the sweet blood of this poet-radical.
-Jim Larkin
Saturday November 27, 1915
Chicago, Illinois-
I. W. W. Gives FW Joe Hill a Grand Send-Off, Thousands March
A grand funeral hosted by the Industrial Workers of the World was provided for Fellow Worker Joe Hill, Working Class Martyr. Thousands gathered in the West Side Auditorium on Thanksgiving morning, November 25th. The windows of the auditorium were open and the singing within could be heard by the the thousands who filled the streets outside, extending for blocks in every direction.
After the morning’s orations were completed, a great throng of mourners followed the casket to the train which bore the remains of FW Joe Hill to Graceland Cemetery. Another funeral service took place there followed by singing which lasted late into the night.
From The Chicago Daily Tribune of November 26, 1915:
RED FLAG WAVES AS I. W. W.
CHIEFS PRAISE JOE HILL
—–
Thousands of Many Tongues at Funeral Services
Over Executed Poet-Agitator.
—–OWN SONGS HIS DIRGES.
—–
Five thousand people paid tribute in ten languages yesterday to the memory of Joseph Hillstrom, convicted and executed murderer.
Before the services began 2,000 men and women were in the West Side auditorium, where the body of the executed I W. W. agitator and poet lay in state, the casket piled high with flowers bearing polyglot inscriptions of defiance from anarchist clubs, syndicalists and the like.
By noon the sidewalks outside the building were jammed solidly for three blocks.
Police, in uniform and plain clothes, were everywhere, but there was no disorder. Along the street a low murmur arose continuously chiefly from the lips of white faced young men and girls. Inside, after the funeral had begun an inarticulate growl of appreciation greeted O. N. Hilton of Denver, Hillstrom’s attorney, when he characterized his client’s execution by the state of Utah as “the brutal murder of a martyr to the cause of revolution.”
Red Flag Over Casket.
—–
But for the most part the expressions of discontent, bitter as they were, were silent. They were to be seen in the huge red flag that was draped over the casket, in the red streamlets worn by nearly everybody, in the buttons bearing the inscription, “He died a martyr,” and in the conspicuous absence of the American flag.
The crowd had a chance to vent its feelings, however, when the services were opened with the singing of several songs written by Joe Hill, as the dead man preferred to call himself. These are characteristic bits of I. W. W. sentiment-“The Rebel Girl,” “Stung Right,” “The Preacher and the Slave”-and they are set to lusty, popular tunes that make strange dirges.
Haywood Pays Tribute.
—–
“Bill” Haywood, founder and head of the I. W. W. , made a short speech of eulogy, and then Hilton, who was one of the defenders of Haywood, Moyer, and Pettibone in the famous Steunenberg case, launched into his two hour funeral oration. The Mormon church came in for a generous share of his denunciation.
[Mr. Hilton said:]
It is the strict command of the law that no inference is to be drawn from the defendant’s silence, but listen to the chief justice of Utah:
“The defendant may not avoid the natural and reasonable inferences deducible from proven facts by merely declining to stay on the stand or remaining silent.”
The law says no inferences shall be deduced, and the chief justice says they shall be deduced, and he cannot avoid the natural and reasonable inferences. The second and third justices concur with him.
Refuses to Gratify Judges.Hillstrom refused to satisfy the curiosity of the Supreme court justices as to where he received his wound and he is condemned, not for what he did but because he refuses to gratify the curiosity of the officers as to the place and circumstances of his wound.
You can now see the particulars wherein the trial was unfair, and that some influence, some preponderating influence, was brought to bear upon the Supreme court to persuade it into an attitude of hostility towards Hillstrom. I do not say that this was done by direct influence other than the imponderable and undefined but always present and dominating fear of the Mormon church, and that the views expressed by the Supreme court are in consonance with the views of that church.
1,000 Marchers Follow Casket.
—–
As the casket was taken from the building 1,000 of more marchers fell behind and followed it to Harrison and Halsted streets, where it was placed on an elevated train to be taken to Graceland cemetery. The red flag headed the procession and the marchers sang the refrain of the British Socialist hymn:
Then raise the scarlet standard high;
Beneath its folds we’ll live and die.’
Though cowards flinch and traitors sneer,
We’ll keep the red flag flying here.—–Talks in Many Languages.
—–
At the cemetery another long service was held, with speeches in Swedish, Russian, Hungarian, Polish, Spanish, Italian, German, Yiddish, Lithuanian, and English. Jim Larkin of Dublin, who led the British dock worker strike, spoke in English.
[He said:]
Joe hill’s last words…were: “Don’t mourn for me; organize.” the I. W. W. movement has been sealed in the sweet blood of this poet-radical.
Wobbly: The Rough and Tumble Story of an American Radical
-by Ralph Chaplin
Literary Licensing, LLC, 2013
https://books.google.com/books?id=o8gmnwEACAAJ
The Chicago Daily Tribune
(Chicago, Illinois)
-Nov 26, 1915
http://www.newspapers.com/image/29007743/
IMAGES
Joe Hill’s Funeral, Chicago, Nov 25, 1915, ISR of Jan 1916
https://books.google.com/books/reader?id=9VJIAAAAYAAJ&printsec=frontcover&output=reader&source=gbs_atb&pg=GBS.PA400
Orrin N Hilton
http://moses.law.umn.edu/darrow/photo.php?pid=888
Joe Hill, Joe Hillstrom, He died a martyr,
button worn at Chicago funeral, Nov 25, 1915
https://quod.lib.umich.edu/l/lbc1ic/x-lbc.0307/LBC0307.TIF
Joe Hill’ Funeral, Haywood Speaks, ISR of Jan 1916
https://books.google.com/books/reader?id=9VJIAAAAYAAJ&printsec=frontcover&output=reader&source=gbs_atb&pg=GBS.PA403
Joe Hill’s Funeral, Casket to Train to Graceland, ISR of Jan 1916
https://books.google.com/books/reader?id=9VJIAAAAYAAJ&printsec=frontcover&output=reader&source=gbs_atb&pg=GBS.PA402
Joe Hill’s Funeral, Rebels at Cemetery, ISR Jan 1916
https://books.google.com/books/reader?id=9VJIAAAAYAAJ&printsec=frontcover&output=reader&source=gbs_atb&pg=GBS.PA403
Joe Hill’s Funeral, Jim Larkin Speaks, ISR Jan 1916
https://books.google.com/books/reader?id=9VJIAAAAYAAJ&printsec=frontcover&output=reader&source=gbs_atb&pg=GBS.PA403
See also:
James Larkin Biography
http://spartacus-educational.com/IRElarkin.htm
The Haywood-Moyer-Pettibone case (1906-1907) by Louis Adamic
(Tried for murder of Frank Steunenberg, ex-governor of Idaho.)
https://libcom.org/history/haywood-mayer-pettibone-case-louis-adamic
Real News: Remembering Joe Hill
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ii3qwitUuL0
Embedding disabled but this is an excellent interview of Alexis Buss by RN on Nov 19, 2015. Buss is co-editor of the new and updated “Letters of Joe Hill.”
Letters of Joe Hill, Centenary Edition
ed by Philip S Foner, Alexis Buss, & foreword by Tom Morello
http://www.haymarketbooks.org/pb/Letters-of-Joe-Hill
Alexis Buss served six terms as General Secretary-Treasurer of the Industrial Workers of the World and also worked as a union organizer specializing in direct action strategies. She has coedited the Solidarity Forever Labor History Calendar since 1998 and is the author of The Union on Our Own Terms, drawn from columns she wrote on solidarity unionism for the Industrial Worker for nearly a decade.
Jim Larkin’s oration at Joe Hill’s funeral, Thanksgiving Day, November 25, 1915
& “I Dreamed I Saw Joe Hill Last Night” by The Dubliners