YEAR: 1921

The Battle of Blair Mountain

Defined by low pay, deadly working conditions, and poor housing, the coal mines of West Virginia powder keg of labor struggle waiting to blow. These brutal conditions were enforced by the private armies of the coal companies and corrupt state and local governments, who even went as far as to assassinate the relatively pro-union police chief of Matewan, WV. The cascading crises led Black, white, and immigrant workers, organized under the United Mine Workers, to launch an armed strike that escalated into open warfare at Blair Mountain. Miners battles the forces of the sheriff, private militias, and hired strike breakers in the largest battle in the U.S. since the civil war. It was only after President Harding deployed federal troops (and authorized the aerial bombing of miners’ positions) that the union was defeated, and hundreds of workers indicted for treason. Blair Mountain demonstrates that the ruling class will always see multiracial, working class solidarity as “treason,” and the brutal exploitation of workers by private armies as business as usual.