The Montgomery advertiser., 1909-11-22
Stories of lieroisn 7old of '
 Miners Who We're Entombed

A
 Cherry, fil.. Nov. 2i.--wiliiam Cie- land, one of the survivors of the mine disaster, after drinking . bowl of soup, appeared none the worse for his expert ence yesterday upon emerging from the shaft.
 we made the most of our situation. he said, sitting in the car and sur. rounded by nurses. As soon as we discoyered fire last Saturday and thai there was no hope of escape. we re- treated to la safe place where watef could be found. Fortunately some of the tinibers behind uA burned out ana this let earth and rocks fall down, eut- ting us off from tts heat and gas How the time went we don't know. We must have been unconscious part of the time.
 T remember soon after we were shut in of, drinking great quantities or the seepage that had dripped down into the gutter and eating my lunch. After that some of us pulled on the bark and began chewing It.
 "We did not realize how serious WAS our petition, in fact Sofne of tns uaen spent the time joking and said they wished they had a psck of cards. It was after we had drark up all the water and the seepags had run dry that we began to pound on the wall to cause more drip down.
 < '.aoon after this we heard voices aud one of our men said At last they are coming after us.' We could hear the.a digging on the other side of the rock and dirt which ,hiled up the pasAaKs and soon a little hol0 was seen at the top and the giesm of the torch"s came through.
 "Our first question was: .Is 1t Sun day or Monday As | matter of fact most of us thought 1t was Sunday and that we had been in the mine only about twenty-four hsurs."
 The difficulty in reaching the east side was said to be due to . bank of black damp Between the main shaft and the bafriSade erected by the men irn- prisoned in this section. The delay Tn this exploration was due to the fact that It was necessary -te prepare the oxygen helmets, 3
 0f he,stWenty-o men found in the south gallery. twelve were too wesk to brave sudden exposure to the sIr. Food was taken down to them.
 George slemitz. another of the res cued, answered the sciar1orous greetlnKs of his friends with an explanation of the incident uppermost h his mind the loss of his dinner pail When the fire broke ont Siemitx rushed for the shaft brit was driven back. He fell over a prcstrate mule, losing the dinner pail which later became of more value to him than, all ths bsnauets ssryad In the world during the week.
 4 graphic description as the reseu- CTS saw 1t Of the recovery of the men was told by Father James F. Heany. of St. Mary's church. Mendota, H., who was down In the. mine with ths rescue party. He said: T.
 Priest Describes fs<seue.
 rJust about o'clock. when we were as near @as U ean tell, 800 feet Into the gallery from, the hoistlnk shaft our party siaekened up because of pile of debris Tn the way Suddenly David Powel said: -IAsten boys thought heard something We ali siienced. A faint knocking as though a noise com ing through the thickness pf the wall. My God said ~Powej. I believe somebody is alive In there
 '.aome of the other men replied: No that is impossible. Nopody In the world thinks for 6 moment the man could. live down here for seven days
 "'wsll. nowis I ;said Let's. listen Ss .ws ali .,,etensa fer what seemed to  came %thef snuf6lea p1uhdiRg sound 5We ftAH ihesrd' beforsl .T'heH we were too iff5uct affected to speak. We could not believe our own senses. Grabbing hold of the picks and, axes our men then began to tear down the loose pie of earth and rock. Frequently we stopped to hear whether the poundings were continued. 1t took us several minutes to make much headway into the obstruction.
 : Finally I. who had been In the Nar. came forward and With shoyei re- leived one of the men who had be. come tired out 'f 4Tt was a ,wierd scene. The lights of our torches on. our caps kept oon. hing up and down as wa laeored ana filled the place with moving shadows.
 "Now iet'si stop and listen again. said Powell. Much to our glee. the ipounding sounds came louder. A tew more digs brought down the dirt rom the top and little black hole appear ed before us.
 TWO or three of us climbed over the dirt and yelled. Are any or you aiaye nAn 'n answsr awe, came back: 'Yes..
 "Before another word could be ut tered the men began pulling at the dirt again and. soon large gap ap.. peared. We yelled in to them: Hold one of our torches
 , How many of you are alive Tn there. boysf We win save you In a minute
 Tn faint, husky voices. the men called back. Yes, we are alive and you bet we are hungry, too. Have you got some lunuch out there:
 q crawted up as near the hole as could without interfering with the men. sT
 "God bless you. men. we will get you out in a minute and give you all the lunch you can eat. Be patient as you can.'
 "I could not see anything back in there for the men were in total dark ness, so I climbed back and prayed that God would make the number we were about to rescue from the living grave as many as possible.
 By that time the hole was wide open and a dozen pairs of glistening eyes shining out from black faces ap- peared.
 We kept yelling in to the men to keep up their courage. promising them that the way would soon be clear and the cage in the hoisting shaft was down and ready to carry them to the surface.
 Fear for FrencIsman.
 one of the men inside answered hack. Most of us are all right and