Power Through Shortage

In the lowering fog that shrouded the cliffs of Dover one morning last week, an unseen foghorn moaned. As if summoned by the echoes, 178 sallow-faced workmen, each carrying a brown paper parcel or a battered cardboard suitcase, trudged along the quay of Dover Marine Station and straggled up the gangplank of a trim Belgian steamer, the S.S. Koenig Albert. The men were Italian miners, recruited to dig coal in fuel-hungry Britain; they were being sent away because British miners refused to work with foreigners (TIME, May 26). Most will find jobs in Belgian pits.

Britain's economic health depends on so small and crucial a thing as a 10% increase in its annual coal production. To help dig that extra coal, the National Coal Board last year invited 5,000 unemployed Italian miners to work in the pits. They were to be given the dirtiest and lowest-paid jobs; they would be the first to be fired in hard times. But 18 months and $615,000 later, only 2,200 had been placed. And their 715,000 British workmates threatened to down tools unless the "Eyeties" were thrown out.

What was wrong with the Italians? "They wave their 'ands when they talk," groused one Englishman. "They wink at the women and shampoo their 'air." Worst of all, said a squat Yorkshire digger, "They 'aven't larnt to talk English proper." Back of this pettiness was an unreasoning fear of unemployment that discourages hard work in all of Britain's heavy industries. Haunted by depression memories of dole and idleness and "bread and drip" (a diet of bread spread with cooking grease), British coal miners expect to safeguard their now-well-paid jobs by keeping coal in short supply. "They don't want coal," said a bitter Italian. "For them, la mancanza fa la forza--power through shortage."

The S.S. Koenig Albert cast off from Dover. Leaning on the taffrail, the Italians reflected on the months of wasted time. Some were bitter: "The English were afraid we would take their work away from them. How could we? They don't do any." Others grieved. "They wouldn't talk to us," cried Giovanni Ovino. "I said to myself: 'Maybe they don't like my black hair.' In a funny way, I felt ashamed of my hair. But how could I change it?" Domenico Loi saw it in a wider context. "They weren't Communists . . . But if they had been Communists, they couldn't willfully have damaged their nation more." As if in agreement, the unseen foghorn moaned.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.