Fred Mooney and Frank Keney

Recently I was traveling on the West Virginia turnpike and I saw I was passing Paint Creek and Cabin Creek. History reminds me how the miners a hundred years ago were harshly treated during the coal wars in that area. I find it hard to believe a man’s life was less valued than an animal of burden. Or the fact if a miner was injured or even worse, killed on the job, his family would be moved out of their company house immediately. Value was in the coal and little else. At first, coal barons did not allow any labor problems in the coal towns and mines. Their only goal was to increase profits. But as things got worse for the miners the word spread beyond the hollows and hills of southern West Virginia of their plight and unions came to help. But even with the knowledge of miner’s troubles, few outside the mining industry took notice. One person who stepped forward was a lady named Mary Harris Jones. History remembers her as Mother Jones. She saw the plight of the miners and their families. She was known to have participated in many strikes to improve miner’s rights and working conditions. Her union organizing got her arrested and jailed many times in the early 20th century.

The coal camp civil wars in history started in southern West Virginia. The miners who worked in the Paint Creek and Cabin Creek areas had not yet organized in 1912. Miners along the river in Kanawha County had mostly become members of the UMAW. The miners in those two communities wanted their grievances to be heard and a list of demands met. No more black listing of miners. A tactic mine owners used to prevent those whom they fired going elsewhere to organize. The amount of coal a miner removed, needed to be accurately weighed and re-checked by a weight master hired by the miners. Company stores were no longer going to be operated by the company. The miners wanted them to be operated by merchants who were not affiliated with the coal company. And the practice of cribbing in parts of the mine were to be stopped. In extremely dangerous sections of the mine, workers were sent in to crib up the roof to prevent falls.

None of these demands were met by the owners. And non-union labor was brought in to mine coal. Government investigators concluded the grievances by miners were true. Still, the state nor the government did anything to lessen tensions between the two sides. Coal Companies began setting up fortifications that looked like frontlines on a battlefield. It was about this time,

“Mother” Jones took to the steps of the capital and gave a speech advocating for miners to use force and rid the area of mine guards. Miners and guards often engaged in small conflicts during this time. Then things began to escalate at Mucklow, on Paint creek when a fight resulted in sixteen men being killed.

These killings led to over six thousand miners from around the area to converge on Cabin Creek. The stage was set for the coal camps civil war to begin. September 1912, the coal valleys near Paint and Cabin Creeks were primed to explode into violence. Governor William Glasscock, declared martial law and sent in over a thousand militia to disarm both sides, preventing the war.

Martial law and troop intervention may have controlled the fighting, but it did nothing to end the strike and hostility’s. By February, tensions were still simmering when a train owned by the coal company passed by the strikers camp. From onboard the train mine guards fired a machine gun into the miners camp. A few weeks later the new governor Henry D. Hatfield settled the strike ending the conflict.

Tensions and conditions in the southern mines never improved. Political corruption kept the miners from gaining any rights. And with the possibility of mine guards using brutality and martial law being imposed, miners had little chance of improving conditions. Then, in 1920, one of the most famous confrontations took place in a town named Matawan, in Mingo County. The sheriff, town’s mayor and the chief of police, “Sid” Hatfield were in support of Red Jacket Mining Company’s decision to evict strikers from company homes. Mine guards after evicting the strikers and their families were awaiting for the train to take them home. Then for whatever reason, “Sid” Hatfield pulled one of his two pistols and shot the owner of the detective agency, Albert Felts in the head. Bullets then came from all directions. When the firing stop, seven guards, the mayor and two miners were dead. Hatfield and others were charged with murder. The men stood trial twice for the killings and were twice acquitted.

Later that August, Hatfield along with a man named Ed Chambers made a trip with their wives to Welch to appear in court. Shots rang out and Hatfield and Chambers were killed. Guards from the Baldwin-Felts agency who had been appointed deputies fired the shots. They testified they shot the two men in self-defense in front of their wives. They were acquitted of murder in Welch.

Mingo County was also the sight of battles between miners and guards in August of 1920. The battle between thousands of miners and guards lasted three days along eight miles of the Tug River. The conflict ended when both sides ran out of ammunition.

Of all the counties controlled by mine operators and corrupted county officials, perhaps Logan County was the worst of them all. In late summer of 1919, union organizers were determined to bring the union to the county. An estimated five thousand men were set to march on the county. The governor at the time, John Cornwell threaten once again to bring federal troops into control the problems. The threat halted the march. Miners hoped the attention would bring improvements into the life of the miners. For two years the unrest simmered in the mine camps. Finally, conditions got so bad union leader, Frank Keeney called for another march on the county. By then a new governor, Ephraim Morgan urged Keeney to stop the march. Which he did, in hopes the governor would work to improve conditions for the miners, he did not. Not long after, miners were set upon by mine guards and state police. The fuse was lit for the Blair Mountain Mine War. Around three thousand mine guards took up positions on the mountain and began waging a battle against the miners. The fighting was so ferocious, it was compared to battle fields in France during the First World War. Both sides used machine guns to fire upon the other side. General Billy Mitchell’s bombers arrived in Charleston in support of mine owners. He threaten to use gas on the miners if they didn’t disband. Fortunately Federal troops were brought in and disarmed the miners.

Miners and union officers were arrested and taken to trial in the eastern panhandle. Intimidation from both sides prevented any kind of justice. Eventually the miners and officials were released. Early on in the 20th Century, there were 19,000 UMWA members in the southern coal fields. By the end of the 1920s, less than 900 members remained. Then in the early 1930s, the passage of the National Industry Recovery Act allowed unions to organize the coal fields. Thousands of miners returned to the union ranks. Conditions improved, but the life of a miner has always been hard and dangerous.

In my next column I will tell you of “Mother Jones”. Described by some at the beginning of the 20th Century as the most dangerous woman in America as we examine her life Through the Lens.