Beneath the starry banner
Though they came from foreign lands,
They died the death of martyrs
For the noble rights of man.
-Anonymous
Hellraisers Journal, Sunday April 24, 1898
Lattimer, Pennsylvania – Jury Finds Massacre of Miners Was Not Murder
The miners of Pennsylvania were marching peacefully when Sheriff Martin and his army of deputized gunthugs opened fire upon them at Lattimer on September 10, 1897; and yet the miners were not murdered according to the verdict of the jury as reported by The New Time magazine of April 1898:
Plutocrats’ Hero Acquitted-
THE ACQUITTAL OF SHERIFF MARTIN.
The acquittal of Sheriff Martin, the plutocratic hero of Hazleton, was to have been expected. Never yet in the history of the United States, or for that matter any other country, have the hired murderers of workingmen been brought to justice when arraigned before a court. The slaughter of the men at Hazleton was the most infamous act ever committed under forms of law. It has its parallel in the judicial farce which resulted in the acquittal of Martin and his cowardly and blood-thirsty deputies.
Such legal crimes do much to destroy the faith of the American people in their courts and in the machinery of law. If ever men were murdered, the unarmed miners who marched peacefully down the road with an American flag at their head were murdered. If ever men were guilty of murder, they were the deputies who poured volleys of bullets into the ranks of those marchers.
The murder of these men and the farcical court proceedings resulting in the acquittal of their murderers is perfectly natural and inevitable under the private ownership of coal mines and similar properties. When the people are ready to assume ownership and control of such plants the world will no longer be shocked with such scenes as those enacted at Lattimer or in the court where justice was made a mockery.
[Photograph added.]
The Foreign Miners Taught a Lesson-
SHOOT THEM DOWN.
Here is an extract from the “eloquent speech” made by the attorney of Sheriff Martin, the leader of the deputies who shot down a score of unarmed miners at Hazleton. Listen to him:
But this turbulent foreign element had learned a lesson. They did not dare to tempt another baptism of fire. The lesson was costly, but effective. The lesson will not be forgotten. Its value will be felt wherever other desperate men seek to violate the law and disrupt the peace. When the next attempt is made to “persuade” men who do not wish to join a strike by a display of force, it will be remembered that the civil officer in citizens’ clothes with a band of citizens at his back represents the majesty of the law, and that he has authority to shoot and kill, if necessary, to preserve the peace.
No comment is necessary.
SOURCE
—–
The New Time:
A Magazine of Social Progress, Volume 6
(Chicago & Boston)
-Jan to June 1898
C.H. Kerr, 1898
https://books.google.com/books?id=ixhGAQAAMAAJ
NT of April 1898
https://play.google.com/books/reader?id=ixhGAQAAMAAJ&printsec=frontcover&output=reader&hl=en&pg=GBS.PA214
“The Acquittal of Sheriff Martin”
https://play.google.com/books/reader?id=ixhGAQAAMAAJ&printsec=frontcover&output=reader&hl=en&pg=GBS.PA263
“Shoot Them Down.”
https://play.google.com/books/reader?id=ixhGAQAAMAAJ&printsec=frontcover&output=reader&hl=en&pg=GBS.PA265
IMAGES
Lattimer Massacre of 1897, Locomotive Firemens Mag, Nov 1897
https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=mdp.39015075056435;view=2up;seq=806
AD for New Time Mag, Labor World p4, Apr 23, 1898
https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn78000395/1898-04-23/ed-1/seq-4/
Charles H Kerr, Autograph, New Time p285, Apr 1898
https://play.google.com/books/reader?id=ixhGAQAAMAAJ&printsec=frontcover&output=reader&hl=en&pg=GBS.PA285
Lattimer Massacre, Sept 10, 1897, Plaque with Names
https://horrorhistory.net/2017/09/10/lattimer-massacre/
See also:
Hellraisers Journal, Tuesday February 22, 1898
Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania – Gunthugs with Badges on Trial
From the Appeal to Reason: “The Hazelton Massacre;” Report on Trial of Sheriff & Deputized Gunthugs
WE NEVER FORGET: September 10, 1897-The Lattimer Massacre:
Description of Slaughter from Trial of the Gunthugs
-from the Locomotive Firemen’s Magazine of March 1898
WE NEVER FORGET: September 10, 1897-The Lattimer Massacre:
The Martyred Miners of Pennsylvania
-who lost their lives in freedom’s cause
WE NEVER FORGET: September 10, 1897 -The Lattimer Massacre:
“Ballad of the Deputies,” Poem for Deputized Company Gunthugs
From The Hazelton Daily Standard, September 17, 1897
Tag: Lattimer Massacre of 1897
https://weneverforget.org/tag/lattimer-massacre-of-1897/
The Lattimer Massacre Project
https://lattimermassacre.wordpress.com/
“The Martyred Miners of Lattimer”
by Alyssa Murphy, Fall 2010
http://pabook2.libraries.psu.edu/palitmap/Lattimer.html
Location of Lattimer Miners Massacre Memorial:
Main St., Lattimer, PA
Directions: North of Hazleton
-take Hillside Dr and Lattimer to fork of Main St. and Back St/Quality Rd
http://explorepahistory.com/hmarker.php?markerId=1-A-3BA
WE NEVER FORGET
Lattimer Massacre Song by Van Wagner