Welsh miners from the Knoxville Iron and Coal Company began mining coal at the foot of this hill in 1867, but during a strike in 1877 they were replaced by convict laborers. After convicts were brought to a mine in Briceville in July 1891, miners and business leaders met to plan a response. Miners captured the stockades, sent convicts and guards on trains to Knoxville, and telegraphed Gov. Buck Buchanan that convicts would no longer be allowed to take jobs from miners. The Coal Creek War then spread to convict mines in Oliver Springs, Tracy City, and Inman, Tennessee.