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CHAPTER 3
Grumant: fragments and photography
TEXT
Morten Søberg
PICTURES
Haltenbanken
Noregs Bank (note)
Norsk Polarinstitutt (map)
I
The word money rarely appears on banknotes; only between the lines. A string of distinguishing features are enough: we recognise banknotes by their rectangular shape, the name of the issuer (mostly central banks), the watermark, “handwritten” signatures and of course the numbers that signify what the notes are worth. But one exception to prove the rule is the 5-kroner note from 1920/21 from Grumant in Svalbard. Printed on the note in purple letters on a light brown background is the word Pengeseddel (meaning banknote or promissory note), written in a kind of arc at the top of the page, like a headline. The note has also been signed by a person whose name ends with an S, a letter which is even written as if to underscore the headline.
5 kroner note dated 1920/21 from Grumant in Svalbard.
In its heyday just over a thousand adults and children from the Soviet Union lived and worked in Grumant.
Boundary map, Anglo-Russian Grumant Company Limited.
Map of Grumant and its surroundings.
II
Grumant may not be known to most people, but the abandoned mining village on the south side of Isfjorden – between Barentsburg and Longyearbyen – was the most populous settlement in Svalbard for almost two decades after WWII. In its heyday just over a thousand adults and children from the Soviet Union lived and worked there. The Soviet mining company Trust Arktikugol began operations in Grumant in autumn 1931. Thankfully, the village had been evacuated by the time the two German battleships the Tirpitz and the Scharnhorst along with ten other warship firebombed all the buildings on 8 and 9 September 1941. The Soviets returned to the village when the peace broke out. But it was impossible to do anything about the harbour. To this day you will not be able to disembark there from a large vessel. In the beginning the coal was moved by conveyor belt onto barges, which were then tugged to the coal steamers waiting out on the fjord. From 1951 onwards the coal was carried by a covered narrow gauge electric railway to be shipped from Colesbukta some 7–8 kilometres from Grumant.
To this day you will not be able to disembark there from a large vessel. In the beginning the coal was moved by conveyor belt onto barges, which were then tugged to the coal steamers waiting out on the fjord.
From 1951 onwards the coal was carried by a covered narrow gauge electric railway to be shipped from Colesbukta some 7– 8 kilometres from Grumant.
III
However, the aforementioned 5-kroner note carries the words Coal Bay and just above them the imprint Grumant Co. This refers to the mining company Anglo-Russian Grumant Company, established in London in 1919. The company continued to mine for coal in Grumant until 1926, by which time it had shipped more than 62,000 tonnes of coal to Northern Russia. All the text on the note is written in Latin script and in Norwegian (Riksmål). That is hardly surprising. Most of the workers in Grumant in the early 1920s were Norwegians, so it was only reasonable that the krone was used as currency in the village. The monetary value FEM – 5 – Kroner is printed on the note in black handwriting. Who could use this note and for what? Miners could – to purchase goods in the mining company’s shop in Grumant. Why did Anglo-Russian Grumant Company issue its own money? From what we can tell, there were practical reasons behind it: shipping other obvious alternatives such as British, Norwegian or Soviet notes to Svalbard was presumably an inconvenience; much better to print local money.
«In Russian culture the figure 3 stands for something deeply religious, not to say orthodox.»
IV
Trust Arktikugol also issued Svalbard notes and used its own coins minted in Leningrad in 1946. Soviet Svalbard money differs numerically with its denominations of 3 roubles and 3 kopeks. The number 3 is for some reason a rarity as far as currency goes. The norm in most countries has been and still is the use of the familiar numbers 1, 2, 5, 10 and so on. But the Soviet denominations in Svalbard came from the Soviet Union. There the number 3 enjoyed a ubiquitous numismatic presence, even before the revolution in the case of Russia. In Russian culture the figure 3 stands for something deeply religious, not to say orthodox. It manifests itself in the proverb “бог любит троицу” – God loves the Trinity. All good things come in threes, including the three beings the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.
The Soviet mining company Trust Arktikugol began operations in Grumant in autumn 1931.
Today Grumant is merely a collection of ramshackle buildings – the legacy of an industrial culture.
V
Grumant is an industrial ruin; mining stopped in 1961, and the plant shut down six years later. As late as in 1959 a new housing block was built here, and the frame for a new bathhouse and laundry was erected. A new mine east of Grumant began operating with production from stopes 60, 61 and 62, Svalbard’s mining inspector could report. “A lift for personnel and goods was built in the passage connecting the new mine and the entrance via the old workings.” Today Grumant is merely a collection of ramshackle buildings – the legacy of an industrial culture. Mount Grønberget east of the mining village plunges straight into the fjord, but here and there you can spot man-made holes, contours of pits disappearing into the darkness and a long gone age.
Here and there you can spot man-made holes, contours of pits disappearing into the darkness and a long gone age.
VI
Like other types of Svalbard money, the note from Grumant from 1920/21 did not carry a watermark – a mark you can only spot if you hold an official banknote up against the light. The main purpose of watermarks is to prevent forgeries. A watermark helps generate trust in the authenticity of the notes. However, the abstract watermark of the Svalbard money was mining: co-operation, shift work and hard toil. As such, the money was a loud and clear reminder of monetary matters – it was inextricably linked to gainful employment. Unlike today’s money, it was also physical, tangible money. Nowadays money is increasingly appearing as numbers on a screen. Yet all money – as well as access to it and the trust we place in it – clearly reflects various forms of work at different points in history.
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