You ought to be out raising hell. This is the fighting age. Put on your fighting clothes.
-Mother Jones
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Thursday December 17, 1903
New Castle, Colorado - Homes of Five Strike Leaders Bombed While Families Sleep
Home of Striking Miner after Bombing
New Castle, Colorado
At 4:47 this morning, while the families of striking coal miners slept, bombs went off in five homes of known strike leaders. Amazingly, no-one was seriously injured. In one of the homes, that of John Lawson, his wife and little three-year-old daughter were sleeping in the dining room, which Mrs. Olive Lawson had turned into a bedroom due to the small size of the actual bedroom. The bomb went off underneath that small bedroom, where the bomber must have thought it would cause the most injury.
The home of W. G. Isaac was also bombed. Brother Isaac was away from home at time, which is the only reason that his two children were not killed. Mrs. Isaac had brought the two little ones into her bed to sleep with her. The house was set on fire by the blast but Mrs. Isaac was able to escape through a window near her bed, and managed to save both of the children. The family dog was sleeping near the children's bed, and was found burned to death after the fire was put out.
The homes of three other strike leaders suffered similar damage, including the homes of William Doyle and Evan R. Davis (pictured above.) The bombs all went off early in the morning. The local union is planning a meeting today to form a committee to investigate the attacks since the local authorities seem disinclined to do so.
We regret that we do not have the name of the fifth miner at this time.
SOURCES
Blood Passion
The Ludlow Massacre and Class War
in the American West
-by Scott Martelle
Rutgers U Press, 2008
The Cripple Creek Strike
-by Emma F Langdon
(Part I, 1st pub 1904)
NY, 1969
(scroll down to paragraph that begins, "December 17...")
http://www.rebelgraphics.org/...
Photo: New Castle Bombings of 1903
http://digital.denverlibrary.org/...
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Wednesday December 17, 1913
From The New York Times: "38 DEAD IN COAL MINE"
Fire Follows Explosion in Colorado Pit-Rescuers Save Two.
New Castle, Col, Dec. 16-Thirty-eight men, all married and all save eight of them Americans, were killed in the Vulcan Mine of the Rocky Mountain Fuel Company to-day by an explosion of coal dust.
A number of men were in the upper workings which are reached by a long incline from the tipple. The mine being of the sloping variety. These hastened to the main tunnel, and are said to have been met by a second explosion.
Father J. P. Carrigan of Glenwood Springs, near here, rushed into the smoking pit with the first rescuers in search of the dying, to whom he might administer the last rites of the Church. Two miners were rescued after the underground workings had caught fire.
Before sundown the mine had been cleared of gas, and a thorough exploration of the wrecked workings was made, but the men in charge of the rescue work said it probably would be a day or two before the bodies could be recovered...
This Fall employees of the mine were called out on strike by the United Mine Workers of America, but some of them had gone back to work. The other victims of to-day's disaster were strikebreakers..
We offer our deepest condolences to the families of the fallen miners. We do not wish this fate on any miners, not even strikebreakers. Better for them and for us, that they should join with the union miners, and fight, side by side, for safe working conditions in the mines.
SOURCE
The New York Times
(New York, New York)
-of Dec 17, 1913
http://select.nytimes.com/...
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Tuesday December 17, 2013
More on the bombings at New Castle, Colorado:
The names of William Doyle and Evan R. Davis are from this source:
http://digital.denverlibrary.org/...
The union committee was able to amass quite a bit of evidence which they brought to the attention of the District Attorney, to no avail. The information implicated mine operator, Perry Coryell. It was found that eighty-five pounds of dynamite had gone missing form one of his mines. Coryell later shot Lawson in the lower abdomen with a shotgun. Lawson was unable to work for many months after that, but did eventually recover.
SOURCE
Blood Passion
(See above.)
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They'll Never Keep Us Down-Blair Mountain Marchers
The power wheel is rolling, rolling right along
The government is keep it going going strong
so working people get your help from your own kind
Your welfare on the rich man's mind
Your welfare on the rich man's mind
Your welfare on the rich man's mind
They want the power in their hands just to keep out of the workers hands
Your welfare on the rich man's mind
-Hazel Dickens