———-
Hellraisers Journal – Sunday March 13, 1921
Leavenworth Federal Prison – Letter from Fellow Worker John L. Murphy
From the Appeal to Reason of March 12, 1921:
The White Terror at Work
Recently I [Upton Sinclair] published a novel [100%-A Story of a Patriot] dealing with the activities of spies and secret agents of big business. Our gracious Postoffice Department does not permit me to mention the name of this novel, otherwise this contribution will be considered as an advertisement. But here is a letter which has just come to me, and which you might take to be a chapter out of the aforesaid unnameable novel. Read it, and see how very proud of your country it makes you. I do not know the writer of this letter, but the accent of truth is in every word of his story, and it what I have learned of hundreds of other cases, makes me quite ready to believe what he tells. If you know any 100 per cent American patriots in your neighborhood, take them this letter and try to get them to read it.
[Letter from John L. Murphy, No. 13586]
Leavenworth, Kans., Feb. 13, 1921.
Mr. Upton Sinclair, Pasadena, Cal.
Dear Comrade:Below I am sending you the facts of my case.
I was born in Boston the boasted, cradle of Liberty. I am a working man, not a leech. In 1918 while working at Olympia, Wash., I wrote a letter to Chris Luber at Sacramento, Cal. He was an I. W. W. He was in jail at the time of my writing. This I did not know at the time. In fact he had been in jail almost two months before I wrote my first letter. My letter was the ordinary kind exchanged among workers—working conditions, etc. This letter was not delivered to Luber. The Department of Justice got it. They answered it and forged Luber’s name to it. This letter was indeed very bitter against the government. I thought my friend Luber had gone “bugs.” How was I to know that the Department of Justice agent was writing to me? They had his name forged to the letter, and I did not know he was in jail at the time. They wound up by asking me to “Pull off” something violent, just anything would do.
I will now make it clear how they played the game. Unknown to me at the time, fifty-five I. W. W. working men were in jail at Sacramento, Cal., and they wanted to get evidence to convict them. This is one of the games they played to get said evidence. They were willing to pay any price, and they cared not how they got it. In the letter I wrote to this “agent,” I refused to agree to commit a crime, and I roundly scored this “agent,” thinking I was scoring my working friend, Luber, for his d—d foolishness. Letter after letter came. Bribes, and big ones, pleas, offers, etc. I denounced such doctrine again and again. In those letters I would agree to the declarations that we were being run over by military hysteria, and that men were using the war frenzy to stifle legitimate discussion. Then I would denounce the writer for his plan to cure such things.
Now, get the infamy of this trick. The parts of the letter which spoke of “military hysteria,” and such terms were photographed so as to leave every declaration of my own out entirely. Then I was arrested, taken to Sacramento, Cal., and thrown into jail. The letters this forger wrote were secured and destroyed. I then found out my friend had received no letters from me, and knew nothing about any letter writing to me, as he had been in jail since December 5, 1917, and my first letter written to him was January, 1918. I then knew the characters England was employing to destroy American citizens. But I did not fear trial as I knew my own letters would clear me.
Every scheme imaginable was resorted to in order to force me to lie on the men in jail. I was wined and dined at first; I was offered freedom and a goodly sum, to say something. I knew nothing, and I refused to be a perjurer. Then they tried threats and abuse. I told them I would spend my life in jail with clean hands, and my flag flying nailed to the mast, before I would place upon my heart the slime of perjury, and blood, and tears of innocent, helpless workers, whom I did not know anything about, much less anything against. That ended it. They feared to release me after what I had found out. Imagine my feeling when the trial day came for those workers, to find I was indicted with them.
Then, if you can farther imagine, do so, when I tell you that three or four short extracts from my letters were presented from photographic copies, so as to identify my handwriting, and these extracts, admissions of what had been sent me, and true in every word, yet torn out of all connection; and I was convicted and sentenced to a five-year term for “espionage.”
Since coming here not a mark or blemish has been put against me. I never had a mark or stain against my life, and have always worked for my bread. Yet, when I asked for parole, I was denied at Washington, not here. Counterfeiters, postoffice burglars, white slavers, and the worst kind of degenerates ever found, have been paroled, but not me. I can see now that I made a mistake asking for parole. Parole is for those who are guilty of some of the above crimes, while my only crime is that I have an opinion. I am a conscientious pacific Socialist and an I. W. W., that is all.
I never gave any man or woman or child a moment’s grief in my life. I have lived clean and honest. And as nearly as I can find out, I am in prison because a Department of Justice agent committed forgery on a worker in jail, abused the government, lied to me, and then failed to get me to carry out the crimes they were willing to pay me for. Only I did not fall to their level. That is why I am serving five years.
Before the great Arbitrator, whose knowledge can weigh all truth, I swear that I write the truth. This is America too! I am not alone in blackened and ruined men here who have been honest. Do what you can. With all confidence in your honesty to the cause we are fighting for I am
Yours for Industrial Freedom,
(Signed):
John L. Murphy Reg. No. 13586
Leavenworth, Kans. P. O. Box 7P. S. Excuse this letter a my eyes bother me a great deal since I came here. It is the best I can do.
Put my Reg. No. 13586 on address, if you write and it will prevent all chance of mistakes. I am not the only Murphy that has the honor of being in here.
Respectfully,
(Signed) John L Murphy———-
[Photograph, paragraph breaks and emphasis added.]
[Ad for Sinclair’s “unnameable novel” from the Appeal of Nov 13, 1920.]
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
SOURCES
Quote Frank Little re Guts, Chg July 1917
Chaplin, Chapter 18-War, pages 208-9
https://books.google.com/books?id=n-ygPQAACAAJ
Appeal to Reason
(Girard, Kansas)
-Mar 12, 1921
https://www.newspapers.com/image/612855419/
IMAGES
Ad, Story of a Patriot by Upton Sinclair, AtR p3, Nov 13, 1920
https://www.newspapers.com/image/612855206/
IWW Sacramento Class War Prisoner John L Murphy,
-Leavenworth, Jan 25, 1919
https://catalog.archives.gov/id/117719377
Note: re date of arrival at Leavenworth
Hellraisers Journal – Monday January 27, 1919
Leavenworth Penitentiary – Fellow Workers Arrive from Sacramento
See also:
100%: The Story of a Patriot
-by Upton Sinclair
Sinclair, 1920
https://books.google.com/books?id=Ld4qAAAAMAAJ
American Political Prisoners
Prosecutions Under the Espionage and Sedition Acts
-by Stephen Martin Kohn
Greenwood Publishing Group, 1994
(search: “john l murphy”)
https://books.google.com/books?id=-_xHbn9dtaAC
The Liberator of July 1921, page 7:
“Personal Testimony” by John L. Murphy
https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/culture/pubs/liberator/1921/07/v04n07-w40-jul-1921-liberator-hr.pdf
The Christian Century, Volume 38
Christian Century Company, 1921
(search: “john l murphy”)
https://books.google.com/books?id=x2oxAQAAMAAJ
Tag: Sacramento IWW Class War Prisoners
https://weneverforget.org/tag/sacramento-iww-class-war-prisoners/
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Willard Losinger Performs “I.W.W. Prison Song”
Lyrics by Ralph Chaplin
https://digital.wolfsonian.org/WOLF045327/00001/1j
