Sanford, May 27—Two score men were trapped 800 feet under ground in the Carolina Coal Mine nine miles from here today when three successive explosions of gas wrecked the shaft, blocking all escape and none among the mine experts who are directing the rescue work hold out the faintest hope that any of them will be removed alive.
Twelve hundred feet from the mouth of the slanting shaft into the mine a handful of relief men work feverishly with a mountain of crumbled slate and timber. Beyond the wall of debris a fire rages, and the thousands who wait silently abut the mouth of the shaft can only wonder what else goes on beneath the quiet earth beneath their feet.
Six of the men are known to be dead and their bodies were brought out at 8 o’clock tonight. Superintendent Howard Butler who rushed into the shaft immediately after the first explosion saw them caught there beneath the tangled mass of slate and timber. A second explosion shook the mine, and the young superintendent was scarcely able to fight his way back before a third and final detonation closed the throat of the shaft and hid the men from his sight.
Tonight rescue workers are attacking 20 tons of rock which block the shaft just beyond the point were the first bodies were recovered. While the bodies removed showed some signs of burns, it appears that they were killed by falling rock.
The six men whose bodies were brought to the surface tonight and sent to a Sanford undertaking establishment were:
White—A.L. Holland, W.E. Byerly, Hollis Richardson and Zeff Rimer.
Colored—Will Irick and one other unidentified.
From the front page of the Concord Daily Tribune, Thursday, May 28, 1925 newspapers.digitalnc.org/lccn/sn92073201/1925-05-28/ed-1/seq-1/#words=MAY+28%2C+1925
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