Newcastle, 1917

 Gossip by Elfin.

The Earth and the "Evil One."

Following upon what I had to say yesterday regarding the long-established custom among miners of laying the pit idle when a fatality occurs in the mine, a correspondent reminds me that to understand the organisation of such a custom we must go back to the ancient beliefs in the oldest traditions; that the earth belongs to the Evil One, and that this spirit of the earth demands a sacrifice before any displacement of the rocks or the crust of the earth demands a sacrifice before any displacement of the rocks or the crust of the earth can take place for a building. 

The Church has perpetuated this belief in two familiar customs, that of consecrating the burial place of the dead, and of placing coins under the foundation of sacred buildings. It was an old belief that the "Evil One" claimed the first corpse that was buried in a new churchyard, and to avoid this calamity a dog was usually taken into the enclosure and then buried alive, thus cheating Satan of his due.

There is, however, historic evidence to verify the custom of burying human remains in the foundations of new buildings, which were the offering to the God of Earth, and which took the form of a favourite dog, slave, or the child of a vassal being built into the foundation walls of the building. The Romans were the first to substitute images and busts for the animal form.

Haunted Mines.

An old miner told my correspondent many years ago that he firmly believed that the mines were haunted by evil and mischievous spirits that dwelt in the old workings, and that he had experienced the result of their strange doings, when all the men's picks were blunted, and frequently the spectre was heard rushing through the mine with a sad, moaning sound, which made all tremble with fear. It is related that miners have turned pale at the recollection of the fright they got, yet the same men when the terrible accident took place at Hartley Colliery, and upwards of 200 men and boys lost their lives, faced death in search for their entombed fellow workmen. 

And this was the locality where "Cutty Soams," the spirit of the mine, was a familiar tradition and belief. A belief in the old superstitions of the past does not necessarily make men cowards; but all evidence goes to prove that the custom has come down from the far-off ages, when miners in all parts of the world believed that the Spirit of Evil claimed a sacrifice for the invasion of the earth under his sway.

"Cutty Soams."

The older generation in Northumberland are, of course, familiar with the legend of "Cutty Soams" to which my correspondent refers, but the younger people may scarcely have heard of it in these days, when the old fashioned superstiitons are seldom talked of. You could not get anybody to believe in these enlightened times that "Cutty" ever existed, but in the long ago he doubtless exercised the imagination of our forebears as something very real, and was regarded as one of the mischievous goblins that haunted the bowels of the earth. Like many another spell of a bygone era, "Cutty" is obsolete, and his antics are but as a tale that is told. 

He's "vanished like the baseless fabric of a vision," / His occupation gone - completed his last mission. / The light of science he disdained to brook / And fled- when other phantoms took their hook.

Newcastle Daily Chronicle, 20th March 1917.