The Library · WRIT
Chapter 118
The Never-Rescinded Muster Order
also called the pit-levy order, the temporary company
House Vandahl's original order pressing a crew of its own miners into a 'temporary' armed levy to hold the lower gallery — with a term of service left blank, and never rescinded.
BY ORDER OF THE HOUSE OF VANDAHL, to the shift-boss of the lower gallery:
You and the men of your crew are raised, from this day, into a levy company for the defence of the lower works, the seam being too dear to lose and the garrison too thin to spare. You will hold until relieved. C. Harrow is confirmed serjeant over you. Wages to be entered against the season and paid on relief.
Term of service: ______ (to be fixed by the House).
The blank was never filled. No relief was ever named. The order was filed, and the House moved its worry to newer seams, and the men below — miners who had been handed a pike and a word — went on holding a gallery nobody remembered to release them from. A company is only ever as free as its orders. This one was written without an end.