31. with a great pride and feeling of camaraderie amongst its people

as the menfolk were bonded like no other from working together deep underground. Cutting out best Welsh anthracite to help keep the country’s energy supplies moving. Depending upon each other for their very lives. They had no respect for parasites like Jeffrey. In the same vein, what Richard felt about Jeffrey was confirmed by his research findings. He had grown to despise his merchant’s mentality the more he had learned about him. Money was his God and protector. Why, he had even sent out his own son to Wild Bay in the Fall of 1939 instead of going out himself to deal with Quigley’s bad management. He was a coward at heart. Unable to face up to the reality that he was a crook and a liar he always sought to lay the blame at the door of other people whenever something started to go wrong; which they frequently did. The British Government found Jeffrey a thorough nuisance and they had a great deal of trouble in getting rid of him mainly due to their own mis-handling of the whole affair from the days of Sir James Wrigglesworth’s through to Claude Wolsey as Government Director of the Company.
“Quigley had personal assistants you know,” said Oscar. “There were about two or three men who worked directly for him. But they never trusted him and often shared what they knew about him with other folk. For instance, George Ponting ran the Company store. To his credit it was George who secretly organised the first Lumber Strike in 1934. He knew what Quigley was up to in regards to pocketing profits from the Store and wages not being paid on time or not at all to the loggers and their families. All on top of no proper houses been built. They, The Englishmen, thought themselves so clever being so nice to everybody. George really had enough when he found that some of the families who came to the store were starving to death and without proper shelter. Then there was smart Ben Lovell who loved his gardening, could cut wood with the best of them, loved to fish when the fancy took him and was an expert self-taught boat builder. I think he built about 100