Some of the West Virginia coal miners had enough time to write notes to their families saying they weren't suffering, that they were just going to sleep, says one relative.

An excerpt from the CTV.ca story:

It was a painless death for the men trapped in a West Virginia coal mine Monday, according to notes later found with their bodies.

It is not yet known how many of the 12 miners who died left notes, but a relative of one of the men told The Associated Press on Thursday that she found out about them from the medical examiner who inspected their bodies.

"The notes said they weren't suffering, they were just going to sleep," said Peggy Cohen, who had been called to a makeshift morgue at a school to identify the body of her father, 59-year-old mining machine operator Fred Ware Jr.

She said she didn't know if her father had left a message for her, but she was planning to check his lunchbox when she collected his belongings.

"It comforts me to know he didn't suffer and he wasn't bruised or crushed," said Cohen, describing her father's face as "peaceful" and a bruise on his chest as his only apparent injury.

"I didn't need a note. I think I needed to visualize and see him."

Cohen said she was told that several of the men, whose bodies were found after 41 hours inside the mine, had left notes carrying similar messages.

Update:

This NYT story has a photo of one of the notes. It also talks about possible causes of the blast.