Biography
James Pierce was a Tennessee coal miner jailed with his brother Nelson on December 5, 1933 and sentenced to a year in state prison. Their mother, Eliza Pierce of Washburn, and James’s young daughter were left without their support. The Forkridge mine operator evicted the family from its company housing after the arrests. The International Labor Defense assisted the family while the brothers were imprisoned.
His mother Eliza’s letter reports James and Nelson seized and jailed December 5 of the preceding year, their one-year state-prison terms and the eviction that left her caring for James’s eight-year-old daughter. The article supplies no actual final discharge or complete served total; relatives are not treated as prisoners.
