Iron County register. [volume] (Ironton, Iron County, Mo.) 1867-1965, 1901-09-12

CERGT. Bob leaned his rifle against
- the stack. and sat down on an up
turned, empty soap box in the shadow
of the tent, with a sigh of relief. He
unbuckled his belt, and mopped his
hot face with a red cotton handker-
chief.
There" he said, that's done for
n while! I shall not have any more
guard duty for at least "a hours, thank
goodness, though we've got none too
many men and extra guard duty is
becoming the rule"
Thought you liked it," grinned the
other sergeant, looking up from his
occupation of poking a little sharp
ened stick into the recesses of his
r~ife-breech in search of dust.
Like it," Sergt. Bob calculated
ironically, with a disdainful wave of
a grimy hand at all the surroundings.
From the scrubby hills to the east
a dusty country rOad ran across the
narrow valley, and disappeared in the
hills to the west. The sides of the
hills were covered with underbrush
INT second-growth timber, with here
and there a little whitevashed house
set down box-like in a clearing. The
valley was q marsh. with coarse grass
and weeds; here and there a pool of
stagnant water or a ditch-like stream;
little hummOcks of drier ground rose
from it. covered with brambles and
wild roses.
Through the center of this valley
ran the long black line of a railway
embankment, crossed midway by the
wagOn-rOad. In one of the angles
formed by the crossing stood a coun-
try store, a one-stOried box of gray
boards. In another angle was a great
coal-tipple, its skeleton frame black
against the sky. From this a little
railway straddled across the marshy
running back to where the dark
mouth of a coal-shaft yawned in the
hillside.
Around the tipple yer great piles
of slack. waste coal-dust, screened
from the dump. The store was built
on slack; the railway embankment
was made of slack; grimy hills of
slack. cut through by the railway
and the wagon-road, flied all the
neighborhood of the tipple.
Some of the murky hills were on
fire, ~smoldering at the base. They
had been burning for years, and from
them rose GoXious gases. The stream
that ran at their base was polluted by
the drainage of the slack, and on the
surface of the water foated an rides
cent, metallic scum.
Along the wagon-road, on either
IL -%-a%ohA1 n1.- 80 %ar3e. o-1%IA-
row was placed on a little strip of
level ground at the foot of the railway
fill; more tents stood in the shadow
of the coal-tipple. In front Of the
store a tent held a telegraph instru-
ment. placed on a barrel, and here a
blue-clad operator listened to the
busy ticking of the receiver. The
brazen sun of a hot June day shone
in a sky of burning blue. The Their
mometer. hung in the telegraph tent,
registered 81 degrees.
Now and then a long coal-train
rushed by, raising black dust in swirls,
which settled again On tents and tip
pie and store A wagon, dragging its
slow course along the road, was half
hidden in a gray cloud of dust. In
the shade of the tipple or in the hot
shadow of the tents lounged blue-clad
men. with blouses unbuttoned or cast
aside. each one trying to get a breath
of fresh air in that valley furnace.
Four infantry companies and a bat
tery of the national guard were en-
camped here; four miles down the
railway were two other companies,
and four miles in the other direction
were two companies more. Sixteen
miles of railway were held and guard
Cd nv these two battalions. Beyond
them were troops of other regiments,
scattered here and there along 60
miles of road, until the railway
reached the waters of the broad Ohio.
Night and day sentinels paced the
track and squads of guards watched
the bridges, the coal-tipples and the
mine buildings. Night and day watch
fn1 pickets along the hills waited with
loaded rifles.
When the troops had reached the
narrow valley, three days before,
BRIDGES and tipples were burning!
Ioaded ears had been overturned and
wrecked, and not a train was running
:, This section of one of the great
ra4vavs of the country. All this
roe the work of rioters who found