No, Al, they'd been conscripted into providing the ventilation for the escape tunnel.
And the most significant event in my memory relating to a brass band was when one around a 100 000 gallon beer vat failed at the upper end of Tottenham Court Road, the collapse of the tank took the rest with to and something close to hald a million gallons of beer washed down to the Thames at Charin Cross. A number of people died - one from going in in an attempt to drink it dry, and more when the floor of a house charging to view the bodies gave way, pitching another fifty into the beer-filled cellar below. And I quite like brass bands...