Miners Vanished in 1962 — Sheriff’s Shocking Discovery 50 Years Later Reveals a Chilling Cover-Up in West Virginia

It was supposed to be just another sleepy spring morning in Matewan, West Virginia. The year was 1962, and coal was still king. Seventeen men — fathers, husbands, brothers — put on their boots, grabbed their lamps, and descended into the Blackwater Mine for a routine shift. By sundown, none of them came back.

The town was told there had been a catastrophic methane explosion. The official report claimed three tunnels collapsed, sealing the miners inside forever. The company, Cumberland Coal, wasted no time issuing settlements — $5,000 for each grieving family — and the mine was permanently shuttered.

The tragedy became local lore, a cautionary tale of the dangers lurking deep beneath Appalachian soil. People whispered about it, then stopped whispering. Time, as it always does, moved on. Matewan buried its dead, swallowed its grief, and closed its eyes to the darkness still lying under the mountains.

But half a century later, one small-town sheriff cleaning out dusty archives would stumble onto a file that ripped open a wound everyone thought had healed. What Sheriff Danny Morrison uncovered was not just evidence of a forgotten tragedy — but a secret so explosive, it threatened to unravel decades of lies, corporate corruption, and possibly even Cold War espionage.

Because inside the Blackwater Mine, it wasn’t only coal that lay buried.

The File That Shouldn’t Have Existed

Danny Morrison wasn’t looking to stir ghosts when he went down into the basement of the Mingo County courthouse in 2012. He was just doing grunt work — digitizing old paper records, tossing out the junk, and preparing the office for a long-overdue computer system upgrade.

Most of the yellowed papers he sifted through were routine: traffic citations, land disputes, property tax records. But then his eye caught a thick, faded folder wedged between boxes. Its label read: “Blackwater Mine Incident, 1962.”

Everyone in Matewan knew the story of the mine explosion. Seventeen men gone in a single morning. But when Morrison flipped open the file, his heart froze. Among the list of the dead was a name he recognized immediately:

James Patrick Morrison. Age 31. Lead Foreman.

His grandfather.

Danny had grown up believing his grandfather died of a heart attack. His father swore the man had worked construction, never coal. But here, in typewritten ink older than he was, was proof that the official story his family told him was a lie.

And the deeper he read, the stranger it got.

The Cover-Up Begins

The incident report described a methane explosion at 11:47 a.m. on April 23, 1962. Seventeen miners underground. All presumed dead. Rescue operations “impossible” due to tunnel collapses.

But a handwritten note clipped to the back told a different story.

“Investigation incomplete. Recommend further inquiry into company safety protocols and timeline of events. Several discrepancies noted in witness statements. — Deputy R. Collins”

Beneath it, in a different hand, were chilling words:

“Case closed by order of Sheriff Hawkins. No further investigation required.”

Why would a sheriff shut down an investigation into seventeen deaths?

Then came the settlement documents. Less than three weeks after the “explosion,” every family had signed away their claims. That’s practically unheard of in industrial accidents, which usually drag out for years in lawsuits. The haste stank of hush money.

But the real smoking gun was inside a manila envelope stamped:

“Evidence — Property of Cumberland Coal Company.”

Inside were geological surveys noting something far more valuable than coal. Over and over, one phrase appeared in the reports:

“High-grade uranium ore deposits. Estimated value: $2.3 million per ton.”

From Coal Dust to Cold War Gold

In 1962, uranium was not just a commodity — it was the lifeblood of the nuclear arms race. The United States and the Soviet Union were stockpiling weapons, and uranium was worth more than gold.

If Blackwater Mine really sat atop rich uranium veins, it wasn’t just a mine. It was a national security asset.

And suddenly, the so-called “explosion” looked less like an accident and more like a cover-up. Seventeen miners buried alive — not to protect their families, but to protect the ore beneath their feet.

The Seal That Told the Truth

Haunted by the file and his grandfather’s name, Sheriff Morrison drove out to the old Blackwater site.

What he found there made his blood run cold.

The mine entrance wasn’t just sealed. It was entombed. Layers of concrete and steel beams reinforced the shaft far beyond what was typical. Stamped into the concrete at ground level were two dates: April 24 and April 25, 1962.

The very next days after the supposed explosion.

But according to the official file, rescue operations had continued for “several days.” How could there have been rescue attempts if the entrance was already walled off the very next morning?

The evidence suggested something horrific: the miners may have been alive when the company sealed the mine.

The Man in the Trees

As Morrison photographed the strange reinforcements, he noticed movement in the tree line.

A tall, thin man stood watching him. Work clothes, baseball cap, face hidden in shadow. When Morrison waved, the man slipped deeper into the woods without a word.

Minutes later, back in his patrol car, the sheriff’s radio crackled.

“Sheriff Morrison, you there? Got a call from the state mining inspector’s office. Asked if you were investigating old mine sites today. Said his name was Henderson.”

But when dispatch asked for a call-back number, Henderson hung up.

Who was the man in the trees? And how did “Henderson” already know Morrison was at the mine site?

The State Denies Everything

Back at his office, Morrison called the West Virginia Department of Mining Safety. A records clerk, Betty Mason, checked her database.

Her words chilled him.

“There’s no record of a mining incident at Blackwater in 1962. According to our files, Cumberland Coal shut down its Matewan operation on April 22, 1962. One day before your supposed explosion.”

If the state’s official records were to be believed, the mine was already closed before the “accident” ever happened.

No explosion. No deaths. No incident at all.

So what happened to those 17 men?

A Town of Secrets

When Morrison began asking questions around Matewan, he found something even stranger: silence.

Older residents grew cagey when he mentioned Blackwater. Some claimed they barely remembered the incident. Others swore they’d attended funerals, though no one could produce death certificates.

And then there was the money. Several families who lost loved ones in the supposed explosion had suddenly moved away in the 1960s, buying new homes and businesses in other counties. Their settlements were officially $5,000, but their lifestyles hinted at much more.

It was as if Cumberland Coal had paid them not for their grief — but for their silence.

The Nuclear Connection

By cross-referencing Cold War uranium procurement records, Morrison uncovered that in 1963, the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission dramatically increased uranium reserves sourced from “undisclosed Appalachian sites.”

The timing was uncanny. Blackwater closed in 1962. By 1963, uranium output spiked in West Virginia.

Had the government quietly seized the mine’s deposits after staging a “disaster” to erase it from the public record?

The Ghost of James Morrison

For Sheriff Danny Morrison, the case was no longer just about history — it was personal.

If his grandfather’s name was on that list, was the man buried alive with his crew to protect a uranium secret? Or was the entire death list fabricated to erase 17 men who had perhaps stumbled onto something they shouldn’t have?

The biggest question still looms unanswered:

Did those miners die underground — or were they taken somewhere else?

Fifty Years of Silence

The deeper Morrison dug, the more resistance he encountered. Anonymous calls warning him to “leave Blackwater alone.” Locked doors at county offices where records had conveniently vanished. A break-in at his home office where the only thing stolen was the Blackwater file.

Powerful people, it seemed, still wanted the mine’s secret buried.

The Deadliest Secret Is the One Closest to Home

Today, the Blackwater Mine remains sealed, its entrance covered in steel and silence. Officially, nothing ever happened there. No explosion. No deaths. No uranium.

Unofficially, it may hold the most chilling Cold War cover-up in Appalachian history.

Seventeen names on a list. A sheriff’s handwritten note demanding further investigation. Geological surveys pointing to uranium worth billions. And a company and government that erased it all in the space of a single month.

For Sheriff Morrison, one truth is undeniable:

When stories settle too quickly, when families stop asking questions, and when graves don’t match the bodies beneath them, something unspeakable has happened.

And sometimes, the deadliest secrets are not buried in history books. They’re buried right under your feet.