You ought to be out raising hell. This is the fighting age. Put on your fighting clothes.
-Mother Jones
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Saturday April 4, 1914
From The New York Times: U. M. W. Seeks Writ of Habeas Corpus for Mother Jones
Mother Jones at Ludlow Tent Colony
WANT "MOTHER" JONES FREE.
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DENVER, Col., April 3.-A petition for a writ of habeas corpus in behalf of "Mother" Jones, the 82-year-old strike leader, held as a military prisoner in the county jail at Walsenburg, Col., was tendered to the Supreme Court late to-day by Horace N. Hawkins, attorney for the United Mine Workers of America. The court is asked to take original jurisdiction.
While Mrs. Jones was imprisoned in a hospital at Trinidad, application for a writ of habeas corpus was made to the Supreme Court, but was denied on the ground that the lower court should first pass on the case. Subsequently an action was brought in the District Court in Las Animas County, where the petition was denied. An appeal to the Supreme Court was about to be filed, when "Mother" Jones was release. She was rearrested at Walsenburg in the coal strike district while on her way back to Trinidad.
From The Labor World comes news of a recently released report which shows a large increase in the number of coal miners killed on the job in 1913 over 1912:
MORE COAL MINERS KILLED LAST YEAR
WASHINGTON, April 3.-There was an increase last year of 425 deaths in the coal mines of this country over the year 1912, according to a report just issued by the United States Bureau of Mines. The total number killed last year was 2,785. The increase gives a fatality rate of 3.82 in every 1,000 men employed, compared with 3.27 in 1912.
...Dr. Joseph A. Holmes, director of the bureau, in commenting upon the record of the statistics develops the disappointing fact that in our coal mining operations during 1913, there were killed 425 more men than during 1912. This is an increase of 18 percent in fatal accidents, with an increase of only about 8 per cent in coal production.
We can find little comfort in the suggestion that this increase may in part be accounted for by the occurrence during 1913 of four large mine explosions. Furthermore, while the total deaths from mine explosions was 213 greater in 1913 than in 1912, the number of explosions in which more than five were killed was only seven as compared with 10 explosions in 1912. In fact the statistics show an increase in fatalities during 1913 from all the underground causes except mine fires and surface accidents.
[paragraph breaks added
emphasis added]
Let us pause for a moment to remember the
2360 coal miners who died on the job in 1912 and the
2785 who lost their lives while trying to make a living in 1913. All of them, Our Brothers.
At the start of the current strike in Colorado, Mother Jones proclaimed:
We will fight until the mines are made secure
and human life valued more than props.
SOURCES
The New York Times
(New York, New York)
-of Apr 4, 1914
http://select.nytimes.com/...
The Labor World
(Duluth, Minnesot & Superior, Wisconsin)
-of Apr 4, 1914
The Speeches and Writings of Mother Jones
-ed by Edward M Steel
U of Pittsburgh Press, 1988
(Speech at Special Convention of District 15, UMWA,
Trinidad, Colorado, Sept 16, 1913)
Photo: Mother Jones at Ludlow Tent Colony
http://motherjonesmuseum.org/...
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Friday April 4, 2014
More on Coal Mine Disasters Resulting in Five or More Deaths:
Dawson Mine Disaster
1912
01/09/1912-6 killed in explosion at Parrish Plymouth Mine, Plymouth, PA
01/16/1912-5 killed in explosion at Carbon Hill Mine, Carbon Hill, VA
01/19/1912-5 killed in explosion at Central Mine, Central City, KY
01/20/1912-6 killed in explosion at Kemmerer No. 4, Kemmerer, WY
02/22/1912-9 killed in fire at Western No. 5, Lehigh, OK
03/20/1912-73 killed in explosion at San Bois No. 2, McCurtain, OK
03/26/1912-81 killed in explosion at Jed Mine, Jed, WV
04/21/1912-5 killed in explosion at Coil Mine, Madisonville, KY
06/18/1912-12 killed in explosion at Hastings Mine, Hastings, CO
07/11/1912-8 killed in explosion at Panama Mine, Moundsville, WV
07/16/1912-8 killed in explosion at Carbon Hill Mine, Gayton,VA
07/24/1912-18 killed in inundation at Superba and Lemont Mine, Evans Station, PA
08/13/1912-18 killed in explosion at Abernant Mine, Abernant, AL
1913
02/19/1913-5 killed in explosion at Seagraves Mine, Eldorado, IL
04/23/1913-98 killed in explosion at Cincinnati Mine, Finleyville, PA
05/06/1913-5 killed by suffocation at Taylor Mine, Beaver Dam, KY
05/17/1913-15 killed in explosion at Noble Mine, Belle Valley, OH
08/02/1913-20 killed in explosion at East Brookside Mine, Tower City, PA
10/22/1913-263 killed in explosion at Stag Canon No. 2, Dawson, NM
11/18/1913-24 killed in explosion at Acton No. 2, Acton, AL
12/16/1913-37 killed in explosion at Vulcan Mine, New Castle, CO
SOURCE
CDC Statistics on Coal Mine Disasters (with 5 or more deaths)
http://www.cdc.gov/...
(scroll to bottom of list, click arrow to reach 1912)
Photo: Dawson Mine Disaster of 1913
http://www.santafenewmexican.com/...
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We Have Fed You All For A Thousand Years - Utah Phillips
There is never a mine blown skyward now
But we're buried alive for you.
There's never a wreck drifts shoreward now
But we are its ghastly crew.
Go reckon our dead by the forges red
And the factories where we spin.
If blood be the price of your cursed wealth,
Good God! We have paid it in!
by An Unknown Proletarian