The Battle of Blair Mountain
Published: April 10, 2026
Duration: 1:14:29
The Battle of Blair Mountain stands as the largest armed insurrection on American soil since the Civil War, yet for nearly a century it was virtually absent from the nation's textbooks and public memory.
In the late summer of nineteen twenty-one, roughly ten thousand coal miners in southern West Virginia, many of them World War One veterans, picked up rifles, tied red bandanas around their necks, and marched through the Appalachian mountains to fight for the right to join a union.
They were met at Blair Mountain by roughly three thousand deputies, mine guards, and armed c...
In the late summer of nineteen twenty-one, roughly ten thousand coal miners in southern West Virginia, many of them World War One veterans, picked up rifles, tied red bandanas around their necks, and marched through the Appalachian mountains to fight for the right to join a union.
They were met at Blair Mountain by roughly three thousand deputies, mine guards, and armed c...