Tunnelling and Drinking...
When I was a young police officer in London in the 1960’s, there were
numerous large building projects in progress all over the south of England and elsewhere. There was still a lot of evidence of the
bombing of World War Two with ruined
buildings here and there.
Tunnelling became a major industry be it for the Underground Tube network or road tunnels
under the river Thames. The ones under the river were worked under
pressure resulting in many cases of the labourers suffering from the ‘Bends’ – decompression sickness.
The majority of the labourers were Irish.
In fact the name ‘Navvies’
comes from ‘Navigators’ going back to
the time when tens of thousands of labourers (again mostly Irish) were engaged in the building and excavations of
the Canal network that criss-crossed
the UK in previous centuries.
The Irish, being fond of their drink, would leave the tunnel
workings without having fully recovered from the decompression and rush to get into the local public houses and
drink themselves into oblivion.
Whenever we were called to deal with a flat-out drunk,
we would search them to see if they were carrying any form of identification
stating that they were working on the tunnels.
If so they would be rushed back to the site and put into a ‘decompression chamber’ to recover.
They were paid vastly inflated wages for the time and
although the work was dangerous and hard, a great many were only too willing to
‘take the risks’.
One man in particular springs to mind when I think of
the time. He was a huge man and supposedly
an excellent worker. He did like a good
drink however and soon became a ‘regular
customer’ of ours.
He would collect his wages on Friday night and after
partly decompressing, make his way to a local clothes shop. There he would purchase a full set of
clothing, suit, underwear, shirt, tie, shoes and socks. He would pay cash then make his way to the
local baths.
These were normally part of a swimming baths building where
he would bathe, shave and dispose of his dirty clothing. He would then make his way to one of the
local public houses having discarded his old clothing.
The thing was, that he would wear his new clothing all
weekend and return to work on Monday still wearing them. The following Friday he would purchase a new
lot of clothing and continue likewise week in, week out. It
must have cost him a fortune.
The drinking habits of not only the Irish, but the
general public in London and all over
the UK was a case of necessity. In Victorian times and further back water
quality was abysmal and dangerously polluted.
Disease was rife. It appears that
the brewing process somehow made it safer to drink beer instead of water.
Most of London’s rivers were in fact open sewers with
human waste, the results of animal slaughter and in fact all kinds of rubbish being
regularly thrown into the rivers. The
worst aspect was that as the Thames is tidal, most of the waste was washed down
towards the sea but returned with the incoming tide. The rivers and in fact most of London had
putrid air and water as a result.
Another point on water: Tap water in
London is now better quality than most bottled water. In and around the tourist traps it can cost
£1.50 (that’s $1.96 US) for a small bottle.
A complete rip-off........
In the old nursery rhyme ‘Ring a ring of Rosies, A pocket full of posies’ is reputed to come
from the Black Death era, but it fact
such posies were carried and sniffed to lessen the smell from the rivers.
Another interesting point is that each Monday morning
in the Central Criminal Court – the
infamous Old Bailey – the most senior
Judge goes from one court to the next to show his authority. He carries with him a black silk material
which Judges used to put on their heads when sentencing prisoners to death – albeit that capital punishment ended about
sixty years ago. He also carries a ‘posie’ – usually of purple violets – to shield him from the smells
coming up from the cells below the courts.
As I said earlier, tap water in London is probably one
of the best in the world and proven regularly to be better than the majority of
that which is sold in bottles.
However, I doubt if it will
inhibit the Irish from imbibing their choice.....Guinness.
............Mike......
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