Reports of the Inspectors of Mines of the anthracite and bituminous ...

No. 12.] Fifth Anthracite District. 147
inson called to his assistance, he was not able to rescue the man from
his danger, and the cross-heading- had to be driven through and the gas
drawn off from the top of the breast before the body was reached. The
man entered the gas between four and five o'clock on the afternoon of
Friday, January 23, and his dead body was taken out about half past
one o'clock Saturday afternoon, and taken to his home in Ebervale,
where a wife and two small children waited for his coming home.
(Nos. 2 to 14 inclusive will be treated of in the report of the Jeanes-
ville disaster.)
No. 15. Irvin Heckler, an outside driver, American, age 16, was in-
stantly killed at No. 2 breaker of the Upper Lehigh company on the 12th
of February, by falling under the slate car. Deceased was employed in
hauling the slate cars from under the breaker to the foot of a grade
where a small locomotive pushed the car up the grade to the slate pile
and brought it back to the bottom of grade again. It was not really
necessary for him to unhitch his mule from the car while in motion, but
he was in the act of doing so and must have slipped on a branch rail.
No. 21. John Cannon, miner, Irish, 35 years old, single, was fatally
injured at the Evans' Colliery, by a fall of clod. Cannon and his part-
ner when they went vip their breast, which pitched about 22°, noticed
on this Monday morning March 23, that the clod was drawn away from
a slip in the roof and taking their drills they together tried to bar it
down, and failing to bring it, decided it was safe, and without securing it
with even a temporary prop, they both sat down under it and felt safe.
McDevitt the partner had started a hole before they began to bar the
clod and he went to the rib and began to drill his hole leaving Cannon
sitting on a small chunk of coal under the clod, the partner had just begun
to drill when without the slightest warning the clod fell injuring
Cannon so seriously that he died in about four hours.
No. 24. Patrich Gaffuey, conveyor tender, American, 14 years old, was
killed by being crushed in the conveyors into which he in someway fell,
and as no one saw the accident, and as the body was found where it had
fallen free of the machinery, it was somewhat of a mystery how the fa-
tality occurred and I notified deputy coroner, T. A. Buckley of Freeland,
to hold an inquest which he did, taking the jury to view the scene of the
accident, and after hearing all the evidence in the case the jury returned
the following as their verdict, "That the said Patrick Gaifney came to
his death in Foster township, Luzerne county. State of Pennsylvania,
on the 21st day of April, A, D. 1891, by being caught in a coal conveyor
at No. 2 Highland breaker, operated by G. B. Markle & Co., and that
said death resulted through negligence on the part of the said G. B-
Markle & Co. in not providing a proper railing along the said conveyor,
which is in direct violation of article five, section five, of the mining laws of
the anthracite coal districts of Pennsylvania and which reads as follows:
("All machinery used in or around the mines and collieries, and especi-