Jasper County Democrat, Volume 5, Number 22, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 6 September 1902 — APPLY TORCH TO MINE. [ARTICLE]

APPLY TORCH TO MINE.

Strikers Set Fire to Large Colliery in West Virginia. The great mines of the Pocahontas Collieries Company at Bramweil, W. Ya., were set on fire. Tuesday morning strikers applied the torch to various [tortions of the mine near the west entrance, which is on the Virginia side, and the mine was soon burning furiously. The guards r.nd strikers fired volley after volley at each other. The Governor of Virginia was asked to send troops to Pocahontas at once. Richard Roberts, mine driller, ami John Devitt, machinist, employed by the Lehigh Valley Coal Company at its Fort colliery, were attacked by four men while on their way to work. Roberts was struck on the back with an iron bar and a miner’s needle was run through the fleshy part of Devitt’s legs, 'lhe injured men called for assistance, when their assailants fled. The C. D. Bliss mine of the Delaware, Lackawanna and Western Company at Nanticoke was put in oi>eration Tuesday. A large quantity of coal is said to Lave been run through the breaker. The company officials say they have a large Lumber of miners cutting coal. The strikers deny this. They say the coal being run through the breaker is stock coal which lias bet>n accumulating in the mine for some time. John Ilarvilla. aged 34 years, a nonunionist employed as coal hauler at the Beaver Meadow colliery of Ooxe Brothers & 00., llazelton, Pa., was shot in the right eye while attempting to drive away unknown persons who had bombarded his bouse with shines. -» Company C of the Twelfth regiment eaeorted the non-union men in the Panther Creek Valley to work Tuesday without meeting interference. The officials of the company assert that almost 300 men reported for duty. This is contradicted by the strike lenders, who say their rnuks are as *olid os they were the first day of the strike.