The Evening statesman. [volume] (Walla Walla, Wash.) 1903-1910, 1907-01-02

H..
skewed his head around and, in fact,
did the stunt of contOrtionist to
show what little space he had occu-
pied
Il could lie on my left side and my
back. | tried at first to get over, but
there were timbers in my way, and
never got beyond certain point. The
mere matter of lying on my right side,
in gold hadn't any more room tnan
II wanted
at took me a right smart while to
discover that there was a little space
at the bottom of the hole l was lying
in for my knees. But it was only one
knee at a time. In order TO rest myself
! | would stick one knee up until it
pressed against the timbers. At first
| tried to get both knees up, but it was
a failure. / would stick one knee up
there and give it rest for an hour or
So and then ! would bring 1t down and
stick the other knee up. This is about
The only rest / had. | was forced to
lie on my left side and that was my
most comfortable position, but every
once in while l would flop over and
lie on my back.
Say, this left side of mine and my
back are about the toughest parts of
any human being that ever was. be-
lieve if a man were to stick knife into
my left hip and in my shoulder, where
it was lying and rubbing against that
rock under me. it wouldn't hurt me
bit. There is one big callous all over
me there
Hicks was asked to tell the story
of his entombment Here it is:
(By Lindsay B. Hicks.)
Well. there amt much to say.
1t all came down on us at once, the
whole mountain shut up on US. That's
all there was to it. | heard a big noise
and didn't give one time to think.
think every man of that gang of six
who were working in the shaft jumped
at the same time. l know that l did
high jumping stunt, but there was
man in front of me, | don't know who
ne was, who stumbled. He seemed to
trip up on one of the timbers. | was so
close behind him that tripped too.
My hand reached out and touched
him. l don't know how l ever got away
from him as they say l did, but l fell
down beside the car>and l think it was
1t flashed over me that the car was
my salvation. / got my hand on the
edge of the car, sort of turned my head
upward and saw everything falling.
Then | ducked-fell fiat beside the
timbers right next to the car, got my
self into as small bunch as possible
and lay there. 1t takes me a long time
to tell this, but it was mighty short in
happening.
Everything came down with crash
covered my head with my arms and
hands and waited, but nothing touched
me except something that hit me low
in the back That did not hurt very
much.
For two hours l was in hell. l came
purity near strangling. To make
things worse, there were two men right
above me that were dying. l could not
say who those men were. One of them
lived for two hours. l talked to him
, and he told he that he was a gOner.
who are you?" he asked me.
l said: Il am Hicks
Well" he said, Il have no rela-
tions and l am not long for this world
have no word to send OUT
Heard Their Dying Groans.
| / did not hear anything for a long
| time. Then he spoke out: Il haven't
any relations that care for me, but 1
wish you would say
l waited a long time, because l
| thought he was a poor devil that's in
worse luck than l was, and the sit
uation was just about as bad as it
could be.
The next l heard from that man, and
could hardly hear it, was a groan. 1
think the fellow tried to cry out but
the ground was closing in on MIN.
That poor fellow was strangled to
death and heard it all. He wasn't the
only one.
Away up above me, it seemed. but it
wasn't so very far, there was another
fellow who must have been in pretty
close quarters. l know he tried to call
to me, Or. anyway. to call out, because
his voice had that sound, but he did not
say anything. He didn't utter any
! words, but the language that he spoke
went straight to my heart. Don't you
know you can hear some things with
your eyes and something's with your
heart? My heart caught that full
force
| l lay there and heard two men
strangling to death. l knew what it
/ meant, but l was mighty near doing
the same thing. 1t took me three or
four hours to get the sand and dust out
of mine l call it my underground
| residence, now that l am out of it. and
want to tell you old man, that those
| few hours were hell
/ Old age 10 a heautifrl thing thov