On this day in 1891, armed Tennessee Coal Miners freed hundreds of prisoners who were being used as strikebreaking convict labor. The raid took place in the context of the "Coal Creek War", a militant labor uprising in the early 1890s.

The Coal Creek War took place primarily, but not exclusively, in Anderson County, Tennessee. This labor conflict ignited in 1891 when coal mine owners in the Coal Creek watershed began to remove and replace their company-employed, private coal miners then on the payroll with convict laborers leased out by the Tennessee state prison system, used in this case as strikebreakers.

Coal workers at the Tennessee Coal Mining Company (TCMC) went on strike on April 1st, 1891, demanding to be paid in cash, not scrip (currency only usable at company stores) and to be allowed to check the weight of their haul (they were paid by weight, but not allowed to check the company's measurement).

Workers initiated a series of raids against the TCMC - on July 14th, armed miners surrounded the stockades where leased convicts were held and sent them by train out of the city. On October 31st, 1891, the miners burned company stockades to the ground and freed hundreds of convicts being held there. On Nov. 2nd, another band attacked stockades in a different location and freed those prisoners as well. From those two events alone, at least 453 convicts were set free.

The strike was forcibly put down by state militia, ending with the arrest of hundreds of miners. All but one were either acquitted or merely fined. Tennessee ended its policy of leasing convict labor, using convicts to work in state-owned mines instead.

Megathreads and spaces to hang out:

reminders:

  • 💚 You nerds can join specific comms to see posts about all sorts of topics
  • 💙 Hexbear’s algorithm prioritizes comments over upbears
  • 💜 Sorting by new you nerd
  • 🌈 If you ever want to make your own megathread, you can reserve a spot here nerd
  • 🐶 Join the unofficial Hexbear-adjacent Mastodon instance toots.matapacos.dog

Links To Resources (Aid and Theory):

Aid:

Theory:

  • asa_red_heathen [he/him]
    ·
    edit-2
    1 年前

    Look at this

    Show

    Show

    If you were to look at these two pictures, youd think they were a before and after shot of a restoration project right?

    Well youd be wrong. This is the Błędów Desert in Poland, a desert artifically created by forest clearing in the middle ages, which then naturally went away as the plant life returned (shown in pic 2). THEN the poles deliberately destroyed all the plant life in an effort to conserve the artifically created desert (thats pic 1).

    https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/B%C5%82%C4%99d%C3%B3w_Desert

    • 2Password2Remember [he/him]
      ·
      1 年前

      one time I was traveling in Portugal and I met some Polish guys in a park and no joke, within 10 minutes of meeting me, one of them goes, "we are polish, we hate Muslims!" and I've hated Poland and polish people ever since. so this doesn't really surprise me at all, fuck Poland

      Death to America