Daily Republican. [volume] ([Wilmington, Del.]) 1874-1890, 1883-02-19
THE LATE NINE DISASTER.
The Cave.in = Seventy -four Men
brow ned.

BRAIDwoOD, H., February l7.-This
city is filed with lamentation, owing t.
he disaster of yesterday, which result.
I'd in the death Of seventy -four persons
who were overwhelmed by landslide
a number of those killed leaving large
families. The place where the accident
occurred was in the northwest side OF
Shaft No. 2, Of the Wilmington Coal
Mining and Manufacturing Company :
mine. This company is one of four
which form the Wilmington Coal Asso-
citation. Each company employs itH
own men, has its separate mines and
transacts its business privately, but all
the coal mined is turned over to the as
ISOLATION, which disposes Of it, giving
back to each company proper proper
ton Of the proceeds.
1t is a pooling arrangement, and the
companies forming this association or
pool are the Chicago, Wilmington and
Nermillion Coal Company, with three
shafts the Eureka Coal Company, with
two shafts the Wilmington Coal Min
ing and Manufacturing Company, with
two shafts, and the Wilmington Star
Coal Company, Of Coal City, with two
shafts. The first aforementioned com
panies are of Braidwnod. These mines
were the first to sink shafts in this por-
| ton Of the country, sixteen years ago.
The shaft in which the accident occur
red has been working for the past eight
years. II is situated at Diamond, lit
tie village about four miles southwest
of Wilmington and two miles north
west of Braidwood. The country there
about is AS level AS a floor, with perhaps
a slight inclination towards the mines.
The sudden thaw and heavy rainfall
have transformed the prairie into ii lake
for miles and miles. About Diamond
the water stands from six inches to
three feet in depth.
WHERE THE MINE FELL.
With scarcely any warning there
suddenly appeared an opening from the
surface OF the earth into the mine.
The surface being submerged it took
only a short tim" for the water to pcnr-
tiate the entire mine, drowning all who
We're unable to get ont before the rising
water caught them. In opening this
mine shaft scvcnty-tiyc feet deep wa,
sunk into the earth. At right angles to
this two main galleries were run nearly |
parallel with the surface of the earth |
and about scyenty-tive feet below it. |
From these main galleries narrowo |
spurs, or gangways, are dug out in va
rions directions.
These spurs rise and fall with the |
ledge Of Goa, sometimes rising TO with |
in twelve or fifteen feet of the surface. |
II was at such II point, very near the
hal l,,I
lying on his back, picking away at the
coal above, the earth must have fallen
upon the doomed miner. Through the
opening thus made the water poured in,
filling on" gangway after another and |
cutting off escape to the central shaft.
There was little time to give an alarm,
for in less than an hour from the time
the break occurred nearly every means
of escape was cut of and every orc,l-
pant of the mine at that time must have
been drowned. These galleries were
long and narrow, and only by painfully |
slow crawling could the poor victims
escape.
20 POSSIBILITY OF RESCUE.
No nois,. accompanied tine rising of
the water, and the first indication had
If their danger by many Of the vie
i'm, was "a chilling sensation of cold
water trickling along the pathway ~
which they lay at work. There was AN
air shaft offering an additional avenue
Of escape, of which many awaited them
selves, bur the wafer came in too rap
idly to allow all to reach IT, The mine
was not considered especially danger
tlt,II,,l a lr,..,l, had