Written by Entombed Miners
In November, 1909, over three hundred miners were entombed for a period of ten days in a mine at Cherry, near Spring Valley, Illinois. The living were imprisoned with the dead. At the end of ten days, twenty-two miners were rescued; those saved had kept themselves free from fatal gas by building a barricade. Saved from death by suffocation, they were threatened with death by thirst. Two of these men, self-constituted leaders, gave orders for the protection of the community; they conducted religious services and cared for the sick and exhausted, and their directions were strictly carried out.
Two of the miners wrote wills while so imprisoned; they are pathetic documents. The writer of the following will, Joe Pegati, was rescued:
“This is the 4th day that we have been down here. That’s what I think, but our watches stopped. I am writing this in the dark because we have been eating the wax from our safety lamps. I also have eaten a plug of tobacco, some bark and some of my shoe. I could only chew it. I hope you can read this. I am not afraid to die. O Holy Virgin, have mercy on me.
“I think my time has come. You know what my property is. We worked for it together and it is all yours. This is my will, and you must keep it. You have been a good wife. May the Holy Virgin guard you. I hope this reaches you some time, and you can read it. It has been very quiet down here and I wonder what has become of our comrades.
“Good-by until heaven shall bring us together.
“Joe Pegati.”
The writer of the second will, Samuel D. Howard, aged twenty-one, died in the mine; his will in part is in these words:
“Alive at 10.30 o’clock yet. Sam D. Howard and Brother Alfred is with me yet. A good many dead mules and men. I tried to save some, but came almost losing myself. If I am dead give my diamond ring to Mamie Robinson. The ring is coming to the Post Office. Henry can have the ring I have in my good clothes. The only thing I regret is that my brother could not help mother after I am dead and gone.
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