Now is the time, Boys…
We can make it if you muster
all the strength you have left.
-Manus Duggan
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Hellraisers Journal, Sunday July 21, 1918
Chicago, Illinois – Butte Miners Describe Horrors of Mine Fire
On June 15th, there came forward two miners from the city of Butte to testify for the defense in the federal conspiracy trial against leaders of the Industrial Workers of the World. The miners quietly and calmly described the horrors they had witnessed during and immediately following the mine fire that claimed the lives of 164 of their fellow miners.
From the Billings Morning Gazette of July 16, 1918:
BUTTE CITY OF WIDOWS SAYS WOBBLY
—–
The Daily Missoulian June 10, 1917
CHICAGO, July 15.-“Butte is a city of widows,” said Murta Shay [Murty Shea], a witness at the I. W. W. conspiracy trial today. John Muzilech [Musevich], a miner, told of the fire in the Speculator mine in June, 1917, declaring that the workers were trapped behind cement bulkheads which contained no doors. “We found the bodies piled in heaps against these bulkheads,” he said.
Joseph Kennedy, recording secretary of the Metal Mine Workers of Butte, testified he had joined the I. W. W. in 1917. Since 1909, he said, he had worked about six years under ground in Butte and had never seen a mine inspector in the workings.
George Taylor of Fernwood, Idaho, testified he had worked in lumber camps on St. Mary’s river for many years, but was made, a deputy sheriff last summer during the lumber strike there. He said there was no disorder but that many I. W. W. members who went into the woods to fight forest fires were arrested and locked in a stockade on their return.
—–
[Newspaper clipping added.]
Report from Defendant Harrison George:
[Testimony of Murty Shea]
Next upon the stand [June 15th] came a stalwart, broad-shouldered man, a pleasant-mannered Irish miner from Butte, who told in that nonchalant way usual to those whose every hour of labor is an hour of peril how he and a few other miners had fought their way through that hell of flame and smoke which swept the Speculator Mine in June, 1917, and left its sacrifice to greed in the form of 174 burned and mangled men. The story of this man, who walked out of the jaws of death into the Chicago courtroom is worth perusal.
We appeal to you then, fellow countrymen,
to rally around the only banner that
symbolises hope for you in America as in Ireland
–the banner of Socialism.
-James Connolly
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Hellraisers Journal, Tuesday May 12, 1908
James Connolly Speaks to Irish Workers of America
From The Harp of May 1908:
To Irish Wage Workers in America
James Connolly
Fellow-Workers:
As all the political forces of the United States are busily engaged to-day in lining up for the great conflict of the Presidential election of 1908, as on every hand there is a measuring of strength, a scanning of ‘issues’, and a searching of souls we desire on our part to approach you for the purpose of obtaining your earnest consideration of our principles before determining where to cast your support in the campaign. Let us reason quietly together! We speak to you as fellow workers and as fellow countrymen, and we ask where do you stand in politics to-day? Hitherto the Irish in the United States have almost entirely supported the Democratic Party, but the time has come when the majority of thoughtful Irishmen are beginning to realise that as the causes that originally led to that affiliation are no longer existent, the affiliation itself must be reconsidered. Political parties must thrive or fail according to the present development of the class in society they represent, and cannot be kept alive by a mere tradition of their attitude in past emergencies. The antagonism of the Democratic party towards the Know Nothing movement in the past won for it the support of the Irish Workers, but Know Nothingism is not an issue to-day, and as the Democratic party is going down to an unhonored grave because of its inability to grasp the problems of our own time shall we Irish Workers suffer ourselves to be dragged to social perdition with it?
