Above--(1) Miners preparing for battle against armed company riflemen and law enforcement. (2) Anti--union strike guards set up a machine gun nest near Blair Mountain in August 1921. This was the biggest battle on US soil since the Civil War and one that is largely forgotten outside of West Virginia.
Before the battle that involved six-seven thousand miners was over,fifty union men and twenty five others were dead, dozens wounded and nearly a thousand men arrested on charges ranging from murder, conspiracy to treason. Most were acquitted by local courts but some were many were jailed until a general pardon was granted in 1925.
The initial victors in this battle were the coal companies, but Blair Mountain evolved into an important turning point in union history in the United States. Led by charismatic and tough union leaders like John L. Lewis, the mine workers eventually won recognition in 1933 with the mining bosses. This was coupled with a rise of greater union power during the first years of the New Deal. The violent "miniwar" help culminate the creation of the National Labor Relations Board in 1935 under the Wagner Act, the most important piece of pro-union legislation to ever pass Congress.