The U.S. Government Bombed West Virginia and Erased It From History In 1921, President Warren G. Harding ordered the U.S. Army to drop bombs on 10,000 coal miners marching in West Virginia's Battle of Blair Mountain, the only time in U.S. history the government bombed its own citizens on domestic soil for labor organizing. Miners fought for union rights, fair wages, and safe conditions against coal companies who hired a 3,000-man private army with machine guns. When miners kept advancing, the Pr