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Wednesday February 16, 1916
Butte, Montana - Hope Faded for Twelve Missing Men in Pennsylvania Mine Fire

Hope is faded, and, by some accounts, lost for the miners who remain missing in the Pennsylvania Mine. This latest disaster follows, by only four months, the disaster in the Granite Mountain shaft of the Speculator Mine. On October 16th of last year, a mine car filled with 500 pounds of dynamite ignited in a massive explosion which instantly blew seventeen miners into eternity.

From The Omaha Daily Bee:

TWENTY-ONE CAUGHT IN BURNING MINE
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Nine Bodies Recovered from Blazing Copper Workings
at Butte by Rescue Crew.
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TWELVE MORE MEN MISSING
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BUTTE, Mont., Feb. 15.-Twenty-one men probably have perished, according to the rescue workers at the Pennsylvania mine of the Anaconda Copper Mining company, in which fire broke out in one of the levels while 220 miners were at work last night. Nine bodies had been raised from the mine before noon and twelve were unaccounted for.

A new ventilating system was installed in the mine today which changer the air currents and made exploration of all levels in the affected area possible. The mine is 1,900 feet deep.

There was still hope that some of the twelve missing might have escaped into the workings of other properties.

Within a few minutes after the fire was discovered in the timbering at the 1,200-foot level near the shaft, gas fumes and smoke poured into the higher workings of the mine. Station tenders were ordered to warn the hundreds of miners, some of whom were as much as a quarter of a mile from the shaft.

Signals to the engineer from the cage came from half a dozen levels at once. Insistent calls came from the 500-foot level. One cage full of men was taken from there, but when it was again lowered to this level there were no men at the landing. William G. Mitchell, assistant foreman of the mine, and Jack Brennan, a miner, who volunteered, were quickly lowered to the 500-foot level. A few minutes later their dead bodies were found by first air rescue crews. Both were overcome within a few yards of the shaft. First aid teams with complete equipment of respirators and oxygen helmets had great difficulty in penetrating the drifts.

Most of the dead and missing men were at work on the 500 or adjoining levels.

Officers of the Anaconda company gave out a statement saying they had no means yet of determining the cause of the fire.

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Copper Miners of Butte, Montana

From Missouri's Moberly Daily Index:

MANY ARE DEAD IN A BIG MINE FIRE
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NINE BODIES HAVE BEEN RESCUED SO FAR.
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SOME HELPERS ARE OVERCOME
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At Butte the Pennsylvania Caught Fire in the
Air Shaft While Men Were At Work.
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BUTTE. Mont., Feb. 15.-Twenty-one dead and a great number missing sums up the extent of the big fire at the Pennsylvania mine last night. This mine is the property of the Anaconda Copper Mining Company.

Nine bodies have been recovered and for the missing there is no hope entertained. All miners who were in the mine at the time the fire started at 9 o'clock last night were victims. All who were not caught by the flames were suffocated in their attempts to escape.

Many rescuers have been overcome in their efforts to release those who are imprisoned in the depths of the mine. The fire has been raging so that nearly all attempts have been given up in the underground work.

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[Emphasis added.]

SOURCES

The Gibraltar:
Socialism and Labor in Butte, Montana, 1895-1920
-by Jerry W. Calvert
Montana Historical Society Press, 1988
https://books.google.com/books?id=fMUEAQAAIAAJ

The Omaha Daily Bee
(Omaha, Nebraska)
-Feb 16, 1916
https://www.newspapers.com/image/145413372/

Moberly Daily Index
(Moberly, Randolph County, Missouri)
-Feb 16, 1916
https://www.newspapers.com/image/4729404/

IMAGES
Butte Copper Mine, drawing, ISR, Aug 1914
https://books.google.com/books/reader?id=7Ko9AAAAYAAJ&printsec=frontcove...
Butte Mine Workers, about 1914-1920, Speculator Mine
http://www.miningartifacts.org/MontanaMines.html

See also:

Monthly Review of the U. S. Bureau of Labor Statistics,
Vol. IV, June 1917, Number 6
https://books.google.com/books/reader?id=hqV1vAzFiwsC&printsec=frontcove...
Official Publications Relating to Labor.
United States.
https://books.google.com/books/reader?id=hqV1vAzFiwsC&printsec=frontcove...
Montana Report
https://books.google.com/books/reader?id=hqV1vAzFiwsC&printsec=frontcove...

Montana.—
Second biennial report of the Department of Labor and Industry, 1915-1916.
Helena. 76 pp.
A considerable portion of this report is devoted to statistics of manufactures in the State, covering capital invested, yearly output, number of skilled and unskilled employees, hours of labor, and average daily wages. Statistics showing the operations of free employment offices of the State are also given. In 176 metalliferous mines inspected in 1915, employing 15,000 men, there were 39 fatal and 25 nonfatal accidents; in 180 mines employing 16,500 men in 1916 there were 62 fatal and 28 nonfatal accidents. Fatal accidents per 1,000 men employed thus showed an increase from 2.60 to 3.75 in the two years.

Sadly, in 1917, metalliferous mining fatalities in the state of Montana were greatly increased due to the Granite Mountain-Speculator Mine Fire which claimed the lives of 168 miners.

From Headframe Spirits Blog
http://www.headframespirits.com/granite-mountain-mine-fire/

Calvert's Description from The Gibraltar:

Late in the evening of June 8, [1917] fire broke out in the Granite Mountain shaft of the Speculator Mine. The fire, touched off by a shift boss when his carbide lamp ignited some oil-soaked electrical cable, spread quickly, enveloping the mine with gas and smoke. Of the 415 men on the night shift, 164 [*] were trapped in the spreading inferno and lost their lives. Most died from gas and smoke inhalation. Rescue teams found many of the victims piled up in front of cement bulkheads that blocked escape to other tunnels. State law required that there be doors on the bulkheads to permit escape, but the law had been ignored.

[*Most sources give the number who died as 168.]
[Emphases added.]

Note from Manus Duggan, the miners' hero, to his wife
who was about to give birth to their daughter:
http://mtstandard.com/news/local/butte-in-no-manus-duggan-a-local-hero/a...

We have rapped on the air pipe continuously since 4 o’clock Saturday morning. No answer. Must be some fire. I realize the hard work ahead of the rescue men. Have not confided my fears in anyone, but have looked and looked for hope only, but if the worst comes I myself have no fears but welcome death with open arms, as it is the last act we must all pass through, and as it is, but natural, it is God’s will. We should have no objection.

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The Dream of the Miner's Child - Doc Watson
Lyrics: copyrighted to Andrew Jenkins
http://www.docwatson.de/dream.html

"Oh, I dreamed that the mines were all flaming with fire,
And the men all fought for their lives.
Just then the scene changed, and the mouth of the mines
Was covered with sweethearts and wives."

"Oh, daddy, don't go to the mines today,
For dreams have so often come true.
My daddy, my daddy, please don't go away,
For I never could live without you."