In 1930-31, workers mining a 3.8 mile tunnel through Gauley Mountain to divert water from the New River to a hydroelectric plant near Gauley Bridge were exposed to silica dust as the tunnel cut through almost pure silica in some areas, and an estimated 764 died quickly from acute silicosis, a fatal lung disease, in what is considered America's worst industrial accident. The tunnel workers were primarily migrant workers, mostly black, paid a few dollars a day, and when they became sick many were driven out of the camps to die elsewhere. African Americans who died in the camps could not be buried in local white cemeteries; a few were sent by rail back to their families, while more were taken at night to Summersville and buried unceremoniously on a farm. When those graves later had to be moved to widen US Route 19, the remains were disinterred in 1972, transported several miles to the present site, placed in child size coffins because they were decomposed, and reburied, resulting in about 48 small grave depressions at the grave site.