There are no limits to which
powers of privilege will not go
to keep the workers in slavery.
-Mother Jones
Hellraisers Journal, Sunday May 12, 1907
From Montana News: The First Meeting of Haywood Family
In the May 9th edition of the Montana News, official organ of the Socialist Party of Montana, was published an article by the editor, Ida Crouch-Hazlett which gives a touching account of the reunification Comrade Bill Haywood with his family. The prisoner had not seen his wife and daughters for the past fourteen months.
Just Before the Battle
—–Family Reunion in Ada County Jail
-Everything Ready for Trial
-“Statesman” Gets Rabid”Boise, Idaho, April 30, 1907.
One week from next Thursday is the date set for the trial of William D. Haywood. All sides state that they are ready for the great battle. The work that the defense has done throughout Ada county in safeguarding the interests of their clients is a marvel in painstaking and thorough news. The county has been thoroughly polled, and, as Mr. Richardson says, the conditions are certainly nothing like those in Canyon county. C. A. Johnson of Seattle and M. Barber of Caldwell, the men who had charge of the Canyon county work, have had the work here, and they have had a most able corps of assistants in learning what the sentiment is generally concerning the coming trials.
A report has been circulated that the attorneys for the defense would move for a change of venue from Ada county on account of prejudice. But Mr. Richardson has stated that no such move is contemplated whatever unless, when it comes to the actual forming of the jury it is seen that an unusual prejudice exists….
It is currently reported that Debs will not be here at the trial at all, not only from Chicago resources of information, but from word that has leaked out from the defense attorneys. The objection seems to be that he is too much of an agitator…
Gooding’s Organ Rabid.
The “Statesman” [Idaho Daily Statesman of Boise] continues to publish its inflammatory articles every day. Its latest spasm has been a shriek at the “campaign of the reds.” It refers in lurid terms to the “red flag of anarchy,” the “desperateness of the policy of the reds,” denounces the socialist organs, and says that socialism is an enemy to unionism.
Wives of the Prisoners.
Mrs. Haywood arrived in Boise Sunday night [April 28]. She was accompanied by her two daughters, Verna, aged 16, and Henrietta, aged 10, also by a trained nurse. She stood the trip remarkably well. She is a helpless invalid that cannot use her hands or feet, and has to be cared for like a baby, and wheeled everywhere. Aside from her helplessness, she seems fairly strong and well, and talks most entertainingly and hopefully.
Monday morning [April 29] we went over to see how she had stood the trip. We found her in the best of spirits, and the whole family just getting ready to go over to the jail. They had not seen the husband and father for fourteen months. Verna, the older girl, is a tall fine-looking young person, that much resembles her father. She is in high school, has considerable skill as a musician, and possesses great vivacity and force of character. She shrinks a little from the publicity in which the family have been placed through the capitalistic fire that has been turned upon her father.
Henrietta, the younger, has one of those wonderful peachblow complexions that so often go with deep auburn tresses. She is a child of great sweetness of nature, and very attractive.
Comrade Easterly, one of the Cripple Creek deportees, and Comrade Shoaf [correspondent for the Appeal to Reason] wheeled the invalid’s chair out to the pavement; and then in warm, sunshiny glory of the spring morning we all walked over to the jail, where the three martyrs of labor and liberty are held as life hostages for the subservience and submission of the working class. Haywood was outside in the green court yard, taking the fresh air. The meeting of the long disunited family was most affecting. Henrietta soon found her seat on her father’s knee, and the visit was prolonged several hours. It was stated that no restrictions would be placed upon the visits of the family when Mrs. Haywood’s health would permit of them. [A house has been obtained?] for their accommodation, but the attorneys for the defense are looking for more comfortable quarters.
Mrs Moyer Still Ill.
In the afternoon I went over to see Mrs. Moyer. She is still in St. Luke’s hospital, the difficulty having proven more refractory than was anticipated. She was glad to see me as she says she has been excluded from every one. She looks bright, is full of hope and good heart; and expects to be back at her hotel in a few days. On the dresser stood a great bunch of most exquisite roses, the gift her husband had sent her. She expects her sister to be here in a few days, to remain during the time of the trial.
The Rose Pillow.
Speaking of roses, calls to mind a thoughtful little incident Mrs. Haywood was relating to me. The court house yard is ornamented by many fine large rose bushes. Last summer, Haywood, during his walks, would gather the leaves of the fading roses. When sufficient of them were saved, he had a rose cushion made, which he sent to the lonely invalid in Denver. Such instances as these testify that the human heart of love and sympathy in the breasts of the working class has not been entirely crushed into the adamant of rebellion and hate, by the atrocities heaped upon it, from those who live by exploiting the slaves of labor.
Mrs. Pettibone Nervous.
Calling upon Mrs. Pettibone at the Noble block I found her extremely nervous and all but ill. She like the others, has kept up good heart during all these months of strain; but it is impossible that the constant, wearing anxiety should not have left some bitter and wracking trace. One has only to imagine the situation to realize how this must be. Mrs. Pettibone is a woman of fine education and culture. She is tall and graceful, well-bred, and beautiful. She was a teacher, principal of grade schools in Rockford, Illinois. Going to Denver to visit her sister she became acquainted with Mr. Pettibone, who was in the furniture business. She heard as in a dream tales of the old bull-pen days in Idaho and their unbelievable barbarities. Never did she believe that her own path would ever lie amid such shocking scenes. Her husband was a respectable “business man.” And then one night she comes home from a concert to find the gas turned low, and her husband gone. All night she watches in nervous terror with no clue or word; and when the morning dawns she picks up the paper at the door, and finds in great red headlines her husband’s fate.
The brutal bunch that swarmed into his home when he opened the door would not let him write a note of explanation and leave it on the table, as was his want, would not let him change his collar.
No, this is not an incident from the Russian revolution. This is an incident from the American revolution that will be.
Making all due allowance, I do not think any of the wives or the families realize the true gravity of the situation. It takes a socialist to realize that. These pleasant women know nothing of the incentive to class struggles, and the fight of demons over the splendor and delights of the surplus.
May the fates decree that the awakening may not shadow and break their lives forever.
IDA CROUCH-HAZLETT.
SOURCE
Montana News
(Helena, Montana)
-May 9, 1907
http://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn84024811/1907-05-09/ed-1/seq-1/
http://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn84024811/1907-05-09/ed-1/seq-4/
IMAGE
Haywood Family Reunited, Boise, Wilkes-Barre Leader, May 10, 1907
https://www.newspapers.com/image/116462796
See also:
NOTE:
“C. A. Johnson of Seattle” was Operative #21, Pinkerton Agent.
For more on “C. A. Johnson” see
Big Trouble: A Murder in a Small Western Town
Sets Off a Struggle for the Soul of America
-by J. Anthony Lukas
Simon and Schuster, Jul 17, 2012
Chapter 9: “Operative 21” -page 407
-this chapter also describes Local Caldwell in detail, of which, “Barber of Caldwell” was a prominent member.
https://books.google.com/books?id=d07IME-ezzQC
Hellraisers Journal, Saturday May 11, 1907
Boise, Idaho – Haywood Reunited with Wife and Daughters
Haywood Family Reunited in Boise as “Legal Labor Struggle of the Age Begins”
https://weneverforget.org/hellraisers-journal-haywood-family-reunited-in-boise-as-legal-labor-struggle-of-the-age-begins/
Are They Going to Hang My Papa?
Performed by John Larsen and Michelle Groves
Lyrics by Owen Spendthrift, 1907
http://steunenberg.blogspot.com/2009_08_01_archive.html
For Lyrics to “Are They Going to Hang My Papa?”
Duluth Labor World of May 18, 1907
http://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn78000395/1907-05-18/ed-1/seq-4/