The true northerner., 1877-08-17
MISERABLE MINERS.


Pitiabie Condition OF the Pennsylvania
of Starvation. aE7 ~
Times has bean investigating the con-
dition of the miners in the Scranton coal
district, and reveals q degree OF misery
and wretchedness that can hardly find
parallel in this country. He found them
living in cheerless huts, and feeding
upon potatoes, soda-crackers, and water.
One miner is taken as fair sample OF
the majority. He told him.:
"That he had seldom made more than
SlS a month, and thought that $l5 would
be nearer his average. His rent was 81,
but he paid il irregularly. All his sup
plies were drawn from the truck store of
the company, which is private corpora
tion, selling its coal at the breaker to
the Delaware, Lackawanna and Western.
He was obliged to get his supplies at this
shop because he never could get cash for
his work. Since the strike no -four
had been served out, so he could have
no bread. AS with many other families,
meat was a luxury seldom enjoyed.
Clothes were bought scarcely oftener
than to keep the family decently covered.
A child died last winter, and charitable
people in one of the city churches mad
furnished decent burial fer it, the moth
er being unable to get money or credit
for the expense. There are men among
the Welsh miners who have lived in
Hyde Park for many years, whose cir
cumstances have been good, but who are
now sharing with the nearest laborer
in the hardships common to all the pop
ulation. One man, sober, frugal, indus
trious, in twenty-one years had been
able to accumulate little property,
which was now slipping from his hands,
and he was $500 in debt Yet he had
practiced economy so severe that no
felon in prison but would have
felt wronged if he were compelled to live
on his fare. ID n3
Even the most frugal Of these miners
are in debt, Women whose husbands
are sick subsist only upon charity, and
some of them are upon the verge OF
starvation. A clergyman who had abund-
ant opportunities for knowing the condi-
tion OF the miners said he believed it
would be safe to say the families in the
valley averaged six persons each, and
that they had maintained life for the past
nine months on an average OF 81 per
month A Roman Catholic priest who
was questioned by the correspondent
said that there had undoubtedly been
much intemperance, and n sad want of
economy III numerous cases, but that the
system of payment mt the store was vi
clous and kept the men in debt He de-
MED that all the mining population was
made up of the "Molly Mcguire class
The majority of them are peaceable,
honest and industrious, and have borne
their troubles with remarkable patience.
The revelations of this correspondent
show pitiable condition of things, and
will commend the miners to large de-
gree OF public sympathy. At the same
time, there must be cause and rem
edy for it. 1t is not difficult to find the
one, however difficult it may be to apply
the other. The flush times previous to
the panic attracted great crowds of
European laborers to this country. The
English and Irish mining element nat
urally gravitated to the Pennsylvania
coal districts and settled down there.
Their numbers have constantly increased
until they are largely in excess of the de-
mand of the market, yet still they remain
down, down, down. The consequence
is that for four years past they have not
only lived in suffering for want of the
necessaries of life, but in the midst of a
social confusion which has more than
once threatened to take the form of civil
war. Undoubtedly the companies must
bear their share of the responsibility.
They have conducted business hereto
fore on too large and loose a scale. They
have speculated in vast tracts of coal
lands. They have watered stocks, and
spread out in such manner az to per-
suade miners that there was plenty of
work for them all at big wages. At last
there were tens of thousands too many
men for the demand for coal, and, as
prices have gone down, the men have
naturally been squeezed to the verge of
starvation.
Fighting for $4,000 Trotter.