The Iola register. [volume] (Iola, Allen County, Kansas) 1875-1902, 1884-06-20
Awful SLAUGHTER Of Childhood at the
=. Coal Mines, a. -

Awful Slaughter Of Chfidn00d ~ tRe
"There are many melancholy 'feat
lures connected with the life of coal
MINER" said Morgan Jones, formerly
mine-boss in the Schuylkill coalregion,
but now q resident of this city, "but
the most painful is the emploYment7U1
boys in and about collieries. A colliery
boy is never a, child. He has no games.
He seldom speaks. He knows nothing
of the world beyond the line of bleak
hills that environ the grim locality
where he begins to earn his living al
most as soon as he is large enough BE-
put into trousers. -
a. have in my mind now q colliery
where for years 1 was one of the defv-
ers. 1t is one of the oldest and one of
the richest mines in the region. n i
passed up and down its shaft every day
when it was not idle for more than
twenty-five years. l have helped carry
from its depths the mangled body
of many poor fellow-workman,
crushed beneath some fall of coal OK
mutilated by fire-damp explosions
have witnessed the agony of wives and
mothers and sisters, as victim after
victim to the perils that constantly
threaten the miner has been raised
from the deadly depths, and my heart
has ached for them in their grief. The
poignancy of that feeling time never
failed to temper, but the spectacle of a
score or more of boys aged before their
time, bent, and stunted, and worr,
working their lives away in the black.
dusty breaker, sweltering and suffering
in the summer and chilled to the bone
in the winter, was something that
brought perpetual heartache. The
colliery refer to is only the counter
part of hundreds of Others Its build
ings are on high spur OF the Blue
Mountains, and are visible for miles.
The entrance to the mines is at the top
of the hill. which is covered with the
accumulated coal dust of years, clouds
of which are constantly rising from the
whirling, sharp-toothed machinery
within, and pouring from the open
doors and windows. The interior is
dark and gloomy, with coal-begrimed
men moving silently about. appearing
and disappearing in the dust coming
from invisible corners and suddenly.
swallowed up in impenetrable depths.
In one room in one of these collieIy
buildings room not more than fifteen
feet square, have seen forty boys at
work picking slate from the coal that
passes swiftly down the chutes in an,
endless stream. They are seated on
rough hemlock boards stretched across
the room in rows. The windows are
II IN,
order that the dust may escape. In
winter the wind whistles through the
apartment and the snow beats in at the
window and doors. From seven o'clock
in the morning until darkness compels'
work to cease these boys sit on their
benches, with backs bent almost double
over the running coal. separating the
slate from it. To do this requires great
dexterity and skill with the hands and
quick eye. The slate pickers range
from seven to fifteen years of age. At,
fifteen or sixteen they are old enough to-
enter the mines, and to reach that stage
in their career is their only ambition.
If any visitor to the colliery will take
the trouble to enter the miners grave
yard near by he will not need to be told
how many of these boys never reach
the goal of their ambition. The tomb
stones in the graveyard are numerous,
but great majority bear the names OF.
boys under the age of fifteen-slate
pickers, who have succumbed to the
Overstrain of their toil-toil that bad
made. them old, decrepit and infirm be-
fore they had reached the freshness OF
youth.
1.-The wages paid to these boys are
from 81 to $3.50 week, if they have
luck to be steadily employed. Some OF
them, in many instances, live long dis
tances from the collieries where they
are employed, frequently as far as five
or six miles. In such instances they
are carried to work in the morning and
home again in the evening in the coal
cars of the colliery or company. For this
service they are charged sometimes az
much as ten cents a trip, the moneJ
being deducted from their wages. 1t is
no uncommon thing for the boys tc
find, after reaching the colliery, that
the works will be idle for some reason.
In such cases they get no pay, and 1
have known it to happen that at the
end of the month it would require
not only all the boys wages to pay
for his transportation. but that he
would still be in debt to his employer.
While / was in the coal regions
l endeavored to awaken an interest
among the miners on the subject of this
employing boys at collieries, with the
idea of making a change in the system,
but nine out of ten OF them had large
families of boys. and they were willing
to run the risk of their being equal to
the hardship of the life Of slate-pickeI
rather than lose the pittance each would
contribute to the family income got
up petition among people at large
asking the enacting of a law prohibiting
the employment of boys under sixteen
at any colliery, and compelling miners
to send their children to school until
they were that age, but nothing ever
came of 1t. In the meantime The grave
yards of the coal regions are rapidly
filling with boys whose surroundings
might be made such that they would
grow up to be useful members Of their
communities. and parents, employers,
society and legislators look idly on at
the slaughssr. Y. Sun. ......-
~