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Hellraisers Journal – Friday August 26, 1921
Marmet, West Virginia – Telegram Read by Mother Jones Declared “Bogus”
From The Wheeling Intelligencer of August 25, 1921:
Charleston, W. Va., Aug 24.-Reports received at the offices of Governor E. F. Morgan that the men, estimated by county officials to number more than 5,000, most of them armed, assembled at Marmet from the coal fields of eastern Kanawha county, had taken a vote today to break camp and return to their homes, were denied tonight by C. Frank Keeney and Fred Mooney, president and secretary-treasurer respectively of District 17, United Mine Workers of America.
It was the first statement that has come from the offices of the miners’ union here, since the men began to assemble last Saturday. It was in answer to a statement coming from the governor’s office to the effect that Keeney and Mooney had a “tilt” with “Mother” Jones over the purported speech to the men this morning advising them to return to their homes during the course of which she was said to have read a telegram from President Harding urging the men to break up their camp.
Both Keeney and Mooney declared the telegram purporting to have come from the president was “bogus.” They said they called George B. Christian, secretary to President Harding by long distance telephone this afternoon who told them, they say, that “no such telegram was sent by the chief executive.”
Alleged Harding Message.
[Keeney and Mooney said:]
“Mother” Jones went to the camp of the miners on Lens Creek, Tuesday night and told the men she would bring them a message from President Harding on Wednesday.
This morning the men sent a committee of two to Charleston to request us to go to Marmet and verify the telegram. We returned with the committee, arriving in time to hear “Mother” Jones address some 500 miners assembled at the lower end of the camp, advising them to go home. She read a telegram which she said was signed by President Harding, in which the president asked the miners to stand by the constitution and return to their homes and work and promising them he would use his power to drive the Baldwin-Felts guards from the state, never to return.
After she had finished reading the telegram, we asked “Mother” Jones to show it to us. She refused to comply and some strong words were exchanged.
Keeney and Mooney said they then returned to Charleston and called President Harding’s secretary, who, they say, denied that any telegram had been sent.
“Mother” Jones Leaves.
“Mother” Jones could not be located here tonight. At the hotel at which she stopped while in the city, it was said she checked out today and left on Chesapeake & Ohio train No. 2 for the east.
Keeney and Mooney said they investigated the reports that the men assembled at Marmet had taken a vote to return home and “found them unfounded and untrue.”
Small groups of armed men straggled into the camp today, according to information received by Sheriff Henry A. Walker, and he estimated the number now assembled to be approximately 6,000. Reports earlier in the day that the men would be joined by others from the coal fields of Indiana and Illinois could not be verified. Trains coming in from outside the state have not carried more than the usual number of passengers today, railroad men said tonight.
Two large automobile trucks belonging to C. H. James & Son of this city were chartered by five men from Marmet today, and provisions were solicited from Charleston stores and restaurants. Purchases were also made for the men in camp in Charleston stores, 15,000 loaves of bread having been bought from a grocery company. The trucks were manned by five residents of Marmet led by C. Silvas and [?] Medley both miners.
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[Emphasis added.]
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SOURCES & IMAGES
Quote Fred Mooney, Mingo Co Gunthugs, UMWJ p15, Dec 1, 1920
https://play.google.com/books/reader?id=2hg5AQAAMAAJ&printsec=frontcover&pg=GBS.RA23-PA14
The Wheeling Intelligencer
(Wheeling, West Virginia
-Aug 25, 1921
https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn86092536/1921-08-25/ed-1/seq-1/
See also:
Struggle in the Coal Fields
The Autobiography of Fred Mooney
-ed by J. W. Hess
West Virginia University Library, 1967
(pages 90-91)
https://books.google.com/books?id=nE3tAAAAMAAJ
Note: Mooney describes the fake telegram incident much the same as above. He describes the “strong words” exchanged:
[The assembled miners] demanded of us that we verify that telegram so Keeney asked Mother if he could see the copy she read. “Go to hell,” she said, “none of your damned business.” Not knowing that Keeney had been rebuffed in the aforementioned manner and having become separated from him in the crowd, I asked Mother if I could see the telegram.
“No you cannot, none of your business.”
Aug 25, 1921, New York Times-Mother Jones at Marmet, Harding Telegram Called “Bogus” by Keeney
https://www.newspapers.com/clip/82881298/aug-25-1921-ny-times-mother-jones-at/
Tag: West Virginia Miners March of 1921
https://weneverforget.org/tag/west-virginia-miners-march-of-1921/
Tag: Mingo County Coal Miners Strike of 1920-1922
https://weneverforget.org/tag/mingo-county-coal-miners-strike-of-1920-1922/
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Battle of Blair Mountain · David Rovics