Storming Heaven

Carrie Bishop grows up at the Homeplace in Kentucky with her older brother Miles, her older sister Flora, her father, Orlando Bishop, and her Aunt Becka, as well as her Aunt Jane, who lives nearby. Carrie loves to read and does well in school, but she is also tough, doing the hunting for her brother Miles and helping out around the farm. Although Carrie is a romantic who dreams of meeting her Heathcliff, the love interest in Wuthering Heights, her father tells her he doesn’t expect her to find a husband because she “was not ‘deferrin’’ enough, [her] tongue was too sharp and [she] was too forward in [her] ways” (61). Eventually, Carrie leaves the Homeplace to become a nurse and works briefly for her brother Miles at a coal company. During the strike, Carrie strongly supports the union, having seen firsthand the poor conditions under which the miners are forced to work.

Carrie eventually marries Albion Freeman, and after Albion dies, moves to Charleston with Rondal. By the end of the novel, Carrie returns to the Homeplace and gives birth to Rondal’s baby. 

C. J. Marcum lives with his grandparents on their farm until the coal companies take over the land. Afterward, C. J. moves onto Ermel Justice’s land, where he works at Ermel’s drugstore. C. J. befriends Doc Booker who convinces him to become a socialist. C. J. is particularly involved with local politics, and he and Doc Booker eventually start a newspaper together, the Annadel Free Press. Eventually, C. J. is elected mayor of Annadel, the small town where Ermel owns several businesses. C. J. cares deeply for Rondal, the son of a close family friend, and gets Rondal involved in the union. After the strike begins, C. J. is shot by a coal company guard after attempting to arrest the guards.

Rosa is an immigrant from Sicily. Her father forces her to marry Mario, a violent drunk, and move from Italy to West Virginia, where Mario works for the coal company. Rosa and Mario have four sons, all of whom die in an explosion at the mines. Rosa works as a maid for Lytton Davidson, who operates the Davidson coal mines. She is a Catholic and prays often. After the death of her sons, Rosa lives out the remainder of her life in the hospital, unable to grasp that her sons are truly gone.

Doc Booker is a black doctor who treats patients at the coal mines. He is a socialist who eventually convinces his good friend C. J. to become a socialist as well. Eventually, Carrie comes to work for him as a nurse. As a black man in West Virginia in the late 1800s and early 1900s, Doc Booker faces discrimination from many people who don’t want to be treated by a black doctor. But as Doc Booker points out, when someone “need a doctor for her youngun, she dont care if it’s a Negro. She got a sick baby, that’s all” (58).

Albion Freeman first meets Carrie Bishop as a boy when he becomes sick and his father, a traveling salesman, has to leave him behind at the Homeplace for the summer. Even though many girls, including Carrie, think he’s unattractive, he and Carrie eventually become close and he tells her he wants to marry her one day. Carrie and Albion reconnect as adults when Albion passes back through Kentucky. As an adult, Albion is a “No Heller” pastor, which means he doesn’t believe that some people are automatically destined for hell, as many Baptists believe. Albion also dances and drinks wine, activities that some Baptists don’t approve of. Albion and Carrie eventually marry and move to a coal mining town, where they both become heavily involved in the union. Albion dies when Baldwin-Felts guards shoot him, and Carrie buries him back at Homeplace.

Miles is Carrie’s older brother. At 17, Miles’ schoolteacher convinces his father, Orlando, to let Miles attend school in Berea. One of Miles’s professors is a coal mine operator, and Miles eventually becomes superintendent of a coal mine. Carrie and Miles often disagree throughout the novel. While Miles agrees that the conditions at the coal mines aren’t ideal, he doesn’t agree with the union’s decision to strike, and tells Carrie:“Somebody’s got to make the decisions […]A business can’t make money if there’s no chain of command, and those men won’t have jobs if this mine goes under. Educated men have to say what’s what” (213).

Ermel Justice is a wealthy man who owns a farm and several businesses in West Virginia. Because he owns so much land, the coal companies were unable to force him off his land when they bought up most of the other farmland in the area. Ermel owns the bars and gambling halls in Annadel, and as a result, is friends with many of the local judges and politicians.

Isom Justice is Ermel Justice’s son and Rondal’s best friend. He spends his time at the local gambling halls and brothels until eventually marrying C. J.’s daughter, Gladys. Isom is later shot by Baldwin-Felts guards.