Sixty-six Die in Mine Fire

On July 5th 1944 a methane explosion in the Powhatten #1 mine near Dillie's Bottom Ohio took the lives of sixty-six men. One of them was my grandfather, Hiram Dorsey Hartline. My mother, the youngest of five, was twelve at the time. It was months before the bodies were recovered and when they were, they found, in my grandfather's lunch pail, a letter written to my grandmother. He had used a pencil and the side of a cardboard dynamites case. It read in part -

"I am trusting in God. I know he pulled Jack out. Should I not come home, trust in the Lord, and you and the kids can make it. Should we not meet here, meet me in heaven"


(Jack was my uncle who survived serious wounds on D-day). There is a monument to the sixty-six who died. It's down the Ohio River from the mine at Powhatten Point. My grandfather, who was known as "Hi", loved the mines, his family, and God and is an inspiration to me even though I never met him.

If you want to read more, a report from the United Mine Workers can be found at-

http://archiver.rootsweb.ancestry.com/th/read/OHIO-VALLEY/1998-07/0899775194