Hellraisers Journal – Thursday June 29, 1911 Mother Jones Tells of Women and Children in Rat-Infested Jail
From the Evansville Press of June 29, 1911:
PETER POWERS TALK -WOMEN AND CHILDREN FIGHT JAIL RATS.
Gilson Gardner’s story of women and girls thrown into a vermin-infested rat-hole called a jail because they “disturbed the peace” by beating a tin can and singing at a strikebreaker in Westmoreland-co, Pa., is not overdrawn.
I have just received a letter from Mother Jones, “the angel of the miners,” who has gone into Westmoreland-co, Pa., to lead in the unequal fight of the impoverished men, women and children against the gigantic corporations.
[Writes Mother:]
There were three generations in jail because they could not pay $10 apiece in fines to a corporation ‘squire, who might as well have demanded $10,000 as $10. There was a mother, her three months’ old baby and a grandmother besides two little children who could not walk, huddled together in a foul prison fighting off rats. Can such conditions prevail in Russia? I doubt it. I know they would not be tolerated in monarchial England or Germany. The men of this nation who permit such outrages are cowards.
The so-called judge who sentenced the women and children to jail without mercy is an ardent church-goer. Last Sunday 2,000 miners and their wives and children marched-it’s an old custom and second nature of miners to hold processions. The church people sent the Cossacs to tell us not to play the band or do any singing, as they were praying. Perhaps if we had disobeyed we would nave been in contempt or court.
Mrs. Dot Smith, Aged 19, and Her Three- Months-Old Baby, Sentenced to 20 Days in County Jail For Beating a Tomato Can and Making Sarcastic Remarks While a Scab Was Passing Her House.
Hellraisers Journal – Thursday June 22, 1911 Greensburg, Pennsylvania – Mothers and Babes Locked Up in Rat-Infested Jail
From the Arkansas Democrat of June 20, 1911:
MOTHERS AND BABES TO JAIL ———- In Famous Westmoreland Coal Strike, Which Has Been in Progress Nearly 18 Months, Company is Said to be Taking Severe Steps to End Trouble. ———-
(By Gilson Gardner.)
Greensburg, Pa.-(Staff Special.)-The famous Westmoreland coal strike, which has been in progress nearly a year and a half, has reached a new stage. To win, the coal companies now find it necessary to send mothers with babes and little girls to the county bastile.
A little crippled girl, 14 years old, was sitting on the front porch of her home when the village scab went by on his way from work. The little girl began to laugh at the scab and to sing, “Will There Be Any Stars in My Crown?” For this the town constable, Pat McDonough, in behalf of the Westmoreland Coal Company, swore out a warrant and had it served by the deputy constable. The little crippled girl was arrested, taken to Irwin, a village two miles away, where she was brought up before the local justice of the peace-“Squire” H. L. Meeroff. Tho squire found the cripple girl guilty of “breaking the peace” and sentenced her to the county jail for 20 days. So the prisoner was taken 10 miles to Greensburg, where she was locked up in a jail provided for hardened criminals.
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