BUENA VISTA MINE BATTLE (1874)

One of the earliest mining struggles in southwest Pennsylvania occurred at the Buena Vista mine where the owner, Charles Armstrong, refused to bargain with his workers over how the coal they produced was weighed and paid. The National Miner’s Association led by John Siney had achieved the first union contract in the anthracite coalfields of eastern Pennsylvania and was actively organizing mines in the Youghiogheny Valley. Armstrong hired 173 Italian laborers from New York to break the strike. The labor contractor boasted: “they are adept in the use of all kinds of arms, and are particularly skillful with their peculiar-knives .. .like a pruning hook.”

After several weeks of mounting tension and violent incidents, the situation devolved into warfare. Joining the strikers were many armed men from the surrounding countryside and the Italians were surrounded. An Italian woman advancing with a white flag averted a massacre. Men surrendered their weapons and were escorted out of town. They later sued Armstrong for unpaid wages. As many as ten people were killed, but no charges were filed. Using ethnic and racial divisions to break strikes became commonplace as Slavs were used against Irish, African-Americans against Slavs.

Buena Vista Mine Battle (1874) site, Youghiogheny River at Shaner, Stringtown side, Buena Vista,