Tag: Italian Hall Massacre

Hellraisers Journal: From the International Socialist Review: “The Gunmen and the Miners” by Eugene Victor Debs

Janet RayeEugene Victor Debs
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Quote Mother Jones, Clean Up Baldwin Gunthugs, Speech Aug 4 Montgomery WV—————

Hellraisers Journal – Wednesday September 2, 1914
Eugene Debs Advocates for Creation of a Gunmen Defense Fund

From the International Socialist Review of September 1914:

The Gunmen and the Miners

By Eugene V. Debs

Death Special, ISR p727, June 1914

The time has come for the United Mine Workers and the Western Federation of Miners to levy a special monthly assessment to create a GUNMEN DEFENSE FUND.

This fund should be sufficient to provide each member with the latest high power rifle, the same used by the corporation gunmen, and 500 rounds of cartridges.

In addition to this every district should purchase and equip and man enough Gatling and machine guns to match the equipment of Rockefeller’s private army of assassins.

This suggestion is made advisedly and I hold myself responsible for every word of it.

If the corporations have the right to recruit and maintain private armies of thieves, thugs, and ex-convicts to murder striking workingmen, sack their homes, insult their wives, and roast their babes, then labor unions not only have the right but it is their solemn duty to arm themselves to resist these lawless attacks and defend their homes and loved ones.

To the miners especially do these words apply, and to them in particular is this message addressed.

Paint Creek [West Virginia], Calumet [Michigan], and Ludlow [Colorado] are of recent occurrence.

You miners have been forced out on strike,and you have been made the victims of every conceivable method of persecution.

[For attempting to organize,] you have been robbed, insulted and treated with contempt; you have seen your wives and babes murdered in cold blood before your eyes.

You have been thrown into foul dungeons where you have lain for months for daring to voice your protest against these cruel outrages and many of you are now cold in death with the gaping bullet wounds in your bodies to bear mute testimony to the efficacy of government by gunmen as set up in the mining camps by the master class during the last few years.

Under government by gunmen you are literally shorn of the last vestige of liberty and you have absolutely no protection under the law. When you go out on strike, your master has his court issue the injunction that strips you of your power to resist his injustice, and then has his private army of gunmen invade your camp, open fire on your habitations, and harass you and your families until the strike is broken and you are starved back into the pits on your master’s terms. This has happened over and over again in all the mining states of this union.

Now the private army of gunmen which has been used to break your strikes is an absolutely lawless aggregation.

If you miners were to arm a gang of thugs and assassins with machine guns and repeating rifles and order them to march on the palatial residences of the Rockefellers, riddle them with bullets, and murder the inmates in cold blood, not sparing even the babes, if there happened to be any, how long would it be before your officials would be in jail and your unions throttled and put out of business by the law?

The Rockefellers have not one particle more lawful right to maintain a private army to murder you union men than you union men would have to maintain a private army to murder the Rockefellers.

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Hellraisers Journal: Mother Jones Arrives in Seattle, Guest of Honor at Labor’s Memorial Day Parade, Speaks of Ludlow Massacre

Janet RayeHellraisers Journal
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Quote re Ludlow Monument ed, UMWJ June 21, 1917, page 4—————

Hellraisers Journal – Sunday May 31, 1914
Seattle, Washington – Labor’s Memorial Day Honors Martyrs; Mother Jones Speaks

Mother Jones Coming to Seattle crpd, Stt Str p2, May 29, 1914

A grand parade, sponsored by the Central Labor Council and the local Socialist Party,  was held yesterday in Seattle to honor those who have died as martyrs in the cause of Labor. Mother Jones was the honored guest and the featured speaker at the mass meeting held at the corner of Third and Blanchard Street where the parade ended. She rode at the head of the parade in an automobile which was followed by a thousand coal miners who had been invited to Seattle for that purpose. Following the miners, came marching members of all the various trade unions of Seattle. Some estimates are that six to eight thousand unionists marched in the parade.

LABOR’S MEMORIAL DAY PARADE

From The Seattle Post-Intelligencer of May 31, 1914:

Their banners and emblems draped in mourning, and each wearing a tag bearing a picture of Mother Jones, noted labor leader, who was the guest of honor and speaker of the day, in their coat lapels, thousands of members of organized and unorganized labor turned out yesterday in a monster parade and mass meeting to memorialize their fellow workers who have died in fighting industrial battles. It was the first observance of its kind ever held in the United States, and the huge success which it met prompted those in charge of the project to stamp it an annual affair…

The appearance of Mother Jones, familiarly called “the most devout friend of labor,” was the feature of the program. The aged labor leader addressed two large open air meetings at Third Avenue and Blanchard…

[Emphasis added.]

From The Seattle Daily Times of May 31, 1914:

The central figure of the parade was “Mother” Mary Jones, the noted coal strike leader who was the orator of the day. She rode in an auto with six children and A. Hutcheson, secretary of the joint [trade union and Socialist] committee.. and was cheered early and often along the line.

[Emphasis added.]

Three floats, covered in flowers, lead the three sections of the parade. One was dedicated to the memory of the “The Children of Calumet,” another honored “The Women and Children of Ludlow,” and a third remembered “The Heroes of Labor Who Have Lost Their Lives in Industrial Battles.”

THE SPEECH OF MOTHER JONES

Mother delivered the main address of the day; her speech, in part:

During the Civil War the emancipation of the slaves in the South was brought in as one of the leading measures. Today there is another war-a great war with a bunch of high-class burglars and looters, and the measure of this conflict is the emancipation of the mine workers and the nationalization of the mines. Why should we permit a bunch of burglars to own the mines? Nature did not put that mineral in the bottom of the earth for them. It was put there for the use of the people.

She spoke of that terrible day at Ludlow, of the machine-gun fire which tore through the tents, of the women and children whose bodies were taken from the death pit:

This happened right here in America, not in Russia or in Mexico, but right here under the American flag.

The peculiar thing about it all is that the public in general has not been aroused to a very noticeable extent. It seems that the public has to be struck by a cyclone before it will come to the realization of the actual state of affairs.

While I was down in Washington not very long ago, a Congressman asked me if I told the mine workers to buy guns. I replied that I certainly had told my boys to arm themselves and to do it in a hurry. And I am still appealing to mine workers and other workers all over the United States to arm themselves and be prepared to protect their families and their property. I would not be a fit woman to live in America if I did not tell my boys to be men and not cowards.

Get together, is my message to labor. The worker who has a label on him is not true to the working class. I was a member of the old Knights of Labor, and went into the American Federation of Labor when the Knights disbanded, and I will live and die in the Federation for it represents 2,500,000 workers.

I have been a Socialist for more than twenty-nine years, but I am not one of those who believe that individual freedom is going to drop down from the clouds-while we sleep. The fight can be won, and will be won, but the struggle will be long and education, agitation and class solidarity all must play a part in it. I have no patience with those idealists and visionaries who preach fine spun theories and cry down everybody but themselves. Let us keep our feet on the ground.

[Emphasis added.]

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Hellraisers Journal: From the Michigan Miners’ Bulletin: “Copper Strike Declared Off”-Men Must Surrender Their Union Cards in Order to Return to Work

Janet RayeHellraisers Journal
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Quote Mother Jones, Stick Together, MI Mnrs Bltn p1, Aug 14, 1913—————

Hellraisers Journal – Wednesday April 15, 1914
Keweenaw Copper Country of Michigan – W. F. of M. Declares Strike Off

From the Michigan Miners Bulletin of April 14, 1914:

MI Copper Strike Off, Mnrs Bltn p1, Apr 14, 1914

Copper Strike Declared Off
———-

By Referendum Vote Taken Sunday Demands of Men Granted
With But One Exception.–Strikers Return to Work
———-

At a meeting of the District Union held Wednesday April 8th in which every local of the Federation in this district was represented, it was decided that, if the strike was to be continued, the relief benefits would have to be reduced, and that accommodations would have to be furnished for several hundred families now living in company houses. After thoroughly debating the subject, it was decided to put the matter before the men on strike. Meetings were arranged for the Ahmeek and Calumet locals on Friday and the Hancock and South Range on Saturday when the strikers were informed of the proposed reduction in benefits, and of other obstacles confronting them.

Two propositions were put to the men viz: To either make further sacrifices regarding benefits, or return to work which was put to a referendum vote on Sunday with the result that the men decided on the latter. At the meetings held prior to taking a referendum of the proposition, the question was thoroughly discussed, and the men realizing that all concessions asked at the time of the calling of the strike had been granted by the Mining Companies with the exception of recognition of the union, they felt as though this demand might be waived, and that they could return to work with the feeling that the strike had been practically won.

If the refusal of the Mining Companies to recognize the Western Federation of Miners does in any measure prove balm to their wounded feelings, and give them a sense of having retained their dignity to the end, well may it be cherished in their bosoms. Their only demand is that all union men returning to work must surrender of his union membership card, but whether the fires of unionism which finds a home in his breast can be quenched by forcing a man to renounce his organisation remains to be seen. The turning of the pages of time will only tell. The need of organization among the working classes is forcing itself upon us more day by day, and it it does not devolve on the Calumet & Hecla, the Homestake, nor any corporation to stay the wheels of progress….

The strike with its attendant privations, suffering and sacrifice, the determination and valor displayed by the men and women in the ranks has been a stimulus to organized labor throughout the nation, and instead of a defeat, it is one of the most glorious victories ever achieved by the workers. You have gained ground that will never be retaken. The Western Federation of Miners and organized labor everywhere yet consider you striking copper miners as a part of the great army fighting for the liberty of the working class.

Your sacrifices and indomitable courage in this fight, your privations during the past nine months is proof positive of your agreement and pledge to the principles of united action which you are now called upon to repudiate. God knows it was barely possible for a man with a family to subsist on the meager benefits furnished by your brother worker, but he who so freely gave his small wage made almost as much sacrifice as you have made. He furnished subsistence while you fought at the front. You are comrades, brothers, and an injury to one is the concern of all….

All the beatings, insults,and bloodshed, all the lives crushed out in the Italian hall disaster where some half hungered innocent little children were trampled and smothered to death cannot be laid at the door of the striking miners. The victory you have wrested from the hands of organized greed is bathed in the blood of those of your class whose lives were needlessly sacrificed upon the gory altar of capitalism. This fight for industrial freedom is no child’s play, and requires men of nerve and courage as well as brawn, intelligence, and a determination born of desperation. Can you fill these requirements? Can you measure up to the full stature of the independent manhood? Cast bigotry, hatred, prejudice, nationality and religious bondage to the Four winds and stand out a clean cut workingman, class conscious, and with every drop of your blood, fight the battle of your class. Herein lies your only hope, and the hope of the world.

———-

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Hellraisers Journal: Annie Clemenc, on Fund Raising Tour with Ella Reeve Bloor, Tells of Her Fights for Labor’s Cause

Janet RayeHellraisers Journal
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Quote Carlo Tresca re Annie Clemenc, Daring Woman, Freedoms Banner Iola KS, Feb 7, 1914—————

Hellraisers Journal – Saturday March 14, 1914
March 4th at Milwaukee Federated Trades Council
-Annie Clemenc Speaks on Michigan Copper Strike, Beaten, Slashed, Shot At

From The Milwaukee Leader of March 5, 1914:

Annie Clemenc Tells of Her Fight MI Copper Strike, Mlk Ldr p1, Mar 5, 1914

From The Dayton Herald of March 13, 1914:

Annie Clemenc w Mother Bloor on Tour, Dayton Hld p15, Mar 13, 1914Annie Clemenc w Mother Bloor on Tour 2, Dayton Hld p15, Mar 13, 1914

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Hellraisers Journal: “Calumet Witnesses Repeat Charges That Man Wearing Alliance Button Started Christmas Eve Death Rush.”

Janet RayeHellraisers Journal
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Quote Mother Jones, Stick Together, MI Mnrs Bltn p1, Aug 14, 1913—————

Hellraisers Journal – Thursday March 12, 1914
Calumet, Michigan – House Committee Hears Testimony on Italian Hall Disaster

From The Indianapolis Sunday Star of March 8, 1914:

SWEAR STRANGER STIRRED UP PANIC
———-
Calumet Witnesses Repeat Charges That
Man Wearing Alliance Button Started
Christmas Eve Death Rush.
———-

STORIES OF WITNESSES VARY
———-
Prosecutor Conducts Inquiry to Determine
Truth of Story That Children Died
as Result of Premeditated Plot.
———-
Citizens Alliance Button, MI Cpr Strike 1913-1914, Copper Country Historical Page

CALUMET, Mich., March 7.-Persons who testified before the coroner’s inquest last January that a man wearing a “Citizens’ Alliance” button started the Christmas eve panic, here in Italian Hall today, repeated their assertions before Representatives Taylor of Arkansas and Casey of Pennsylvania, congressional investigators.

Description of the man varied as greatly as it did before the coroner’s jury, which body disregarded this line of testimony in reaching an open verdict.

O. N. Hilton was present to represent the Western Federation of Miners, but he was not allowed to question the witnesses as the full committee at Houghton had agreed that Anthony Lucas, prosecutor of Houghton County, and the committee members should do all the questioning.

Wore Button on Coat.
Mrs. Josephine Leskela [Leskella] testified that she was near the middle of the hall when a man who stood alongside her yelled “fire, fire” and then started for the door. She said he was a large man with a long overcoat and that he wore the button of the Citizens’ Alliance on his coat.

John Burogr, 18 years old [John Burcar, age 13], said the cry of “fire” was given by a short stout man.

“He wore a long overcoat with the fur collar turned up and had a Citizens’ Alliance button on his breast pocket,” said this witness.

Could Not See Lettering.
Mrs. Mary Koskolos [Koskela] said a large stout man cried “fire, rush,” and the panic started. She said he wore a button, but she could not distinguish the lettering on it.

Mrs. Elisha Lesh [Elin Lesh] heard a male voice cry “fire” twice in English, and then its Slavonic equivalent, “watra.”

Mrs. Anna Lustig, who lost a little boy in the rush, was positive that the man who cried “fire” wore the insignia of the Citizens’ Alliance.

Another 12-year-old boy, Frank Shaltz [Schaltz], said he heard a man, wearing a “white button, with a red inscription,” cry “fire.” He said the man had a dark mustache and he recognized  him as one he had seen on the street several weeks before, carrying a club.

This One Saw Two Men.
Eric Ericcson [Erick Erickson] testified that he heard some one behind him yell “fire.” He turned to see who had uttered the cry and saw two well-dressed men moving toward the door. Both wore Citizens’ Alliance buttons, he said. He could not swear that either of these men raised the cry.

Charles Olsen said he was standing on a chair when he heard a cry of “fire” in English, and no other language. He saw the man, he said, and he described him as being 5 feet 8 inches in height and wearing a dark gray overcoat and gray cap. The witness thought the button the man wore on his coat was the badge of the Citizens’ Alliance, although he was not close enough to say positively.

Paul Jakkola said he was standing in the vestibule when a man wearing the alliance button came up the stairway and shouted “fire” twice. Witness said he was a good-sized man, wearing a coat with a corduroy collar and a fur cap pulled over his forehead. He had a dark mustache.

[Photograph and emphasis added.]

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Hellraisers Journal: House Sub-Committee Hearings on Mine Conditions Underway in Denver, Colorado and Hancock, Michigan

Janet RayeHellraisers Journal
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Quote Federation Call by John Sullivan, Mnrs Bltn 1913 1914, MI Copper Strike—————

Hellraisers Journal – Saturday February 14, 1914
House Sub-Committee Hearings Underway in Colorado and Michigan

From The Day Book of February 14, 1914
Representatives Casey, Howell and Taylor Are on the Job in Michigan:

MI House Investigation Com, Day Book p9, Feb 14, 1914

From The Indianapolis News of February 9, 1914
U. S. Sub-Committees to Investigate Mining Conditions in Michigan and Colorado:

HOWELL SNOWBOUND;
STRIKE INQUIRY DELAYED
———-

CONGRESSIONAL COMMITTEE IN MICHIGAN LACKS QUORUM.
———-
REPRESENTATIVES KEPT IN
———-

HANCOCK, Mich., February 9.-The train bearing Representative Joseph Howell, of Utah, the member necessary to make a quorum of the congressional investigating committee, was reported storm-bound somewhere on the lower peninsula today and prospects for a meeting dwindled as the day advanced. Chairman Taylor said that it was unlikely that hearings would begin before tomorrow.

The heaviest snowfall of the winter has kept Mr. Taylor and Representative Casey of Pennsylvania indoors since their arrival on Saturday and they have had no opportunity to see any of the copper country beyond the range of vision from their hotel.

—————

OPENS HEARING IN DENVER
———-
Congressional Subcommittee Seeks Evidence
of Law Violations.

DENVER, Colo., February 9.-Hearing of testimony in the federal investigation of the Colorado coal miners’ strike began in the senate chamber of the state capitol today. The subcommittee of the house committee on mines and mining which arrived from Washington yesterday, will hold hearings in Denver and at Trinidad, Pueblo, Boulder and other points, to determine whether federal statutes have been violated and to determine on recommendations for the settlement of the Colorado strike and the prevention of future labor struggles.

When today’s hearing opened E. V. Brake, deputy labor commissioner; Professor Russell D. George, state geologist, and James Dalrymple, chief coal mining inspector, gave testimony as to general coal mining conditions in Colorado.

Two distinct strikes are included in the investigation, to be made by the committee. The miners in the northern Colorado coal fields were called out in April 1910, and that strike never has been settled. Since then, many of the strikebreakers who took the places of the union men have been organized by the United Mine Workers of America, and a considerable part of them walked out with the southern men when the strike of all the coal miners in the state was called on September 23, 1913.

The investigating committee consists of Martin D. Foster (Dem.), Chairman, Illinois; James Francis Byrnes (Dem.), South Carolina; John M. Evans (Dem.), Montana; Richard Wilson Austin (Rep.), Tenn., and Howard Sutherland (Rep.), West Virginia.

[Emphasis added.]

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Hellraisers Journal: The Children of Calumet-a Poem by Bert Leach and a Drawing by Maurice Becker

Janet RayeHellraisers Journal
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Quote re Annie Clemenc at Mass Funeral Calumet, Day Book p4, Jan 6, 1914—————

Hellraisers Journal – Wednesday February 11, 1914
CALUMET! Poetry by Bert Leach and Artwork by Maurice Becker

From The Coming Nation of February 1914
-formerly The Progressive Woman:

POEM Calumet by Bert Leach, The Coming Nation Vol 1, p6, Feb 1914

From The Masses of February 1914:

DRWG Calumet by M Becket, Masses p9, Feb 1914

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Hellraisers Journal: International Socialist Review: “Calumet” by Leslie H. Marcy, Part II-Profits, Wages and Working Conditions

Janet RayeHellraisers Journal
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Quote re Annie Clemenc at Mass Funeral Calumet, Day Book p4, Jan 6, 1914—————

Hellraisers Journal – Tuesday February 3, 1914
“Calumet” by Leslie H. Marcy, Part II-Profits, Wages and Working Conditions

From the International Socialist Review of February 1914:

Calumet MI by LH Marcy, ISR p453, Feb 1914

[Part II of II]

Italian Hall Massacre Calumet MI, Small White Caskets, ISR p457, Feb 1914

We have seen how the copper country is governed by an “invisible government”; from the judge on the bench, to the grand jury in session; from the national guard of the state of Michigan, on “duty,” since July 24, 1913, to the sheriff with his hundreds of imported professional strike breakers whom he swore in as deputies. The Calumet and Hecla Mining Company, Calumet, is the invisible government of Michigan.

This poor-little-rich corporation was “created” in the early fifties. According to a statement given out by Attorney Peterman, and endorsed by General Manager W. F. Denton, and General Manager C. L. Lawton, we find this devout confession: ”The profits of the Calumet and Hecla have been large, but they were due solely to the fact that the Creator put such rich ore in the company’s ground.”

However, Congress in the year of our Lord, 1852, seems to have been in total ignorance of this little gift on the Creator’s part to the copper crowd, for we find that “it gave to the state of Michigan 750,000 acres of public land, to aid it in building a ship canal around the Falls of St. Mary. The state in turn bargained this land to the contractors who built the canal, at a dollar and a quarter an acre. The lands thus disposed of at so beggarly a price were supposed to be swamp, or overflowed lands, but somehow, and strange to say, a part of them are now the rocky matrices from which the Calumet and Hecla has long been extracting shot-copper,-that company having in some way got hold of them. Years later a man named Chandler, who claimed to have bought the same land over again from the State of Michigan, brought a suit to dispossess the copper company,-charging all sorts of fraud in the switching of swamps so as to be quarries of copper-bearing rock. But the Supreme Court ruled against him, on the ground that as he got his deed from the state, he was in no better plight than the state, and that the state could not go back on its first deed to the canal contractors: so the Calumet and Hecla people kept it.”

This “good thing” was capitalized for $2,500,000 in shares of $25 each, instead of $100-note that. Of this $25 a share, only $12 was paid in. A total cash investment of $1,200,000. According to the Mining and Engineering World of December 27th, Calumet and Hecla has declared dividends on issued capitalization to December 1, 1913, amounting to $121,650,000, or $1,216 a share or $101 profits for each dollar invested.

Dividends for 1900 amounted to 320 per cent; for 1906, 280 per cent; for 1907, 260 per cent. In the Boston market, the stock was quoted on the day before New Years, at 427, bid price. Bearing in mind that the par value of the shares is but $25, this figure means that the stock is now worth more than 1,700 per cent, and bearing in mind also that only $12 a share was actually paid in, it means more than 3,400 per cent, market value. The president of the company receives a salary greater than the president of the United States.

Not long ago, when dividends threatened to be unusually enormous, the company purchased an extensive island in Lake Superior, stocked it with the finest game, and it is now used by stockholders of the company as a hunting preserve.

And the capitalists, who have never seen the inside of a mine shaft, who have stolen and defrauded to gain possession of the Calumet mines, have refused to permit their wage slaves, who produce all the wealth brought out of the mines, to organize into a union. They have denied the right of these workers to organize to demand more wages and better working conditions. Their arrogance is summed up in the words “We have nothing to arbitrate.”

These capitalists want MORE labor from the laborers. They are not satisfied with having stolen hundreds of millions from the men who have dug the wealth from the dangerous recesses of the earth. They demand still MORE.

* * * * * * *

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