A Miraculous Escape from the Newcastle Mine
Deputy Coroner Carroll confirmed a Newcastle mine collapse killed F.W. Farrier and injured William Hahn.
Deputy Coroner Frank Carroll returned from Newcastle yesterday and stated that the account of the killing of F. W. Farrier and the injuring of William Hahn in the mine at Newcastle on Wednesday afternoon was correct. One incident was related by Mr. Carroll: it seems that Grant Curtis, a colored man, was working with Hahn at the time the stone commenced crashing, and the cage boy gave the alarm. Hahn stood still close to the wall, but Curtis gave one leap and went flying through the mine like a demon. He stopped at a place that under ordinary circumstances would require ten minutes to reach, but no one has been able to estimate how long it took him to make the trip. Curtis described his journey in brief but expressive language: 'Lord, man, I didn't wait for nothing; I just flew.'
“Lord, man, I didn't wait for nothing; I just flew.”
Mining was one of the most perilous industries in Washington's early economy, and the account of Grant Curtis emphasizes the raw, life-or-death reality faced by the Black laborers working the coal fields near Seattle.
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