The Birmingham age-herald., 1918-09-04
John Pennington, Contrac tor, and Jake Jones, Negro Miner, Victims of
 Flooded Slope TWO NEGRO MINERS
 MISSING LAST NIGHT Water Fell as if in a Wad, Completely Filling Basin Like Entrance, Forcing
 Wall of Slope
By JEFF BAILEY


 John Pennington, contractor, and Jake Jones, colored miner, are dead from drowning, while Henry Truss and Turner Byers, colored miners, are missing, following the flooding of Mary Lee mines, owned by the Ala bama company, and located at Lewisburg, yesterday after noon about 3::30 o'clock. MT. Pennington leaves a wife and four children at Thorsby, where he made his home before coming to Mary Lee mines.
 That the entire number of min-
 CTS who were in the mine at the
 time of the cIoud-burst, which filled
 the basin where the slope and
 manway is located with water
 was not killed is nothing less than
 a TNCdE ~ lhCh fCNC HI
 the mine at the time the heavy
 pressure of water which had
 backed into the Ioop-shaped sink
 at the mouth of the mine rushed
 down the manway and forced the
 wnIl of the slope, continuing its
 mad rush into the bowels of the
 earth. taking with it timbers.
 .uIn nd Sn
 lay in it's path. The force of the
 water. miners say. was more ter
 rifle thaa the spurt of hundreds of
 fireplugs, and with mighty
 splash they saw the wall give way,
 and knew that it meant instant
 death to anyone coming up the
 manway, or for any of the drivers
 on the slope.
 knew when the wall gave way 1t wal going. to mean a death tol." said Super intendcnt John c. Caldwell" and feared more casualties than the two VI know of, with a possibility of two more However, os telephoning to the bottom of the mine I was able to advise the mar Of what had happened and what the, might expect, so the foremen and fir, bosses kept the men back, even goin:
 
 were, whore they remained safe until tn, water had spent it's force. The two mel that were drowned and the two who ar, I missing had undoubtedly gotten by th foreman when I telephoned, and wer coming out. It was impossible to stol them, for it meant death to the men wh ran to overtake them and warn them MT. Pennington was presumably hit ), the full force of the water near the tul of the sloEe. Jake Jones, the negro wa, was drowned, I am sure, suffered li,S, fate.
 STROUD'S NARROW ESCAPE | J. +. Stroud, another contractor, ss eaped afte; wading through the water but fell at the mouth of the mine corn pletely exhausted just as he reached tn top.
 "I had casaed in my checks" he said and made up my mind to go, for I seemed every minute that it would SC me, and when I felt there was no hope | reached out in the darkness and caugh a small piece of timber that had lodge, crossWays ln the slope, and I clung to until recovered sufficiently to push ol through the mud and water. It was darl as pitch and there was nothing to do bu keep gong. Finally I reached the tor and, to say I was all in, is stating ! mildly
 There are IS or 20 fine mules in th mine that it will be impossible to get ou until the slope is cleared up and mad passabls. l. is, however, possible to ge to them and feed them, as man cal work his way down into the mine, as Wa done yesterday afternoon.
 LOCATED IN BASIN The mouth of Mary Lee mine, whil | loca ted in a semi-basn, is in no wa. susceptible to floods. and never has suf I feieG from any trouble of this kind be 1 fore, and may not have such a ms l fortune again in a lifetime. The unhear' of waterfall at the mines yesterday i described as nothing short of a cloud burst. Several of the men employed ol | top at the mines state that they hay never seen such a de1uge before in thei Hives and that it simply dropped in a wad so to speak, filling the entrance to tn mine absolutely, almost as quick as one I eve could see it. In it's 90 years of op l eration this mine has never suffere 1 from water before. The water presset against the timbers of the wall to tn 1 slope, after entering the manway, whicl issues out to one side, the slope and mar way forming a "" shaped figure, an with crash the timbers of the wall gay way under the heavy weight, and tn earth for about 75 feet around the en trance to the mine gave way and tn whole entrance collapsed.
 DAMAGE UNKNOWN