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Hellraisers Journal – Saturday August 27, 1910
“The Irwin Coal Strike” by Thomas F. Kennedy, Part III
From the International Socialist Review of August 1910:
[Part III of III]
At a Socialist meeting at Jamison No. I on the evening of July 8 three well known scabs walked up and took seats on the grass in the middle of the crowd. Several armed deputies were also present, and we heard later that a large body of these cut-throats were concealed nearby. The purpose of course was to irritate the strikers so they would attack the scabs and use this as an excuse for whole sale murder. They were disappointed because the scabs were not molested, except for the scourging usually given scabs and deputies by the speakers.
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Not a single beer keg, beer case, beer bottle or whiskey bottle around any camp that I have visited. Not a sign of intoxication. This is one of the gratifying features of the strike.
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Numerous dynamite explosions have occurred throughout the district during the strike. No one was injured and no damage to property resulted. If experienced miners accustomed to using explosives had been guilty of such folly there would be somebody or something destroyed. I have not the slightest doubt about declaring that this is the work of the operators or their agents, or of deputies who want their $5.00 day jobs to last and who perhaps are doing it without the knowledge of the sheriff or his employers, the operators.
One of the noteworthy features of the strike is the sympathy displayed by the farmers. And it is no mere lip sympathy either, but takes the good substantial form of defying the coal corporations and permitting the strikers to erect tents on their farms right under the noses of the scabs.
