The daily sentinel., 1913-12-17
ANXIOUS WOMEN
FINALLY GIVE Up
ALL HOPE
Many Miners, Sons Of Men Kill
ed in New Castle Horror
Of 1896.
THE NUMBER OF DEAD IS 81
(By Staff Correspondent

New Castle. Colo, Dec. l7.-New
Castle awakened this morning to the
full extent of yesterdays awful dis
aster, as women and children crowd.
ed about the hastily improvised
morgue in a vacant hardware store
building picking out their dead.
Many of the older women gathered
here. remembered the tragedy of
1896. Many OF them, who dry-eyed
and shaking with pent-up emotion
took last glance at husband or
brother or son. lying cold and stiff
on the long, rough wooden table,
were only repeating the experience
OF the cold winter day in February,
eighteen years ago, when forty-nine
lives were lost in the same mine.
Experience is bitter teacher. but
II did not teach some of yesterdays
victims. Eight of the identified dead
in the morgue were employed in the
Vulcan mine at the time of the form
er disaster They were on the night
shift however, and necessity drove
them again into the dark and dan
gerous passage ways which they were
forced to enter to wrest a paltry wage
from the Garth sgrpcpsues.
Il was in the Hanna, Wyoming.
disaster, and in the Leyden mine.
near Denver, where so many were
killed. and | would have been here If
| hadn't changed shifts, but never
again will go into a mine" said Ed
Johnson, a youthful miner of twenty
three. His brother, Arvid, was one
of the mines victims. He leaves
wife and an infant child and he was
only twenty-siX.
Groups of miners stand about the
portals. when they are not busy In
the rescue work and tell how they
have given up mining forever. II is
hazardous occupation, and the pay
Is small at best they say, and they
prefer some less dangerous manner
OF earning a livelihood. But the old
timers who are here-men who were
working in the Vulcan at the time
of the 1896 explosion. say they said
the same thing eighteen years ago.
as they saw comrades and relatives
carried out from the mine. battered
beyond recognition, and lifeless. And
then they say-"This is our last, we
will never go into another mine.
And then Immediately one of the cap
tains of the first aid crew calls for
volunteers and there is a scramble
among the men who wouldn't go into
mine again, to be the first at his
side.
Among the mine victims of Tues
day are many of the boys who were
made fatherless by the previous dis
aeter. Widowed mothers forced them
into the mine again.
Hoping Against Hope.
All night wives and mothers wait
ed in the boarding house almost adj
Joining the portal of the wrecked
mine-hoping against hope that they
might be gladdened by the news that
their particular wage-earner might
have escaped the disaster which over
took all the others. Committees from
the city served hot coffee and sand
witches to the rescue crews as they
came from the mine. and volunteer
women did what they could to cheer
those who had relatives in the mine.
AS one by one, the bodies were
brought from the mine entrance. the
anguished women melted away, as
Identification compelled them against
their will to believe that further hope
was futile.
Mrs. Tony Montelli lost both hus-
band and son in the mine. She came
to the mine in the same train with
the Sentinel correspondent.
81 know there can't be any hope,
that either of them are alive, she
said, "but I can't give up hope. There
is nothing to live for If l do. l
know they can't be alive. but / can.
not believe they are dead. Kind
women did what they could to allay
her fears, but when at two O'Clock
this morning she boarded Midland
train, which stopped at the mine, she
had given up hope. Both father and
son had been brought from the mine
and identified Mrs. Montelli also
lost two nephews in the mine, Ga
briel and Joe Monpelli.
The Rescue Work.
Early last evening first aid
crews arrived from nearby mines to
assist in the work of bringing out
the bodies. Crews of eight men, who
were equipped with oxygen helmets
came from the South Canon mine I'M
der command of Jack Reese. from
Spring Gulch headed by Dick Malley
and from the Sunlight mine above
Glenwood. also a Rocky Mountain
Fuel company mine. led by J. p:
Smith With their arrival, the RELIEF
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