The Pipe Bands
The first adult pipe band in Newtongrange was the Newbattle and District Welfare Pipe Band* founded in 1937 under Pipe Major Scott. Some of the men at the pit paid 1/2d (6p) a week for the band and the Dean Committee gave a loan of £94 for pipes and drums. This was repaid by 1944. The band folded in 1950 and the Welfare Committee tried to reclaim the uniforms and instruments but only one uniform was ever handed back.
Another pipe band was started up in 1939. Two boys, John Grant and James Peacock
went round all the doors in Newtongrange asking for names of boys who wanted
to join a pipe band. Forty names were collected and the Newtongrange Juvenile
Pipe Band was formed. Pipe Major Sandy Mclntosh tutored them and the Dean gave
them £150 to buy uniforms - they wore the shepherd tartan with blue jerkins.
Between 1940 and 1948 the boy's pipe band raised £17,000 for charity and
in 1944 won every contest they entered. Three years in a row, 1948, 1949 and
1950, the band won the World Juvenile Pipe Band Championship. At 18, some of
the boys were too old to play in juvenile competitions so an adult band, Newtongrange
Lothian Pipe Band, was begun but it was just the same lads (bar two) under a
different name.
In 1950 the bands were 1st in the Juvenile, 1st in Grade 3, 1st in Grade 2 and
4th in the Open category, at the Miner's Gala in Edinburgh. A number of girls
joined the band and later a Girl's Pipe Band was formed.
The Dean Committee gave the Boy's pipe band a loan of £300 to buy new
kilts in 1950. The money was not repaid by 1956 and rumours reached the Committee
that the pipe band were selling the uniforms.
The band took an new name in 1954, Lady Victoria Pipe Band, when an arrangement was made for 1d (½p) a week to be collected from some of the men at the pit. It was no longer a juvenile band. Since the Lady Vic closed in 1981 the pipe band has had a connection with Bilston Glen Pit, where the men contribute 3p a week. The band is now called Newtongrange and Bilston Colliery Pipe Band and is still going strong under Pipe Major Tom Wilson
His predecessor, Bill Peacock, remembers playing in one competition in which
eight good pipers were needed. The Lothian Pipe Band had only seven players
good enough to take part in the competition. The eighth player was OK on the
chanter but forgot all the tunes as soon as he had the pipes under his oxter.
They put him in with dummy reeds so he couldn't be heard. The judges never knew
there was a dummy piper as they were under cover.
The pipe band used to play round the park after the gala and then march single
file into the Dean and play round the bar.
* There was a Boy's Brigade Pipe Band in the 1920s