Amonate, VA

Editor's note: Terry Marchal is a 20-year-old student at West Virginia State College who has been working part-time at The Gazette. On the morning of Dec. 28, he was sent out on his first "big" story, the mine explosion at Amonate, Va. It was his first up-close look at death. Here he describes what he saw and how it affected him.

AMONATE loomed out of a gray mist at dawn.

Its endless rows of houses stood at attention—evenly spaced one-story frame dwellings, each unrailed porch with a naked light bulb glowing brightly.

The small Virginia mining community appeared unaware of the disaster that had occurred just a few hours before.

Associated Press writer Herb Little stopped the car near a roadside slate field, where a young watchman sat by a small campfire carving on a twig.

Herb asked the youth where we could find the Pocahontas Co. mine and the watchman replied, pointing with his knife, "You done missed it. It's back up a ways past the company store. Don't see how you missed it. There's a lot of cars and people there at the entrance."

Herb asked if anyone had been brought out since the first 14 were rescued.

"No one else brought out yet," the watchman replied, "but I heard they found three bodies and are looking for eight more."

WE DROVE BACK into the mining town past the company store which, unnoticed to us before, now appeared on a hillside to our left, its massive five stories towering high above Amonate.

A Virginia State Policeman stopped us as we arrived at a midtown intersection clotted with parked cars and solemn people.

We identified ourselves and he permitted us to pass through. As the car slowly started away, Herb asked the trooper if the photographer from Charleston had arrived.

"Wouldn't know one from the other. Been about a hundred pass through here," he shouted to us as we turned into the unpaved road leading to the mine.

We traveled approximately a mile and passed under a large overhead sign which read:

"Pocahontas Fuel Mining Co. Will you work safely today?"

HERB PARKED the car and we walked over a small rise and arrived at the mine entrance.

Photographers and reporters stood silently and patiently at the entrance.

Three or four miners who had been laboring as rescue workers since their regular shift ended, sat exhausted near the entrance, their faces and clothes stained black with coal dust, their helmet-lights still burning.

The silence was suddenly broken by a tremendous metallic crash inside the mine, followed by the steady rumbling of a coal train.

Someone said, "They're bringing them out."

Everyone crowded to the entrance. Photographers readied their cameras.

FOUR HELMET-LIGHTS appeared in the darkness of the shaft as the rumbling of the train grew louder.

The crowd moved away from the entrance as the three-car electric loading train emerged from the tunnel and continued slowly across the mine field followed by the crowd.

One of the miners walking beside the train shook his head, the lamp on his helmet moving noticeably in the grayness of the morning.

Popping of flashbulbs and the rumbling of the train were the only audible sounds as the procession moved from the mine entrance to a large mine shop building.

The train passed through a large overhead door and came to a halt inside a storage room. Flashbulbs continued to pop and no one spoke.

ONE BY ONE, the burlap-covered bodies of the 11 dead miners were carried from the train and into a small room adjoining the storage section.

An identification tag was attached to each of the shrouded bodies. Rubber, high-topped shoes protruded from each of the burlap wrappings.

The last body was carried into the adjoining room, the door closed behind.

A few solemn-faced relatives—all men—were ushered into the small room to identify the bodies. The door again closed.

THE CROWD in the storage room eyed the door and spoke in whispers.

"They made the women and children wait at the intersection in town," Gazette Photographer Chuck Taylor said. Chuck had left Charleston approximately an hour before we did.

"I talked to one of the miners who was rescued. He said he would never work in a mine again," Chuck said softly, then added, "I don't blame him."

A man came from the adjoining room and passed out identification lists of the dead and their survivors.

Chuck glanced over a list. "Look at that. Those miners left about 50 children.

"I heard that a lot of them were laid off and this would have been their last day. I guess it was."

A LARGE MINER, his helmet-lamp still burning brightly inside the well-lighted building, came from the room where the bodies had been taken and exited into an office where Red Cross workers were giving out coffee and sandwiches.

"Knew that young fellow for 23 years and I couldn't identify him," the miner said wiping the back of his arm across his mouth, leaving a smear of coal across his face.

"He was burned bad. Them explosions are the next thing to an atomic bomb blast. Probably didn't even know what hit him."

ANOTHER MINER, answering a question, said, "Naw, I wasn't afraid the mine would cave in while I was in there with the rescue party. If I'd-a thought that, I wouldn't of gone back in.

"Friend of mine was in there anyway. I thought maybe we could get him out alive, but . . ." His voice trailed off into the cup of coffee he was drinking.

Once again the bodies were carried by and out of the building to hearses that were waiting at the door.

As one body was being placed in a hearse, a state trooper handed a water-drenched envelope to an elderly man who stood by, his face stained with tears.

The man tore the envelope open and carefully removed two wet $10 bills and a pink slip, carefully separated them and placing them in a pocket and said to the policeman, "It was his last day."

Chuck Taylor drove the press car down the unpaved road that led to Amonate.

We passed under the large overhead sign at the entrance to the mine field. It read:

"Have you worked safely today?"