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Hellraisers Journal – Wednesday December 31, 1913
Calumet, Michigan – Little White Caskets Carried Two Miles to Lakeview Cemetery
From the Michigan Miners’ Bulletin of December 31, 1913:
Text, paragraph breaks added:
Beneath a canopy of hovering gray clouds, with crystalline tears of angels softly sifting from above, the striking miners of this district tenderly laid away their dead in beautiful Lakeview cemetery Calumet on Suday afternoon. Services for the dead, hope and comfort for those with bleeding hearts were said in Finnish Apostolic Lutheran church, St. John’s, St. Mary’s, St. Joseph’s and the Finnish Synod at 12 o’clock noon. At 1 o’clock the sad march to the “City of the Dead” was begun, the different funerals uniting at the intersections of Fifth, Seventh, and Eighth streets with Pine street, thence to Lakeview two miles away.
The sad procession was headed by fifteen hearses, an automobile following carrying three caskets. Forty of the little white coffins coming next in line being borne by members of the Miner’s Union, many of the smaller caskets being taken into the carriages with the mourners. The line of carriages and sleighs extended the whole distance from the city to the cemetery.
Following the vehicles came the select choir of fifty voices heading the great parade. The choir sang several hymns in the march to the cemetery, the opening one “Rock of Ages” being beautifully rendered.
Behind the choir came the women and children marchers headed by their leader, Mrs. Annie Clemenc, who bore her “Stars and Stripes” furled and swathed in crepe. Following came the union, twenty-one thousand being in line reaching the distance of two miles. Near the center of the parade marched the Kaiku Finnish band and near the rear the Mohawk Miners’ Union band playing funeral dirges. At the cemetery the choir gatherd at the speakers stand where they sang huymns, the opening one being “Nearer My God to Thee.”
Attorney E. A. McNally of Chicago delivered the funeral oration; Attorney Clarence Darrow of Chicago who had been invited to make the address being unable to attend.
The scene at the graves was a most pitiful one; fathers parting from their wives and children; mothers laying away forever their precious babes by the side of their fathers; brothers parting from their sisters and sisters from brothers. In the Finnish section of the cemetery two long trenches held the bodies of forty-seven victims of the awful tragedy, whle in other private burial lots members of the same family were placed in one grave. Four of the victims of the disaster were buried Saturday, and seventeen more were buried on Monday.
The trolley and steam railroads were taxed to their capacities, but handled with dispatch the great crowds, not an accident occurring. A special train of eleven coaches came from South Range, and one of nine coaches came from Negaunee bringing hundreds of unionists and others. It is estimated that fully fifty thousand people either took part in the funeral or came as spectators.
One of the sad features of the day was the absence of President Charles H. Moyer of the Federation, whose solicitude for the afflicted as well as for the strikers and their families has been nothing short of paternal. President Moyer now lies seriously bruised and wounded at St. Luke’s hospital, Chicago, from the assault and beating received at the hands of thugs and lawless citizens of the district at the time of his deportation on last Friday night. Many were the regrets expressed at his absence, and sorrow for his condition.
It was almost six o’clock before the last sad rites had been spoken over all the graves of the departed, the funeral occupying six hours of time.
The Funeral Oration
[of E. A. McNally]…Here in this cemetery today the fathers and mothers, sisters and brothers, whose hearts are rent with anguish, whose whole life seems to have gone out with those dear ones, who on the eve of the birth of our Savior had collected together to enjoy themselves, and to receive their small Christmas gifts. They died in a union meeting with the little stocking given them by “Santa Claus” still clasped in their little hands.
This, dear friends, has been a sad community. For five long months there has been contention here among the different systems, and the different classes, and among different citizens. There is an industrial dispute. Whatever your opinions are as to the merits of this industrial dispute, the fact remains that those men and women, those little children, those little boys and girls walked in the union parades. They believed in union principles among the working men, and with that thought in their minds, they gave up their lives…..
There has been some criticism as to the conduct of the survivors who refused charity. It is not charity we want, it is justice, and gentlemen, these men and these women who are the most grief stricken people here today are not to be blamed because they will not accept charity from their opponents. Here the enemies have threatened their leaders, shot and deported the President of this organization, Mr. Moyer. You cannot rid organized labor from among the American workers by striking or killing any man, because in his stead another will rise to take his place more powerful than the one before. I think, dear friends, that these bodies here in this cemetery today, cut down in their young childhood ought to be a sufficient appeal to Mr. Shaw to meet his men in arbitration, which is all the strikers ask, and in some measure atone for this sadness which has been experienced here for five months.
Dear friends, I do not intend to keep you longer, but I know down deep in your hearts there is a prayer for those loved ones and a hope in your hearts that before long the community will see this sad condition ended. I hope and believe that these men, women and children now are in the arms of Jesus.
[There follows a list of those who perished in the Italian Hall Massacre, as known thus far, with names, ages and addresses, 72 in number.]
Calumet, Michigan – Monday December 29, 1913
50,000 March to Cemetery Behind Little White Caskets
Funerals for those who died at the Italian Hall on Christmas Eve were held in six churches yesterday. At the front of the churches were the small white caskets of the little children along with the larger caskets of the adults with whom they perished, most of these adults being mothers of the youngest victims. After the funerals, the march began from the churches and merged into one as it headed out to the Lakeview Cemetery two miles distant. Here mass graves had been dug.
Following the hearses and the choir, came Annie Clemenc bearing her massive flag as usual, but with the flag draped in black crepe in honor of the dead. Tears were streaming down her face but she remained quiet and calm. Behind her marched twenty-one thousand union men in a line two miles long. The march included the Kaiku Finnish band and the Mohawk Miners’ Union band.
Snow fell on the small white caskets as four men carried each one the distance to the cemetery. Grown men broke down in their grief and had to pass the little flower-covered caskets off to others near-by.
One of the victims was a member of the Women’s Auxiliary of Calumet, #15 of the Western Federation of Miners. Beside the vehicle carrying her casket walked eight women, four on each side, in honor of their fallen sister.
The service at the cemetery began with the hymn “Nearer My God to Thee,” and was followed by funeral orations in Finnish, Austrian, English and Croatian. The main address was delivered by Attorney E. A. McNally of Chicago. Clarence Darrow had been invited to speak but was unable to attend. McNally spoke for all, the living and the dead, when he said:
It is not charity we want; it is justice.
It was said that the sobbing of the mourners could be heard in the town, two miles away.
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SOURCES & IMAGES
Quote Mother Jones, Pray for dead, ed, Ab Chp 6, 1925
https://www.iww.org/history/library/MotherJones/autobiography/6
Miners’ Bulletin
“Published by authority of
Western Federation of Miners
to tell the truth regarding
the strike of copper miners.”
-Dec 31, 1913
Copy in possession of Janet Raye
Big Annie of Calumet
-by Jerry Stanley
NY, 1996
Death’s Door
The Truth Behind Michigan’s Larges Mass Murder
-by Steve Lehto
MI, 2006
Annie Clemenc
& the Great Keweenaw Copper Strike
-by Lyndon Comstock
SC, 2013
Photos: Little White Caskets
https://www.pasty.com/reflections/id258.htm
Tag: Italian Hall Massacre
https://weneverforget.org/tag/italian-hall-massacre/
Tag: Michigan Copper Country Strike of 1913-1914
https://weneverforget.org/tag/michigan-copper-country-strike-of-1913-1914/
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Nearer My God to Thee – Sharon Singers