The Bridgeport times and evening farmer., 1921-09-08
By SIEGERIED D. WEYER International News Service Staff

| NcWS SerVlcG otdh | Correspondent
 | Copyright, 1921, by the International News Service)
 New York, Sept. 8.-The West Vir- l ginia mining war, which has again | necessitated Federal intervention, is, | in the last analysis, an Armageddon | between organized capital and organ | ized labor. Upon it's ultimate out | come. which seems far off-for the | present government intervention can l only enforce an armistice but cannot | end the war-hinges, primarily, the issue of the closed open shop The struggle between the coal op ] orators on the one side and the United Mine Workers of America the other revolves around the non-union coal fields in the southern part of the l state, adjacent to the border of Ken lucky and West Virginia. There are altogether 92,O00 miners in West Virginia. Approximately two l thirds of this total are union men. l miners in the southern part of the l state, of whom 1000 are union min CTS in Mingo county. The northern part is almost solidly organized by l the union. Acid Test of the Open Shop | But between Mingo and the north an Valley, in Logan county. This is | the richest 'black diamond" field in | the couriry and one of the richest in l the world. Together with various un- | organized districts to the south it pro- | duces enough coal to supply the whole | of the United States in an emergency. i From these mines is derived the finest 1 grade of bituminous coal to be found | anywhere on the face of the globe. | They hold the key to the country's coal duStry. Consequently they form
 the crux of the titanic capitalization
 struggle which once again has come | to a bloody climax.
 | These mines are unorganized. With | them stands or falls the open shop. | Logan county is the bulwark of the coal operators in their determined last | stand against unionism. To get these l mines organized is the oll-overshad- l owing aim of the United Mine Work | CTS of America To bring these non l union miners - numbering between
 15,0 900 and 10000 men-into the field ! of the most powerful branch-body Of the American Federation of Labor is
 the dream of more than half a million
 union miners in all larts of the coun-
 try.
 The coal operators. on the other
 hand, are not one whit less determined
 to fight this unionizing effort to the
 bitter end.
 The whole history of the unionizing
 of the West Virginia coal fields is
 written in the crimson of human
 blood. The organization of most of
 the fields was accomplished only after
 the miners moved on them en masSe.
 Nine years ago they swept down upon the Paint and Cabin Creek Mines, in Kanawha county un1oosing civil war
 that cost 600 lives.
 | In 1919, in the midst of the war, the
 great national coal strike was wreck ; ed against the rock of non-unionism , in the south of West Virginia, nota- organized Mingo fields, which kept
 supplying the nation with steady
 streams of the vital ''block diamonds
 when the coal fields of the rest of the
 country were shut practically drum
 Logan Is VeritabIe Arsenal
 That crisis accentuated the lesson
 to both sides-that in these regions
 lay the battlefield of Arma geddon-
 Since then both the operat ors and the
 miners have prepared feverishly for the supreme contest. Gigantic sums
 of money, untold quantities of arms
 and 1egions of men of death-defying
 vaIor and iron will are at the dis posal of each side.
 The opertors unequivoca1lv deny ., ing fhe right to organize on the part T | of the United Mine Workers of Amer I ical employ a veritable army of mine o guards, known as the Ba1dwin-Felts e detectives. to prevent by force any = and all attempts to organize. Allied
 with these private detectives is pri- vate army maintained by the oper-
 l ators in Logan county. under the su-
 | preme command of Sheriff Don Cha
 fin-"Gentleman'' Chain, they cal
 him. for his fame as 9 handler ol S guns is enhanced by his being a, col
 lege man-and for the maintenance
 of which army the coal operators are $ lowing so much ger ton of coal. - That the present bloody clash was bound to come sooner or later was . foregone conclusion with all those ia, Is rniliar with the situation. The surprise r. to them was that it did not come y sooner.
 70 s'Trigger Triar' Served As Spark 1'' But *he proper psychological back IF ground for action was given at thi
 particular juncture for both sides b! of the prospect of the second 'HTrigge h Triar' beginning in Williamson. W t. Va. September 6. There. in the 1ittl' " county courthouse of Bloody Mingo. ;r ;r a dozen or more of the same men wht "a last March were acquitted of tn T charge of nurderi1g Detective AFber y. Fe1ts, are to stand trial again befor h. the same bar of justice, on the secons ss of seven indictments growing out o jjee the Battle of Matewan." May 19
 1920.
 ,e The central figure of the first 'Trig pr ger TriaI' and leader of the radica 's element of union miners, Sid Hatfield
 was killed last month at..Weleh, w.