Lewis Proudlock (1838-1914) was a miner, trade unionist, musician, dancing master, poet and novelist from Northumberland.
In the late 1870s the birth records of his children show he was living in Dinnington, and his obituary states that he worked as a coal miner there.
He is known to have owned a set of 18th century Border pipes,[5] which had belonged to his relative Muckle Jock Milburn; these are now in the Morpeth Chantry Bagpipe Museum.
In the same period, he also wrote two novels, "The Shepherd of the Beacon, or the Hero of the Khyber", dated by the British Library at 1877,[6] whose action is based in Coquetdale, and later, "Crimson Hand, the Scourge of the Bushrangers: or, The Oath Redeemed", with action moving between Coquetdale and Australia; Proudlock refers to both books in an advertisement in 1882,[7] so this too must have been published before this time .
[9] In a short notice on the death of his wife,[10] he is referred to specifically as the author of The Borderland Muse, and it is noted there that the work describes life both in the border country and in the pits.
He was given an extended obituary in the Morpeth Herald, headlined "Death of Lewis Proudlock, Novelist and Poet", where he was described as "One of the most remarkable and versatile men produced among the miners of Northumberland".
Another article in the same issue of this paper referred to "his ceaseless craving for the acquisition of knowledge", and stated that he had acquired "a tolerable library for a man in his position".