Hellraisers Journal – Sunday May 30, 1920
Logan County, West Virginia – Coal Operators Own Public Officials, Part I
From The Nation of May 29, 1920:
Private Ownership Of Public Officials
By ARTHUR GLEASON
[Part I of II.]
Harrisburg Telegraph October 16, 1919
WEST VIRGINIA has started in again on the organized killing which every few years breaks loose in the mining districts. On May 19, eleven men were shot to death in the town of Matewan, Mingo County. Seven of them were detectives, three were miners and one was an official. This skirmish is the first in the 1920 war between the coal operators of the State and the United Mine Workers of America. Mingo is one of the counties in the southwest of the State which have been held against organized labor by detectives, armed guards, and deputy sheriffs.
With the beginning of May, the miners formed local unions, and brought in 2,000 members. As fast as the miners join the union, the coal companies are evicting them from the company-owned houses. I saw the typewritten notice of the Stone Mountain Coal Company on the window of the company-owned grocery store. It stated that the houses of the miners were owned by the company, and that the miners must leave the premises at once if they join the union. Ezra Frye, the local organizer, acting for the United Mine Workers, had leased land, and was erecting tents for the evicted families. He had ordered 300 tents on the first allotment. Matewan lies on the Tug Fork of the Big Sandy River. It is run politically by the Hatfield clan, who for generations have had a feud with the McCoy clan. The economic struggle is making a new alignment across the old feudist divisions. No stranger is safe just now in these unorganized counties. We had a spy who trailed us from Charleston to Matewan. In the town, we were kept under constant guard.
Hellraisers Journal – Sunday September 7, 1919
4,000 Armed Miners Gather Near Marmet to March on Logan County
From the The West Virginian of September 6, 1919:
(By Associated Press)
CHARLESTON, Sept. 6-According to information received from a local operator who refused to be quoted the coal operators of the Guyan field yesterday unloaded a car load of machine guns at different places in Logan county as a means of preparation to meet the hosts of invading miners from the Kanawha and Coal river fields.
The five hundred armed miners who left Oak Grove this morning on the march across the hills to Coal river with the Guyan field of Logan county their object was to be joined at Racine and Little Coal River by about 3,000 more armed men according to information received here by coal operators.
The additional armed forces were said to be assembled at Racine and on Little Coal river early this forenoon awaiting the crowd from Oak Grove.
W. M. Petry, vice president of District No. 17 United Mine Workers of America said there were 4,000 armed miners on the march this morning to the Guyan fields, but disclosed no information regarding their whereabouts at that time.
Petry said the men absolutely refused to listen to the appeal of Governor Cornwell and the orders of the union officials. They refused to listen to any of us, Mr. Petry said and declared their intention of marching into Logan county to help their brothers organize.
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