The Savannah morning news., 1902-08-21

CHILD SLAVERY IN THE MINES
Juvenile Humanity Stunted Physi-
caiiy and Mentally in the Coal


ca1ly and Mentally in the Coal
Breakers.
F. HI. Nichols in the Christian Herald.
On railroad track, near the mining
town of Edwardsville, l met a child
carrying sack filled with coal SCREEN
ings that he had stolen from a COM
pany's pile, for use in his mothers
cook stove. The child certainly did
not look day over IL years old. His
face was pale and his cheeks were
hollow. He was very round shoulder
ed for child of his age, and he show
ed the stunting and whitening effects
OF struggle for existence against tre-
mendous odds.
How old are your" I asked.
Thirteen, goin' on a." was the re-
ply.
And you work in the breaker?"
Sure, and so does all the other lads
in the town, when they're not strik-
ing. You haven't got 1t in for me?"
he asked, in a scared tone, 81 s'pose
you is some kind of a company's de-
tectivc, amt your"
1 succeeded in allaying his fears by
telling him that was merely visitor
in the town, and that / was living in
d miners boarding house.
Tell me a little about your work
in the breaker" / said.
Work in the Breaker.
well, that's it over there" and he
pointed to structure outlined against
the sky. -Four hundred lads works
in that building. There's six breakers
in this town, SO that all the lads is
working. We go to work at 7 in the
mornin' and stay until 6. We have half
an hour at noon fur eatin'. We sort
over the coal as it comes out of the
sleeves. We pick out the slate and Stag.
That's all we do-see?"
Rather hard work. 1 suggested.
Yes, 1t is, until you get used to it.
The coal dust's pretty bad. Sometimes
it gets into your eyes and makes you
kind of blind. The breaker isn't
heated in winter, so you got to get
used to bein' cold all day. But" he
added proudly. ST don't mind it no
longer. The only thing I kick about is
the way the coal cuts my fingers
Pickin' over the coal will once in a
while wear a feller's nails off and wear
the skin down to the bone, so he has
to lay off for a week until they heals
up. Say, isn't it too bad that they
can't invent a way of keepin' coal
from wearin' a feller's fingers off'n
his hands?"
tents n Duys
How much pay do you receiver"
Sixty cents q day. The most you can
make in the breaker is 80 cents day.
I'll be maxim that in two years from
now. started on forty cents. I'm get
tin there
How long have you worked in the
breaker?"
six years. Ever since me ladder
was burned in gas explosion in the
mine. He's par-lyzed for life, you
know"
Then you must have been years
old when you began picking coal?"
The child hesitated. We'll" he said
slowly, ut makes no difference how old
1 was. Me papers and alffydavits
was Q. X. The comp'ny has got 'em
now. They says 1 was 10 when 1
started to work and that's what /
was"
Are many in the breakers younger
than you?"
why, sure. I'm one of the Oldest
I am maxim sixty cents. Most of 'em
is and 8 years old; but their papers
is all right, though" he added earnest
ly. 1.-THE papers says they'se all Is.
goin' on 14.'
Did You ever go to school?'
For the first time in our talk the
child. laughed; not with the innocent.
ripping laugh of childhood, but with
the hard cynicism of a man of so.
SCHOOL," he echoed. Say, mister,
you must be green hand. Why, lads
in Anthracite doesn't go to no school;
they works in the breaker"
And as he trudged off along the rail-
road track with the heavy sack of coal
on his little STOPPING shoulders, he
looked back at me quizzically, as
though he wondered what strange man
ner of man this might be, who could
suppose for a minute that a child born
under the coal-dust cloud could ever
receive the light of an education.
No school for These.
The child spoke the simple truth.
Boys do not go to school in Anthracite.
They work in the breakers, and the in
tellectual and physical training of
childhood is the saddest part of life
at the mines.
The coal that is brought up in cars
from the base of the shaft is in large
Jumps, just as it has been blasted or
hewn out of the vein. From the cars
1t is dumped into crushing machines,
which grind it into the various sized
Jumps in which it is sold to the con-
sumner. These machines are in the GU
pcla at the top of the breaker, and
from this process the breaker takes it's
name. The broken coal falls into enor-
NOUS revolving sleeves on the floor be-
low the crusher. From the sleeves it
passes through chutes that wind
throughout the entire building to the
ground floor, when it is loaded on
freight cars. Mixed with the coal Is
more or less slate. rock and dirt, and to
pick this out of the unceasing river of
coal is the work of the boys and cid
men employed in the breakers.
The company insists that on file in
its office IL has an affidavit sworn be-
fore Justice OF the Peace for every
boy who receives from forty to eighty
cents for ten hours work in the break
err. The affidavit declares the boys age
TO be IL years or over. Therefore,
there is no such thing as child labor
I'm the mines" In name. though not in
fact, every breaker boy is OF the legal
age prescribed by the law OF the state