Dominico Rapsardo – WE NEVER FORGET

Quote Lawrence Strike Committee, Drunk Cup to Dregs, Bst Dly Glb Eve p5, Jan 17, 1912 —————

Hellraisers Journal – Friday January 19, 1912
Lawrence, Massachusetts – Young Striker, Dominico Rapsardo, Bayoneted by Soldier

From The Boston Globe (Morning Edition) of January 16, 1912:

By JOHN W. CARBERRY.

Lawrence, Jan 15-In an attempt to prevent the operation of the woolen mills today, strikers and their sympathizers incited a riot which compelled the City Government to summon police aid from Salem, Lynn, Haverhill, Everett and Lowell, and to call into service eight companies of militia……

Today, in the clash between militiamen and those supporting the cause of the striking textile workers, one youth, Dominico Rapsardo, was stabbed in the breast by a soldier, and is seriously, though not mortally, wounded.

Many others were injured by being struck with the butts of rifles and the clubs of policemen.

More than 30 were arrested charged with damaging property and disturbing the peace…

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[…..]

Rapsardo Is Struck Down.

[About 10 a. m., at the Atlantic mills, militiamen with fixed bayonets, charged the strikers and drove them across the bridge at Canal st.]

In the charge Dominico Rapsardo of 51 Essex st was wounded. The crowd was packed so densely that those in front did not fall back quickly enough to suit the soldiers, and young Rapsardo received a thrust from a bayonet in his left breast. he fell fainting to the street, and was hastily driven to the General Hospital, badly injured. The bayonet had penetrated the flesh between the ribs, but doctors believed that no vital organ had been pierced.

[…..]

Continue reading “Hellraisers Journal: News from Lawrence Textile Strike: Militia Drives Back Strikers: Young Dominico Rapsardo Bayoneted” →

Quote Lawrence Strike Committee, Drunk Cup to Dregs, Bst Dly Glb Eve p5, Jan 17, 1912 —————

Hellraisers Journal – Thursday January 18, 1912
Lawrence, Massachusetts – Fellow Worker Joe Ettor Urges Strikers to Fight On

From The Boston Sunday Globe of Jan 14, 1912:

Mayor Scanlon Addresses Big Mass Meeting.
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LAWRENCE, Jan. 13-Tonight sees approximately 15,000 Mill operatives out of employment and grave apprehensions are felt that this number may be further increased Monday morning. Some of the mill agents and owners contemplate a general shut down. About 4000 of the men now out are strikers and the rest have been forced out by the closing of several mills.

Joseph J. Ettor of New York, a member of the Executive Board of the Industrial Workers of the World, who has assumed the position of leader of the strikers, in an impassioned speech at a mass meeting in the City Hall this afternoon, urged his audience of 1300 men and women to bend their efforts toward preventing any secession from their ranks…..

[He exhorted:]

Monday morning you have got to close the mills that you have caused to shut down tighter than you have them now.

It is up to you to encourage all to stand by the cause of the workers and get them not to go to work Monday morning. If you want to avoid blood shed remove the cause.

You cannot win by fighting with your fists against men armed or the Militia, but you have a weapon that they have not got.

You have the weapon of labor and with that you can beat them down if you stick together.

[Mayor Scanlon warned that the strikers must obey the law, to which Ettor replied:]

Must Be Firm, Exhorts Ettor.

Leader Ettor said that he, too, was for calmness and for anything that would prevent bloodshed, but, nevertheless, he must insist that whatever blood was spilled was not on the head of the working people, but on those who ground down the laboring class.

[He declared:]

While we wish to be cool and clam, at the same time we must be determined to win the contention for which you have struck. We are here to consider your interests alone. It’s up to you to win, and to do so you must hold together.

He was enthusiastically received and when he later addressed the Italians in their natural tongue there was further demonstration.

[Gilbert Smith, secretary-treasurer of Local 20, I. W. of W., presided at the meeting. Also speaking were Joseph Langiet (French), August Detollanaere (Belgian), Charles L. Webert (Polish), Michael Rusecky (of United Mine Workers, Pittston, Penn., Lithuanian).]

At the conclusion committees were chosen to represent the different nationalities involved in the strike in arranging a plan of action to be reported to a mass meeting in Franco-Belgian Hall tomorrow evening.

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Continue reading “Hellraisers Journal: News from Lawrence Textile Strike: Joe Ettor, IWW Leader, Urges Mill Workers to Stand and Make a Fight” →