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Hellraisers Journal – Wednesday February 17, 1904
Trinidad, Colorado – Fairly and Mooney Recovering from Violent Attack
From The Rocky Mountain News of February 15, 1904:
From The Arizona Republican of February 15, 1904:
MINE WORKERS ATTACKED
———-
A Violent Strike Episode
Near Trinidad, Colorado.
———-Trinidad, Colo., Feb. 14.-William Fairley and James Mooney, members of the national board of the United Mine Workers, from Alabama and Mississippi, respectively, were waylaid this afternoon on the road between Majestic and Bowen, dragged from their buggy and beaten by eight men with stones and six shooters and left lying in the road.
They were able later to get in the buggy and drive to Bowen. They were then brought to Trinidad. Mooney is in serious condition and had to be taken to a hospital. Fairly is able to go to his hotel. No arrests have yet been made. This is the first time since the coal strike was inaugurated that any officials of the United Mine Workers have been assaulted. It is reported that the men who attacked the miners officials are coal company guards. We have learned from the United Mine Workers’ Headquarters in Indianapolis that Mother Jones was in a wagon which was following the vehicle carrying Fairley and Mooney, but she was not harmed. Mother was recently released from the hospital in Trinidad, after surviving a serious siege of pneumonia.
[Emphasis added.]
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SOURCES & IMAGES
Quote Mother Jones, CFI Owns Colorado, re 1903 Strikes UMW WFM,
Ab Chp 13, 1925
https://archive.iww.org/history/library/MotherJones/autobiography/13/
The Rocky Mountain News
(Denver, Colorado)
-Feb 15, 1904
https://www.genealogybank.com/doc/newspapers/image/v2:12C601A5C4B97518@GB3NEWS-146DC5F82C24B090@2416526-146C21E7196F13F0@0-146C21E7196F13F0
https://www.genealogybank.com/doc/newspapers/image/v2:12C601A5C4B97518@GB3NEWS-146DC5F82C24B090@2416526-146C21E71CABB4D8@5-146C21E71CABB4D8
The Arizona Republican
(Phoenix, Arizona)
-Feb 15, 1904
https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn84020558/1904-02-15/ed-1/seq-1/
See also:
Feb 15, 1904, Indianapolis News-UMWs Mooney & Fairley
Beaten Near Trinidad CO; Mother Jones Unharmed
https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-indianapolis-news-feb-15-1904-indi/141312524/
Hellraisers Journal – Tuesday February 9, 1904
Trinidad, Colorado – Mrs. Bertha Howell Reports from Colorado Strike Zone
Tag: Joe Poggiani
https://weneverforget.org/tag/joe-poggiani/
Tag: Cripple Creek Strike of 1903-1904
https://weneverforget.org/tag/cripple-creek-strike-of-1903-1904/
Tag: Telluride Strike of 1903-1904
https://weneverforget.org/tag/telluride-strike-of-1903-1904/
Tag: Colorado Coalfield Strike of 1903-1904
https://weneverforget.org/tag/colorado-coalfield-strike-of-1903-1904/
Mother Jones Describes the Attack on Fairley and Mooney
in Her Autobiography, Chapter 13:
https://archive.iww.org/history/library/MotherJones/autobiography/13/
In her Autobiography, Mother Jones conflates the Cripple Creek Strike of 1903-04 with the Colorado Coalfield Strike of 1903-04. She also miss-remembers some dates and the names of some people and places. Her errors were not corrected by her editor, Mary Field Parton.
On Sunday in February of 1914 [Sunday February 14, 1904], Joe Panonia [Poggiani] and myself went to a camp out in Berwyn [Berwind] to hold a meeting, and William Farley [Fairley] and James Mooney, national organizers, went to Bohnn [Bowen]. Both settlements lay in the same direction, Berwyn being a little further on. As we drove through Bohnn after our meeting, three women ran out from a shack, waving their long, bony arms at us and shrieking and whirling around like witches. They jumped right in front of our automobile in the narrow road.
“Come in! Come in! Something bad!” They put their hands to their heads and rocked sidewise. They were foreigners and knew little English.
“Joe,” I said, “we’d better drive on. They may have been drinking. It may be some sort of hoax to get us into the house.”
“No! No!” shrieked the women. “No drink! Something bad!” They climbed on the running board and began pulling us.
“Come on, Mother,” said Joe. “Let’s go in — I think there has been trouble.”
We followed the three lanky women into the shack. On a wretched bed covered with dirty rag-ends of blankets and old quilts lay Mooney, — bleeding profusely and unconscious. Farley sat beside him, badly beaten.
Joe raced into Trinidad and got a doctor but although Mooney survived he was never quite right in the head afterward. Farley, however, recovered from his terrible beating.
He said that as they were returning from Bohhn, seven gunmen jumped out from the bushes along the road, had beaten them up, kicked them and stamped their feet upon them. All seven were armed and resistance was useless.
Sources used for corrections:
Joseph Poggiani Obit (Died 1939, age 75)
https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-indianapolis-star-joseph-poggiani-ob/9842854/
William Robert Fairley (1846-1927)
https://www.bhamwiki.com/w/William_Fairley
Berwind and Bowen, Ghost Towns of Las Animas County
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Berwind,_Colorado
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bowen,_Las_Animas_County,_Colorado
https://www.google.com/maps/place/Las+Animas+County,+CO/@37.4043686,-104.7743245,9z/data=!3m1!4b1!4m6!3m5!1s0x871191d577bf60b1:0x4c02dcbef4478244!8m2!3d37.2994909!4d-104.1001326!16zL20vMHAwMWo?authuser=0&entry=ttu
Note: enlarging map shows Majestic near Berwind, near Ludlow
https://mapcarta.com/23205520
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