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Hellraisers Journal – Monday December 8, 1913
Colorado Federation of Labor Issues Call for State Convention
From the Denver United Labor Bulletin of December 6, 1913:
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From the Chicago Day Book of December 6, 1913
-Colorado Blizzard Cause Suffering in Strikers Tent Colonies:
News from the Colorado Coalfield Strike
Monday December 1, 1913
Denver, Colorado – State Auditor Roady Kenehan Finally Agrees to Pay Militia.
Today, after much intentional delay, Colorado State Auditor Roady Kenehan was forced to approve payment in scrip for the soldiers of the state militia. When he was informed that the banks had agreed to accept the scrip, Roady began pounding on desk and roared in rage:
The laws of this state say the governor has to come for this stuff, and by golly he’ll have to do it in person as long as Roady Kenehan is auditor.
And, sure enough, Governor Ammons himself was forced to trek over to Roady’s office and pick up the scrip.
Roady Kenehan has been a thorn in the side of Governor Ammons since the first day that troops were sent into the southern strike zone. He makes no secret disliking Ammons and the militia, as well, for their role in the strike zone. Roady is a union man, a member of the International Brotherhood of Blacksmiths, Drop Forgers, and Helpers. He worked at his bellows right up to within 30 minutes of being sworn in as auditor. He was respected as a powerhouse, both in his own union, and also within the Denver Trades and Labor Assembly. It is said, that he “took his hammer and anvil to the statehouse” with him. He was born in Queens County, Ireland, and relishes his reputation as a fighting man.
Every bill sent to Roady by the militia has been scrutinized minutely for evidence of padding especially as regards the bills for feeding mules and horses.
December 4, 1913, Roady Travels to Trinidad
He insisted on visiting Southern Colorado himself to see those horses and mules first hand. He forced the officers to point out brands and other markers on the livestock. All payments were held up until Roady’s personal inspection was completed. He told the officers:
You can only buy your horses once if you don’t want me to burn your backsides for you.
Before his arrival in Trinidad, militiamen angry at having their pay held up by Roady, hanged him in effigy and buried the effigy in a special grave near to their camp. Upon his arrival in Trinidad, Roady bellowed that he want to visit his grave. The militiamen watched as he stood atop his grave, hands stuffed into pockets, and roared:
Sure! and I am the only man is this world who ever stood on his own grave.
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From the Lincoln Daily News of December 2, 1913
Mother Jones will be arrested in Should She Come to Trinidad:
“She is a dangerous actor, because she inflames the minds of the strikers.”
The Journal predicted that Mother would be arrested if she comes to Trinidad. We predict that there is no if about it, but only when:
Will Arrest “Mother” Jones. TRINIDAD, Colo.,. Dec, 2.-“Mother” Jones will be arrested and thrown into jail immediately if she comes to Trinidad.”
This announcement was made today by Brigadier General John Chase, in command of the militia in the southern Colorado coal strike zone, when told that the aged “angel of the coal camps” was about to leave Denver en route here.
“She will not have a chance to make any speeches from her cell, either as she did in West Virginia.” Chase added. “She is a dangerous actor, because she inflames the minds of the strikers.”
[Emphasis added.]
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From the Weekly-Journal Mine of December 3, 1913
Federal Grand Jury Returns Indictments Against U. M. W. A. Officials:
Labor Leaders Under the Ban
Federal Grand Jury Returns Indictments Against
Officers and Organizers of
Mine Workers UnionBy Associated Press
PUEBLO, Dec. 1.-Federal indictments against national officers and organizers of the United Mine Workers of America were returned by a jury investigating the coal strike. Ten indictments were made public and fifteen more will be held until arrests can be made.President John P. White, Vice President Frank J. Hayes and Treasurer William P. Green were indicted on a charge of maintaining a monopoly of labor. Indictments charging conspiracy in restraint of trade and interfering with interstate traffic in coal were made against the others….
“The methods pursued by the Mine Workers of America in endeavors to force recognition of the union are an insult to conservative law abiding labor. They have resorted to measures that all fair-minded labor organizations should repudiate; they have brought in agitators and irresponsible aliens who have become a menace to the peace, prosperity and lives of citizens.”
[Emphasis added.]
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Friday December 5, 1913
Southern Coalfield, Colorado – Blizzard Buries Tent Colonies, Miner Digs Own Grave
A massive blizzard has been blowing across the state of Colorado with sixty-three inches of snow reported in some areas of the state. In the strike zone, we have reports of twenty-six inches and more. Many residents of the tent colonies report that their tents collapsed around them as they slept. The work of digging themselves out from under the snow begins today.
Meanwhile, we have received troubling news from the Pryor tent colony. Andrew Colnar, a Serbian immigrant, is a striking miner who lives with his family in the Pryor tent colony. A few weeks ago, he received a letter from a friend who wanted to stop scabbing on his fellow miners. Colnar wrote back, encouraging his friend to move down to the tent colony, that he would be welcomed there. A few days later Brother Colnar was arrested. He was held overnight, then interrogated about the letter the next day by Captain Drake. Colnar reports:
He raising hell with me, and I thought he going to lick me with the gun. He was pretty cranky and mean.
Drake demanded that Colnar rewrite the letter which Colnar attempted to do:
I could not remember just what I said, but I wrote what I remembered.
At which point Drake began to rage at Colnar and called him names. Brother Colnar was taken back to a soldiers’ washroom, were he was held overnight:
[A soldier] then took me back to the room where I was in the first night. He tied my hands and kept them tied all night and had a soldier with a bayonet watch me.
On November 30th, in the morning, Colnar was led out to the back of the barrack, given a pick and shovel and told to get to work, digging a hole. The area was marked out: two and a half feet wide, six feet long. He was told that he was digging a grave, his own. Soldiers passed by laughing and joking about how they should bury him, with a coffin, or with a blanket. Even a military doctor joined them in their fun.
After awhile a soldier came to speak to him in Polish, and Colnar asked him if he was, indeed, digging his own grave. The soldier answered:
Yes, that is what I came over here to tell you. You are digging your own grave, and you are going to be shot tomorrow morning.
Brother Colnar began to beg for a telephone so that he could call his wife. This request was roughly refused. He begged for pencil and paper to write her a note, also refused. He was taken back to his cell and left there alone, until, finally, he was brought once more before Captain Drake. The Captain lectured him about writing letters, warned him not to write any more, and then released Brother Colnar with a final warning that, if he did not want to be arrested again, he should:
…go home now, with your wife and children, and don’t go out at all.
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SOURCES & IMAGES
Quote John Lawson 1913, after October 17th Death Special Attack
on Forbes Tent Colony, Beshoar p74
https://archive.org/details/outofdepths0000unse/page/74/mode/1up?q=bandanna
United Labor Bulletin
(Denver, Colorado)
-Dec 6, 1913
https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn91052295/1913-12-06/ed-1/seq-1/
The Day Book
(Chicago, Illinois)
-Dec 6, 1913
https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn83045487/1913-12-06/ed-2/seq-32/
Out of the Depths
The Story of John R. Lawson, A Labor Leader
-Barron B. Beshoar
Colorado Labor Historical Committee
of the Denver Area Labor Federation, 1942
https://archive.org/details/outofdepths0000unse
https://archive.org/details/outofdepths0000unse/page/110/mode/1up?q=kenehan
https://archive.org/details/outofdepths0000unse/page/111/mode/1up?q=kenehan
Lincoln Daily News
(Lincoln, Nebraska)
-Dec 2, 1913
https://www.newspapers.com/image/309454316/
Weekly Journal-Miner
(Prescott, Arizona)
-Dec 3, 1913
https://www.newspapers.com/image/42320814/
Blood Passion
The Ludlow Massacre and Class War
in the American West
-by Scott Martelle
Rutgers U Press, 2008
(search: snow) p144&145
(search: colnar pryor tent colony) p142
https://books.google.com/books?id=sH5oOK3MKqUC
See also:
Dec 4, 1913, Trinidad Chronicle News
-Roady Kenehan, Union Man and State Auditor, Goes to Trinidad,
https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn90051521/1913-12-04/ed-1/seq-1/
https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn90051521/1913-12-04/ed-1/seq-3/
Note: The story of Roady Kenehan being forced, finally, to provide payment for the Colorado National Guard is a long and complicated one that reached the state Supreme Court. The Supreme Court made their ruling about November 17th that Kenehan must provide state funding for the militia, but Kenehan was still able to delay payment for awhile after that. Exact dates vary by sources.
Finally the Colorado Supreme Court ordered state auditor Roady Kenehan to sign for the payment of the Colorado militia, mobilized to try to stop the violence spreading over the area. Kenehan said he’d pay and then later in the week said he would not pay until he saw the court order.
Beshoar
https://archive.org/details/outofdepths0000unse/page/111/mode/1up?q=kenehan
Roady Kenehan (May 1, 1856 – January 5, 1927)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roady_Kenehan
https://politicalstrangenames.blogspot.com/2014/03/roady-kenehan-1856-1927.html
Dec 2, 1913, New York Times
-UMW Officials Indicted as Labor Trust Based on Colorado Strike
https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-new-york-times-dec-2-1913-new-york/136601200/
Tag: Colorado Coalfield Strike of 1913-1914
https://weneverforget.org/tag/colorado-coalfield-strike-of-1913-1914/
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