The Illinois coal wars, also known as the Illinois mine wars and several other names, were a series of labor disputes between 1898 and 1900 in central and southern Illinois.
The disputes were marked by the Chicago–Virden Coal Company bringing in strikebreakers by train to bypass local coal miners, racial violence between black and white coal miners, most notably during the Battle of Virden on October 12, 1898, and the Pana massacre on April 10, 1899.[1][2][3][4]
In 1898, a coal miners' strike began in Virden after the Chicago-Virden Coal Company refused to pay their miners union-scale wages. The strike ended with six security guards and seven miners killed, and over 30 others were injured. The company finally granted the wage increase a month after the strike. The strike in Virden is also credited with the winning of the 8-hour work day for hourly mine workers, and a memorial in the town square commemorates the battle.[5]
The same conditions and organizations were also involved in similar conflicts in two southern Illinois towns: in Lauder (now Cambria, Illinois) on June 30, 1899, and in Carterville, Illinois on September 17. At Lauder a group of African-American miners traveling by train from Pana were attacked. One woman, Anna Karr, was killed and about twenty others wounded. At Carterville, five more non-union African-American miners were killed in rioting.[6] Local juries acquitted all defendants accused in those attacks.[7]
After the massacre, the mine operators temporarily shut down all of Pana's mines in late June to demonstrate good faith in arbitration, and also because of their fear of violence. Because of the low wages paid by the operators, the black community was left impoverished. Many of them spent their money to get to Weir, Kansas, where many of them were recruited to break up another mining strike.
^"minewar.org". Retrieved 2022-02-04.
^"Virden, Illinois and the Coal Mine Wars – Legends of America". www.legendsofamerica.com. Retrieved 2022-02-04.
^"Missoula Area Central Labor Council". 23 August 2016.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
^"Virden- IHT 13:2 2006".
^"Virden, Illinois and the Coal Mine Wars – Legends of America".
^Encyclopedia of American race riots, by Walter C. Rucker, James N. Upton, page 673
^Angle, Paul M. (1952). Bloody Williamson: A Chapter in American Lawlessness. University of Illinois Press. ISBN 978-0252062339.
and 26 Related for: Illinois coal wars information
The Illinoiscoalwars, also known as the Illinois mine wars and several other names, were a series of labor disputes between 1898 and 1900 in central...
Labor WarsIllinoiscoalwars (1898–1900) Railroad Wars Range war Sheep Wars Molly Maguires List of worker deaths in United States labor disputes "Coal Mine...
Virginia coalwars (1912–1921), also known as the mine wars, arose out of a dispute between coal companies and miners. The West Virginia mine wars era began...
strike of 1894 West Virginia coalwarsIllinoiscoalwars Colorado Labor Wars Molly Maguires Battle of Blair Mountain Coal strike of 1902 List of incidents...
uprising since the American Civil War. The conflict occurred in Logan County, West Virginia, as part of the CoalWars, a series of early-20th-century labor...
The Coal Creek War was an early 1890s armed labor uprising in the southeastern United States that took place primarily in Anderson County, Tennessee. This...
boundaries of the modern U.S. State of Illinois since European contact. "INDIAN VILLAGES OF THE ILLINOIS COUNTRY" (PDF). Illinois State Museum. Retrieved 2018-07-06...
The Lincoln County War was an Old West conflict between rival factions which began in 1878 in Lincoln County, New Mexico Territory, the predecessor of...
The Coal strike of 1902 (also known as the anthracite coal strike) was a strike by the United Mine Workers of America in the anthracite coalfields of eastern...
turn-of-the-century Illinoiscoalwars in the United States. The national United Mine Workers of America coal strike of 1897 was officially settled for Illinois District...
This is a list of homicides in Illinois. This list includes notable homicides committed in the U.S. state of Illinois that have a Wikipedia article on...
plant in Pennsylvania remained unionized. The AA presence in Ohio and Illinois continued for a few more years, but the union continued to collapse. Many...
development of the Illinoiscoal industry, and was a founder and owner of the Western Coal & Mining Company of Illinois. About 68% of Illinois has coal-bearing strata...
Johnson County War (1889–1893) Spring Creek raid (1909) Others Railroad Wars (1864–1912) Fence Cutting Wars Sheep wars (1870–1920) Bituminous coal miners' strike...
United States portal Colorado portal Organized Labor portal CoalWars Colorado Labor Wars Columbine Mine Massacre of 1927 Labor history of the United...
Laboring Women in Lawrence, Massachusetts, 1860–1912 (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1993). Cole, Donald B. Immigrant City: Lawrence, Massachusetts 1845–1921...
explosion at Frick's coal mine in Mount Pleasant Murder of workers in labor disputes in the United States Vivian, Cassandra (June 2017). Coal Mine and Coke Oven...
it as civil war, while the ARU proclaimed it was a crusade for the rights of unskilled workers. President Cleveland did not think Illinois Governor John...
Johnson County War (1889–1893) Spring Creek raid (1909) Others Railroad Wars (1864–1912) Fence Cutting Wars Sheep wars (1870–1920) Bituminous coal miners' strike...
fiction novel 1632, the starting point of his Ring of Fire series. CoalWarsCoal mining in Appalachia Union violence Labor spying in the United States...
Illinois that occurred on October 12, 1898. After a United Mine Workers of America local struck a mine in Virden, Illinois, the Chicago-Virden Coal Company...
Normalcy in Labor Dispute Interventions: The Case of the West Virginia Coal Mine Wars, 1920–1921". West Virginia History. 50. West Virginia Archives and History:...
or Pana massacre, was a coal mining labor conflict and also a racial conflict that occurred on April 10, 1899, in Pana, Illinois, and resulted in the deaths...
English. Disproportionate numbers of new Slavic immigrants worked in the coal mining industry; they were among the most exploited of all mine workers....
Global Information