Specter of the Black Strikebreaker: Race,Employment, and Labor Activism in the Industrial Era

In the last decade of the 19th century, the outcome of the clash between the miners and the Black Diamond Coal Company in the western mountain community of Mansfield appeared preordained. A labor force that had once numbered about 2500, composed of white men, mostly American, Welsh, Irish, and Canadian, had seen its ranks reduced by unemployment; those still employed endured repeated wage cuts (wages had been reduced by 25% in just over a year), which made it a struggle for “many a miner's family to exist.” In an earlier bout of labor conflict, employers' reliance upon militiamen and Italian strikebreakers led to a decisive defeat for the miners' unions. Now, once again on strike, miners found themselves evicted from their company-owned homes and threatened by “A]ctual starvation.” With strikers reportedly in an “ugly mood,” an outbreak of violence was only a matter of time.