Tag: Colorado Miners Jailed by Judge Whitford 1911

Hellraisers Journal: Whereabouts & Doings of Mother Jones for August 1911, Part II: Found Visiting Colorado Miners Jailed by Injunction Judge Whitford

Janet RayeHellraisers Journal
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Quote Mother Jones, Injunction Shroud, Bff Exp p7, Apr 24, 1909—————

Hellraisers Journal – Friday October 27, 1911
Mother Jones News Round-Up for August 1911, Part II
Mother Jones Accompanies Samuel Gompers on Visit to Jailed Miners

On Sunday, August 20th, Mother Jones accompanied Gompers on his visit to the miners jailed by Injunction Judge Whitford, which visit was described in the August 29th edition of The Joliet News (Illinois):

Mother Jones crpd ed, WDC Tx p5, June 18, 1910

President Gompers [while in Denver] en route to the Pacific coast expressed a desire to visit the coal miners who have been made the victims of the abuse of the injunction writ in the strike in the northern coal fields of the state. The committee in charge made suitable arrangements and a trip was made to the quarters of the miners in the jail, where Mother Jones, on behalf of Mr. Gompers, presented the prisoners with a large bouquet of flowers. An informal and impromptu meeting was held and a few remarks made by Mr. Gompers. The prisoner have been accorded the privileges of the court yard and following the meeting inside the jail all retired to the court yard where, with the grated windows of county jail serving as a background, a group picture was taken, President Gompers and Mother Jones being the central figures.

[Photograph added.]

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From The Denver Post of August 21, 1911:

GOMPERS VISITS MINERS IN JAIL
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“Distortions of law” and “byplays of justice” were terms applied to the injunctions issued by District Judge Greeley W. Whitford in the miners’ trouble of northern Colorado by Samuel Gompers, president of the American Federation of Labor, in a speech at Eagles’ hall in the Club building at 2 o’clock Sunday afternoon [August 20th].

Later in the day he visited the miners in jail and told them they were martyrs to labor’s cause and deserved to be ranked with Lincoln and Jefferson in their devotion to the people. He told the men thy suffered no moral stigma and the good their imprisonment is doing for labor could not be measured in words…..

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Hellraisers Journal: Whereabouts & Doings of Mother Jones for July 1911, Found at Greensburg, Pennsylvania; Miners Meet to Call Off Strike

Janet RayeHellraisers Journal
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Quote Mother Jones, Greensburg PA Cmas 1910, Steel 2, p83—————

Hellraisers Journal – Wednesday October 25, 1911
Mother Jones News Round-Up for July 1911
Found at Greensburg, Pennsylvania, Where Miners Meet to Call Off Strike

From Pennsylvania’s Latrobe Bulletin of July 3, 1911:

The Calling Off of the Strike Is
Declared To Be In Sight
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Greensburg the Scene of Special Convention.
Ten Delegates Are Present From the Local Union

Mother Jones crpd ed, WDC Tx p5, June 18, 1910

Behind closed doors, with Francis Feehan presiding, with Mother Jones, Van Bitner and others prominently identified with the strike present, the convention of miners is now on in full swing in Tonkay’s hall, at Greensburg…

The Greensburg Tribune claims to have received authentic information from Indianapolis to the effect that the executive board decided that the strike should end.

Mother Jones, who is at the convention, was in attendance at the International board meeting, last week, and it is said that she made a plea for the strikers…..

[Photograph added.]

From the Pittsburgh Gazette Times of July 6, 1911:

Greensburg Westmoreland PA Miners Give up Strike in Irwin Field, Ptt Gz Pst p1, July 6, 1911

The long and bitter labor struggle of the coal miners in the Irwin-Greensburg field for recognition of the union was brought to a close yesterday. Locals of the United Mine Workers of America met and adopted a resolution to return to work. This action was taken under instructions from the international executive board of the United Mine Workers, which held a special meeting last Monday that resulted in the decision to call a meeting of the locals and order the return to work.

It is believed the miners welcomed the instructions from their executive board. They had been idle for 16 months, during which time many hardships were endured. When notice was served that the payment of strike benefits would cease next week, the men realized that their cause was lost and the struggle hopeless…..

The abrupt ending of the long strike resulted in a divided sentiment among union miners. When it became known yesterday that the locals had concurred in the action of their international executive board, the following circular was sent out to the various locals, signed by Robert Gibbons, Abe Kephart and Andrew Puskar of the miners’ organization of District No. 5:

The miners throughout the Irwin-Greensburg fields today held local meetings at which in every case a vote was taken to call off the strike which has lasted for 16 months. This was compulsory for these poor, misguided brothers, as the International Executive Board in session at Indianapolis headquarters last week voted to discontinue paying strike benefits to them and directed Francis Feehan to call their leaders and arrange to have the strike terminated without recognition or concessions whatever.

Meeting of Leaders.

A meeting of these leaders was held in Greensburg on Monday. International Board Members A. R. Watkins of Ohio, George Dagger of Western Pennsylvania, and Thomas Haggerty of Central Pennsylvania had been delegated to represent the International Union. Mother Jones told the International Board at Indianapolis that it had been a lost cause since last summer. But it was continued until there had been the loss of 18 lives and the useless expenditure of a $1,000,000 of the miners’ money, besides large donations from many of our people and others in sympathy……

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Hellraisers Journal: Whereabouts and Doings of Mother Jones for March 1911: Found in Denver, Colorado, Standing for Freedom of Sixteen Jailed Miners

Janet RayeHellraisers Journal
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Quote Mother Jones, Powers of Privilege ed, Ab Chp III———–

Hellraisers Journal – Monday April 17, 1911
Mother Jones News Round-Up for March 1911:
–Found in Denver Fighting for Sixteen Miners Jailed by Judge Whitford

From the Black Hills Daily Register of March 6, 1911:

Accuses Judge of Bribery
———-

(By Pan-American Press.)

CO Miners in Dnv Co Jail by Jdg Whitford, ISR p525, Mar 1911
Sixteen miners freed from jail with assistance of Mother Jones.
—–

Denver, March 6.-The impeachment investigation against Judge Greeley W. Whitford, which is being conducted by a committee of the Colorado house of representatives, took a most sensational turn when the committee was told by Mrs. Margaret Miller that prior to his sentencing sixteen union men to jail a few mouths ago, she had delivered a package to Whitford which, she alleged, contained $3,000.

Mrs. Miller said she had been on terms of close relationship with Whitford for eight years. She testified that during the Cripple Creek mining troubles she was in the employ of the Mine Owners’ Association. She alleges a man associated with her in those troubles, gave her the money to give to Judge Whitford.

The sixteen miner were released from jail recently by Judge Whitford after serving two months of their sentence.

Union labor organizations all over the state of Colorado united in petitioning for Judge Whitford’s removal from the bench, declaring that the court in sentencing the miners, had found them guilty of a criminal charge without giving them the right of trial by jury. “Mother Jones” played an important part in the freeing of the men by holding immense meetings in all the large cities of the state.

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[Photograph added.]

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Hellraisers Journal: Ten Thousand March in Denver, Colorado, to Protest Whitford’s Injunction, Jailing of 16 Union Miners

Janet RayeHellraisers Journal
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Quote Mother Jones, Powers of Privilege ed, Ab Chp III

———-

Hellraisers Journal – Thursday March 16, 1911
Denver, Colorado – “A Living Protest” by William D. Haywood

From the International Socialist Review of March 1911:

Living Protest by BBH, CO Miners in Jail, ISR p525, Mar 1901
This picture was taken in Denver County Jail where Pettibone,
Moyer, and Haywood were confined previous to being taken
to the penitentiary in Idaho. The men occupy the same
corridor where Haywood’s cell was located.

FEBRUARY the second was a memorable day in Denver, Colorado. Government by injunction received a jolt in the solar plexus that if followed up by a united working class will put the courts out of business.

Ten thousand men and women unionists and Socialists paraded the streets of the Queen City of the Plains, demanding that government by injunction be abolished. They marched in fours and sixes to the capital building. When the Socialist section arrived at the law factory, their band started up the Marseillaise, every red, big and little, singing the battle song of all nations.

From the capital building the parade marched to the city auditorium, where a monster protest meeting was held. Judge Greeley W. Whitford was damned, and denounced for sending sixteen coal miners, members of the U. M. W. A., to jail for a term of one year for the alleged violation of an injunction issued by him. The injunction was one of the blanket style that covers everything and everybody. Prohibited one from breathing in the vicinity of the coal company’s property or looking at one of their strike-breaking pets that they have imported from West Virginia.

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