For further reading, please see my previous two diaries, "Blackwater and the Matewan Massacre," and "Blackwater and the Ludlow Massacre."
This will be a shorter diary with less comment from me, because in my research on Baldwin-Felts and Pinkerton (I’ll eventually be writing a "Blackwater and the Battle of Homestead" and a "Blackwater and the Haymarket Massacre" diaries), I ran across this article. It really puts a lot of things in perspective and will give you a shiver up your spine.
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Note: I’ll try not to quote too much of the article. If I go overboard, somebody please let me know.
Beginning in the late 1800's the rich coal fields of the southern counties had begun producing vast quantities of coal. This coal was sold in markets where it competed with coal from the unionized mines of Ohio, Pennsylvania, Indiana, and Illinois. As a result, the United Mine Workers of America began trying to organize West Virginia's miners in 1902 as a matter of survival.
My other two diaries (referenced in the opening) focused mainly on two very famous massacres. Both dealt with coal. Both dealt with unions. Both dealt with Baldwin-Felts being used as corporate muscle.
I had no idea it went this far.
Initially, the union focused on the New River fields but was more successful along Paint Creek and Cabin Creek in the Kanawha district near Charleston where they organized several thousand miners. Even so, within a short time, the union was broken on Cabin Creek and in order to keep them out, coal operators there imported hundreds of mine guards and Baldwin Felts Detectives to act as an armed barrier to any further attempts at organization.
What developed on Cabin Creek can only be described as a industrial police state where all roads, train depots, and towns were patrolled by armed guards who decided who could enter, who could meet, and what they could do or say. To defy the guards or to even hint at union sympathy was to invite a beating, exile, or even death. Constitutional guarantees such as freedom of speech and freedom of assembly were strictly denied.
To the miners and mountaineers this arrangement became know as the "mine guard" or "Baldwin Felts system" and it became prevalent throughout the southern West Virginia counties of Mingo, Mercer, Mcdowell, Wyoming, and Pocahontas. Private police forces, paid for by the coal companies, ruled southern West Virginia absolutely and with impunity. Hundreds were deputized by the counties and so acted under the authority of the law with the power to arrest any individual. Their purpose was to keep out the UMWA and they did so with ruthless efficiency. In Logan County guards were unnecessary because its legendary sheriff, Don Chafin, ruled his kingdom with an army of over three hundred deputies whose salaries were also paid for by the coal operators. For his efforts, Chafin received a royalty on every ton of coal mined in Logan County.
I had never heard this situation described in such stark terms. An "industrial police state" makes perfect sense, though. Industry hires the guards. Politicians (who made office with the help of industry) deputized the guards. The guards go ape shit on the people.
Here’s where it all lead. Eventually.
This event (the Matewan Massacre) sparked one of the most remarkable events in American history, the 1920 miner's rebellion in which roughly 15,000 men armed themselves and began marching south with the avowed intention of overthrowing the governments of Logan and Mingo Counties. President Harding sent Brigadier General H.H. Bandholtz to assess the situation and also dispatched General Billy Mitchell and a squadron of bombers to Charleston, the only time in U.S. history that air power has been deployed against civilians. The miners army eventually faced off with a force of 5000 men, organized by Sheriff Chafin, at Blair Mountain where they were subjected to machine gun fire and bombs dropped from aircraft. After three days of fighting during which perhaps two dozen men were killed, federal troops arrived and the miners broke off the engagement hoping that at last, the mine guard system would be ended. Instead, in only four days, Logan authorities indicted nearly a thousand individuals on various charges including twenty-four for treason.
Charles Town was chosen as the venue for the trials. Approximately 800 men were brought here to face charges and on April 22, 1922 Bill Blizzard became the first to be tried for treason. The trial was a national sensation with dozens of reporters from around the country in attendance. Most, like the local citizenry, were sympathetic to the miners. The New York Times observed that "constitutional guarantees...have been suspended by a conspiracy of non-union operators," and the New York Herald added that West Virginia's government had "broken down" and its power had "passed... to the coal operators." On May 27th, 1922 the jury returned a verdict of not guilty. Blizzard was carried through the streets of Charles Town by joyous miners and their ranks, swelled by local citizens, soon formed into an impromptu parade. In the next trial, the Reverend J.E. Wilburn and his son were both found guilty of murder as the result of a gun battle on Blair Mountain and in August, another miner, Walter Allen, was tried and convicted of treason. By this time, the town had become weary of the distractions caused by the trials so the rest of the defendants were given a change of venue.
Given a suspended Habeas Corpus, numerous charges of "Treason" on the rabid right (including an Ann Coulter book with the "T-word" as its title, Blackwater’s quest to expand domestic operations, and a decidedly anti-union/pro corporation government, who’s not shitting their pants right now (in a figurative sense)?
hink