Hellraisers Journal: Elizabeth Gurley Flynn & Mrs. Cram Meet with President Wilson on Behalf of FW Joe Hill

Hellraisers Journal, Friday November 12, 1915
From The Washington Times: Elizabeth Gurley Flynn
-Pleads with President to Aid FW Joe Hill

Elizabeth Gurley Flynn and Mrs. J. Sargeant Cram were granted an interview with President Wilson yesterday in order to make a plea for his intervention to prevent the execution of Fellow Worker Joe Hill, scheduled to take place in Salt Lake City in seven days. The Times of November 11th gave the following report of the meeting:

TWO WOMEN PLEAD FOR JOE HILLSTROM
—–
Mrs. J. Sargent Cram and
Elizabeth Gurley Flynn
see President.
—–

Personal appeals were made today to President Wilson by Mrs. J. Sargeant Cram, of New York City, and Elizabeth Gurley Flynn, I. W. W. organizer, to save the life of Joseph Hillstrom, sentenced to death in Salt Lake City for murder. The President listened to the women’s plea for ten minutes, after which, they said, he told them he would do everything he could to save the man.

Hillstrom is sentenced to die November 19. Every avenue of escape from death has been closed to him and the only one who can save him is the governor of Utah, who thus far has refused executive clemency except on the personal plea of President Wilson a month ago, when the execution was stayed to hear new evidence.

The women this morning told the President they were not asking a pardon, but only asking for a commutation of his sentence to life imprisonment in order that the case can be investigated.

—–

[Photograph added.]

~~~~~~~~~~

SOURCE

The Washington Times
(Washington, D. C.)
-Nov 11, 1915
https://www.newspapers.com/image/79969421/

IMAGE
Elizabeth Gurley Flynn, 1915
http://dp.la/exhibitions/exhibits/show/breadandroses/strikers/elizabeth-gurley-flynn

Years later Elizabeth Gurley Flynn described the meeting with the President in her Autobiography:

We went down [from New York to Washington, D. C.] on November 11, 1915. We had breakfast with Gifford Pinchot, Mrs. Cram’s Republican brother-in-law, who escorted us to the White House. Mr. Tumulty, the President’s Secretary, was friendly. He knew of me from the Paterson strike of 1913. When the President came in he greeted us cordially, in fact he held Mrs. Cram’s hand. He listened attentively while we presented our appeal. He said he had once intervened at the request of the Swedish Minister. He wondered if further insistence might do more harm than good. Not knowing the etiquette of talking to the President, I interrupted: “But he’s sentenced to death. You can’t make it worse, Mr. President.” He smiled and said: “Well, that’s true!” and promised to consider the matter.

Gurley Flynn described how the interview with the President was arranged:

While Judge Hilton was in New York City, [in October of 1915], I introduced him to Mr. And Mrs. J. Sargent Cram. Mrs. Cram was a liberal, an avowed pacifist. Prior to World War I she rented stores in various parts of the city for neighborhood exhibitions of Robert Minor’s magnificent anti-war cartoons. She made all her appointments at the swanky Colony Club in New York and occasionally took me to her summer home in Old Westbury, Long Island. She introduced me to Judge Lovett, President of the Union Pacific Railroad, who lived in a palatial home nearby and who was “amazed” that I thought he had “influence” with the governor of Utah. She also introduced me to one of the Guggenheims, owners of the mines in Utah. For me it was like talking to creatures from another planet!

Judge Hilton and I went to Long Island to see Mr. Cram. He was a portly, bald-headed, shrewd Democratic politician who thought we were all slightly goofy.But he was impressed with Judge Hilton’s presentation of the case and he liked me as a “a sensible woman,” particularly because I enjoyed the rare wines from his cellar. So he agreed to arrange an interview with President Woodrow Wilson for Mrs. Cram and me. We had gone once before on September 28, 1915, to try to see him, but had been referred then to Acting Secretary of State Polk. Mr. Cram had led the New York delegation to vote for Wilson at the nominating convention and had easy access to the White House.

~~~~~~~~~~SOURCES

The Rebel Girl: an autobiography, my first life (1906-1926)
-by Elizabeth Gurley Flynn
International Publishers, 1973
https://books.google.com/books?id=TK2y0I-E9EkC

“Attorney Hilton and Swedish Minister Discuss Plan to Save Life of Joe Hill”
-by JayRaye
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2015/10/13/1430976/-Hellraisers-Journal-Attorney-Hilton-and-Swedish-Minister-Discuss-Plan-to-Save-Life-of-Joe-Hill

IMAGE
Mrs. J. Sargeant Cram, Salt Lake Tribune, Sept 30, 1915
Location: http://newspaperarchive.com/us/utah/salt-lake-city/salt-lake-tribune/1915/09-30

See also:
Edith Claire Bryce Cram
http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=73735909
Estate of J. Sargeant Cram
http://garylawrance.blogspot.com/2011/04/john-sargeant-cram-estate.html
Gifford Pinchot (married Mrs. Cram’s sister, Cornelia Bryce.)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gifford_Pinchot

Information from Archie Green via Gibbs Smith:

After the Sixth Edition of the IWW songbook (Little Red Songbook), dated August 21, 1913 and before the Seventh Edition, dated June 1914, an unnumbered and undated edition was published by IWW locals of Seattle, Washington. This edition featured four new songs by Joe Hill including “Down in the Old Dark Mill” on page 18.

DOWN IN THE OLD DARK MILL
-by Joe Hill
Tune: “Down By The Old Mill Stream”

How well I do remember
That mill along the way,
Where she and I were working
For fifty cents a day.
She was my little sweetheart;
I met her in the mill
It’s a long time since I saw her.
But I love her still.

CHORUS:
Down in the Old Black Mill,
That’s where first we met.
Oh! that loving thrill
I shall ne’er forget;
And those dreamy eyes,
Blue like summer skies.
She was fifteen
My pretty queen
In the Old Black Mill.

We had agreed to marry
When she’d be sweet sixteen.
But then one day I crushed it
My arm in the machine.
I lost my job forever
I am a tramp disgraced.
My sweetheart still is slaving
In the same old place.

Source for lyrics:
http://www.folkarchive.de/downin.html