The Dixon-Pocahontas Fuel Company while engaged in sinking a shaft about 3 miles east of Welch, in McDowell County, encountered gas before the coal bed was reached.

On July 19, 1906. while the workmen were descending in the bucket the open lamp carried ignited the gas, the flame of which came to the top of the shaft.

The hoisting engineer, seeing the flame, immediately raised the bucket to the surface and found one man in it, four others having fallen to the bottom of the shaft and being instantly killed.

To prevent a repetition of such a disaster the shaft was equipped with a small ventilating fan.

Deceased:

• Wallace H. Mitchell
• William Crew
• John Galamore
• Palmer Harris

Source:
	1907 Annual Report of the West Virginia Department of Mines