been a miner since he left school and her brother had carried out his apprenticeship at the Lugar workshop.

She told the Chronicle: 'My heart was broken more than many others at that time, I had to police an area I was born in, grew up in, was raised in, understood, loved and lived.

'My work brought me into contact with people I loved and whose values I respected, believed in and still vote for. It was a difficult time to police but I always acted fairly, without prejudice and within the confines of the law.

'In the early days I would still go into the strike centres in the community I served. I never policed the pickets. But as the strike progressed I remember walking into Netherthird Community Centre one day and was handed a poster saying "We"re not horsing around!"

'I KNEW THAT I WASN"T WELCOME AND MORE. IT HAD GONE TOO FAR.'

She believed the large numbers of Glasgow officers which were drafted in to swell the bodies at the pickets caused much of the antagonism between the police and strikers.

She recalled: 'I remember being called out to a theft of briquettes in Cumnock at that time with a Glasgow officer who hadn"t a clue what they were.'

She continued: 'It was hard for my family. My dad never said anything to me, but I think he would have taken some stick about me being a police officer and him a miner.

'But there was still a respect. I had been in a really bad accident and sustained a lot of facial injuries.

'During the strike there had been a disturbance in Auchinleck that I was called out to. I was trying to arrest someone when he had clenched his fist and pulled back. Just then a man reached in and grabbed his hand to stop him. He said "don"t you think she"s had enough?" If it had connected it would have burst my face open again. This showed me that there was still some respect.'

During the strike she had her car turned over and her windows put in.

She went on: 'The strike really affected my mum. I remember her sitting doing needlework. She was always very good at this and she would do it to relieve the tension of what was happening. She had created this scene which was a brick wall. At the start there were daffodils and primulas growing, by the middle the wall had decayed and there were creepers and ivy climbing over and through it. But by the end there was nothing. And that"s exactly what happened. She kept it for a while and then ripped it up and put it in the fire."

This article appeared in Cumnock Chronicle 21 Mar 07

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