Pickets and police look on as coal is brought into the British Steel coking plant at Orgreave, South Yorkshire during the Coal miners strike. In the early days of the strike, the National Union of Mineworkers agreed to allow just sufficient coal to be delivered to the plant to be converted to coke to keep the steel furnaces ticking over. When it became clear that more coal than was necessary was being delivered, and that the union had been deceived, the N.U.M. attempted to prevent delivery completely. The inevitable confrontation between pickets and police on 29 May 1984 became known as the Battle of Orgreave.