Why did the No. 20 mine explode?
Editor’s Note: This is part two of two posts about the 1911 mine explosion in Elk Garden.
Their wives had waited in their homes, trying to ignore the clamor going on just outside their doors in late April 1911. They had busied themselves cooking and cleaning and all the time praying that what they could feel in their hearts was not true and was simply stress making itself known.
An explosion in the Davis Coal and Coke Company No. 20 mine in Elk Garden had trapped 23 men behind tons of rubble in the shaft. Men from all over the region were racing to get to the miners, but removing the debris that clogged the shaft took time.
The Piedmont Herald reported, “In giving credit for heroism displayed in rescue work at the mine we do not wish to detract any credit due the many faithful mine officials, but we do wish to commend the miners of the Elk Garden region, including Wabash, Oakmont, Kitzmiller, and from distant mines for their coolness, skill and daring. It was their brother miners entombed and they toiled, they braved the dangerous gases, they reeled under the influence of the poison and when refreshed plunged into the mines again.”
Unfortunately, heroes aren’t always successful. Knocks on doors began being heard late in the evening of April 24. Even those who could not hear what was said recognized the sobs of a grieving wife. As each body was pulled from the rubble and each widow notified, the hopes of the remaining wives fell.
“The women in nerely (sic) every case staid (sic) at home and there patiently bore the awful suspense until their loved ones lifeless forms were brought to them by the undertaker. It is difficult to tell which were the greater heroes, the women remaining at home in deepest grief, watching, hoping, praying, or the miners braving the deadly gases to rescue the bodies of their unfortunate comrades,” the Piedmont Herald reported.
Despite the fact that mining deaths were almost commonplace, “never before has there been a mine disaster in that region that paralleled, or even approximated the shocking calamity last Mon. morning, when twenty-three men, all citizens of Elk Garden, except one, were suddenly ushered into eternity by an explosion in Mine No. 20, which is owned and operated by the Davis Coal and Coke Company,” reported the Mineral County News Tribune.
According to a Department of Mines annual report, only 25 men died in mining accidents during the year ending June 30, 1911, and 23 of them had died in Elk Garden. The average age of the 23 miners was 31 with the youngest being 18 and the oldest being 57 years old. These weren’t inexperienced miners, either. Among them, they averaged 13 years of experience.
Five of the miners were buried on April 26 and the rest of them on the following day. “The undertakers did their parts exceedingly well, and worked on almost exact scheduled time. The congregations gathered quietly and quickly, and while one interment was going on in the cemetery another funeral was being held in the church,” The Piedmont Herald reported.
The Davis Coal and Coke Company paid all of the funeral expenses for the miners. In addition, the company had also taken out $400 (around $2,200 today) of life insurance for each of its miners, which the widows received. All of the widows were also given goods from the company store to make sure that their immediate needs for food and other necessities would be met.
Once the funerals ended, the questions began. “The dead are buried. The ghastly scenes that will remain in our memories while life shall last are now in the past. The heart still aches but submits to the awful stroke, and feels that some day we shall understand,” the newspaper reported.
The cause of the explosion was believed to be an accumulation of gas and dust in the mine. Because of the infrequency of work, the mine had not been running for days when the miners went into the mine on Monday morning. It was something that would have to be investigated.
The West Virginia Department of Mines opened hearings into the mine explosion in early May. As officials questioned various experts and witnesses, they came to the conclusion that the explosion hadn’t been caused by a natural gas leak because the mine should have been wetted down, which would have minimized the risk of coal dust igniting. As dust, coal has a lot of surface area that provides plenty of opportunities for a spark to take hold. Once a spark does catch, it creates a domino effect that spreads quickly.
Chief Laing of the West Virginia Department of Mines announced at the end of the hearing, “The evidence gathered, the chief states, seems to point to the breaking of the mining law by their miners, who are thought to have used black powder.”
The coroner’s jury met for two days and was able to determine what happened even more precisely. The jury’s conclusion was that a blown-out charge had been fired by James Pugh or his son, Arthur. This caused the coal dust to ignite, which led to the explosion.
The miners killed in the explosion were:
James Brown, 38;
William Buskey, 25;
James Dempsey, 57;
Leo Dempsey, 23;
Samuel Hamilton, 25;
Ed Harshberger, 33;
William Hetzel, 40;
Hawthorne Patton, 20;
William Pearson, 32;
Arthur Pritchard, 18;
John Pritchard, 48;
Frank Pugh, 29;
William Pugh, 24;
Walter Runion, 20;
William Sayres, Jr., 30;
Wilbur Shears, 31;
Harry Tranum, 26;
John F. White, Sr., 42;
John White, Jr., 24;
Charles Wilson, 21;
John R. Wilson, 57;
Lester Wilson, 18;
Roy Wilson, 23;
Tom Wilson, 23,
Tom Yost, 29.
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