The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1916-1920, 1919-11-03
Operators Expect Half of
Workers to Return to
Galleries To-day.
THINK STRIKE WILL FAIL
Repetition of September Dis
orders Will Be Halted by
U. s. Regulars.
By a s,ar co,-e.ponaent Of TIE suy.

HUNTINGTON, w. Va, Nov. 2.-With
United States regulars, for whom these
lower Alleghanies offer no terrors
compared with the Argonne, marking
a deadline between union and nom
union districts, while others are held
in Charleston for swift despatch II
anywhere needed, Sunday passed with
out a tremor in the coal fields of
southern and southwestern West
Virginia.
This being a day of rest and yester-
day partly so. for comparatively little
coal normally is mined on Saturday,
the full effect of the strike order in
this State, the second in the Union in
the production of soft coal. cannot be
sensed until tomorrow. Monday nor
mally is the biggest day The miners
are fresh then and the over Sunday
distribution Of railroad cars to these
mines raises the supply to its weekly
maximum.
The operators stand by their pre-
diction that tomorrow, the test day,
will find more than half of the States
$4,000 coal miners at work; that at
least 421 of the $50 West Virginia
mines will be producing. The oper
ators do not see how this number can
be decreased.
Union Mines Closed.
II is admitted that 42s mines ceased
production on Saturday morning when
the strike order went into effect These
are the mines which are unioniZed The
great point in favor of the operators and
OF steady If diminished supply of coal
from West Virginia. is that a large part
OF the map can be marked non-union,
and that troops are here 10 protect any
man who wants to work from violent
efforts to stop him.
The field that is supposed to yield the
pest bituminous coal in the world, the
Pocahontas, sixty-one miles south OF
charleston. whose product heats the
boilers of the navy. Is non-union. An
attempt by the United Workers of
America TO get possession of 1t some
twenty years ago was a failure. Others
In which unionism has made little IL
any inroads are the Guyan field in Lon
gan county, seventy-eight miles from
Huntington; Tug River and Williamson
IN the southern part OF the coal and
coke fields and the southern hak of the
wheeling district, in the northern part
of the State.
Better Than Union Wages.
Fair as the garden of the Lord in the
eyes of the miners organizers ia the
Guyan field. 1t is comparatively new,
having been opened in 1902. Its output
has increased gradually to 1880. 900
tons year. The city of Huntington.
on the Hope River, is peppered with the
MONIES OF mine owners, many OF whom
once worked In mines themselves, who
nave come to town with their families
and fortunes extracted from the hills of
Logan county. They say that the wages
paid in the Guyan field are better than
the union scale, that working conditions
are much better than the average and
that sociologists would open their eyes
II they should penetrate the hills be-
yond Logan Court House and see the
model mining towns built there
The Guyan field has never had a
strike, the operators say; the miners
have never wanted any. With the re-
ducuon Of the working day from nine TO
eight hours this year the Utopian quail
ity of these settlements of these IL 900
miners, who include negroes, natives
and foreigners. neared perfection, as de-
scribed to THE SUN correspondent to-
day by an owner who passed his ap-
premiership in mine.
Second Producer in State.
The Guyan field Is now the second
producer in the State, Pocahontas, with
its 2o,oOo.OO0 tons annually, standing
first. The miners of the Guyan and
Pocahontas fields are among those who
don't want to be unionized, according to
the operators, and would welcome any
intervention between them and those
WHO would bring them into organized
labor by force. From the union stand
point, assuming that this is the true
feeling of the miners. they don't know
what is good for them. and, protected
by the operators against union mission
airy work. have never had a chance to
f1nd out.
The extraordinary happenings Of Sep
temher are now regarded as sympto-
matte OF the situation which brought
about the national strike order of the
Federation of Miners The miners OF
the Kanawha field are unionized about
100 per cent. Some one told them that
the Logan county men, In the Guyan
or Guyandotte River field, wanted to
join the federation and were being pre-
vented from doing So Union runners
who went up Kanawha Creek reported
Guyan miners were being shot by armed
guards and that women and children
were being killed or starved to death.
This is said by the operators to be Wild
ly untrue. An investigation board Gre
ated by order of Gov. Cornwall is now
sitting In Charleston. trying to get at
the facts
Miners Gathered with Guns.
The reports. whatever their basis.
caused a crowd OF between $500 and