Tag: June 1920

Hellraisers Journal: Whereabouts & Doings of Mother Jones for June 1920, Part II: Found Speaking in Mingo County, WV: “You can’t make me take back water”

Janet RayeHellraisers Journal
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Quote Mother Jones, Every Damned Robber, Wmsn WV, June 20, 1920, Speeches Steel p222———-

Hellraisers Journal – Sunday July 25, 1920
-Mother Jones News for June 1920, Part II
Found Speaking in Williamson, Mingo County, West Virginia

From Hellraisers Journal of June 23, 1920:

Williamson, West Virginia – Sunday Evening June 20, 1920
-Mother Jones Speaks at Public Meeting in Front of Courthouse.

[Excerpts from Part II of Speech of Mother Jones]

[Mother Jones on Agitators.]

Mother Jones, NYC Dly Ns p12, May 7, 1920

I went to a meeting and the secretary of the steel workers went with me. He got up to speak. They took him. The next fellow got up; they took him. I got up. They arrested me. I wouldn’t walk. They had to ride me. A big old Irish buck of a policeman said, “You will have to walk.” “No, I can’t.” “Can you walk?” “No, I can’t.” “We will take you down to jail and lock you up behind the bars.”

After a few minutes the chief came along.
“Mother Jones?”
“Yes, sir.”

“There is some of the steel managers here want to speak to you.”
“All right, let the gentlemen come in. I am sorry gentlemen, I haven’t got chairs to give you.” (Laughter.)

One good fellow says, “Now, Mother Jones, this agitation is dangerous. You know these are foreigners, mostly.”
“Well, that is the reason I want to talk to them. I want to organize them into the United States as a Union so as to show them what the institution stands for.”

“They don’t understand English,” he says.
I said, “I want to teach them English. We want them into the Union so they will understand.”
“But you can’t do that. This agitation won’t do. Your radicalism has got to go.”
I said, “Wait a minute, sir. You are one of the managers of the steel industry here?”
“Yes.”
“Wasn’t the first emigrant that landed on our shore an agitator?”
“Who was he?”
“Columbus. Didn’t he agitate to get the money from the people of Spain? Didn’t he agitate to get the crew, and crossed the ocean and discovered America for you and I?

“Wasn’t Washington an agitator? Didn’t the Mayflower bring over a ship-full of agitators? Didn’t we build a monument to them down there in Massachusetts. I want to ask you a question. Right today in and around the City of Pittsburgh I believe there has assembled as many as three hundred thousand people [bowing the knee to Jesus during Easter season.] Jesus was an agitator, Mr. Manager. What in hell did you hang him for if he didn’t hurt your pockets?” He never made a reply. He went away.

He was the manager of the steel works; he was the banker; he was the mayor; he was the judge; he was the chairman of the city council. Just think of that in America—and he had a stomach on him four miles long and two miles wide. (Laughter.) And when you looked at that fellow and compared him with people of toil it nauseated you.

Continue reading “Hellraisers Journal: Whereabouts & Doings of Mother Jones for June 1920, Part II: Found Speaking in Mingo County, WV: “You can’t make me take back water”” →

Hellraisers Journal: Whereabouts & Doings of Mother Jones for June 1920, Part I: Found in Mingo County, WV: “Workers Must Be Waked From Their Sleep.”

Janet RayeHellraisers Journal
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Quote Mother Jones, Doomed, Wmsn WV, June 20, 1920, Speeches Steel, p213———-

Hellraisers Journal – Saturday July 24, 1920
-Mother Jones News for June 1920, Part I
Found Speaking in Williamson, Mingo County, West Virginia

From the Baltimore Evening Sun of June 10, 1920:

REPORTS COMPANIES TERRORIZE MINERS
—–
Lawyers Sent To Pike County, Kentucky, By Union,
Tells Of Brutalities Perpetrated.
—–

FEARFUL DEPUTIES WILL BRING ON GREAT TRAGEDY
—–
Tells Of Man’s Hands Shot Off And Of Others
Chained Together On Long March.
—–

(Special Dispatch to the Evening Sun.)

Mother Jones, NYC Dly Ns p12, May 7, 1920

Charleston, W. Va., June 10.- Conditions in Pike county, Kentucky, are described in a written report to headquarters of the United Mine Worker here by Thomas West, attorney, of Williamson, W. Va., who visited the scene of the trouble. Pike county is opposite Matewan, across Tug river, in which section mine workers are organizing, miners being evicted from their homes by coal companies after joining the union. Frank Keeney, miner’ district president, asked West to go into Pike county, which he did. He reported:

The miners were chained together and, with a mounted armed guard, were walked through to Pike, 25 or 30 miles away, in a pouring rain. Mud was almost knee deep. Pike county deputies shot a man’s bands off on the Kentucky side at Borderland. About 30 of them are terrorizing both aides of the river. The miners came to Williamson and asked for assistance. I would not be surprised to hear any minute of a tragedy which would make the Matewan difficulty look like 30 cents. Pike county deputies were all drunk. In my opinion they constituted one of the most dangerous gangs of men I have ever come in contact with. I would not go back into Pike county for any amount of money.

The Borderland Coal Company and the Pond Creek Coal Company have employed the detectives. Fred Mooney, miners secretary, requested Attorney General Palmer to take some action. Governor Morrow, of Kentucky, was also asked by Mooney to help. It is feared that miners of Matewan will secure arms and cross the Kentucky Border to help their fellow miners. Mother Jones is here and will go to Pike county.

———-

[Photograph added.]

Continue reading “Hellraisers Journal: Whereabouts & Doings of Mother Jones for June 1920, Part I: Found in Mingo County, WV: “Workers Must Be Waked From Their Sleep.”” →

Hellraisers Journal: Eugene Debs, the Socialist Candidate for President, Greets Running Mate, Seymour Stedman

Janet RayeEugene Victor Debs
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Quote EVD re SP n Working Class, Atlanta Cstn p2, May 30, 1920———-

Hellraisers Journal – Sunday June 27, 1920
Atlanta Federal Penitentiary – Debs Greets Stedman with a Kiss

From the Appeal to Reason of June 26, 1920:

EVD Kisses Stedman at Atlanta Pen, AtR p2, June 26, 1920

President Should Pardon Debs

William M. Reedy, in Reedy’s Mirror.

President Wilson should order the release from prison of Eugene V. Debs. He will, if he has any place in that heart which so throbs for humanity in the abstract, for the individual man. He will, if he has any admiration for a man whose convictions defy prison and death. He will, if he has any brotherliness for another who obeys those “voices” which Wilson himself hears and obeys as Socrates did his demon. He will not doom Debs to death for his opinions based on a higher law than that of that man-made, Hobbesian God, the State. I understand that Mr. Debs is in a much weakened condition as the result of his confinement, that his physical plight is such as to make his immurement during hot weather extremely dangerous.

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Hellraisers Journal: Gunthugs Cross Tug River from Mingo County to Inflict Reign of Terror on Pike County Miners

Janet RayeBattle of Blair Mountain of 1921
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Quote Mother Jones, Doomed, Wmsn WV, June 20, 1920, Speeches Steel, p213———-

Hellraisers Journal – Saturday June 26, 1920
Pike County, Kentucky – Miners Marched in Chains by Company Gunthugs

From The Buffalo Labor Journal of June 24, 1920:

Pike Co KY Terrorized by Gunthugs, Ellsworth Co Ldr KS p1, June 24, 1920

EVICTED MINERS IN CHAINS
—–

Charleston, W. Va.-When Pike county (Ky.) miners joined the union they were evicted from company houses, chained together and marched in mud and rain 30 miles by armed guards.

This is one of the sensational statements made in a report to President Keeney, district No. 17, United Mine Workers’ union, by Thomas West, attorney, who investigated Pike county mining troubles. Pike county is opposite Matewan, where several persons were recently killed by Baldwin-Feltz detectives.

[Said the investigator:]

The miners were chained together and were walked in a pouring rain to Pike, 25 or 30 miles away. Mud was almost knee deep. Pike county deputies shot a man’s hands off on the Kentucky side of Borderland. About 30 of them were terrorizing both sides of the river. The Pike county deputies were all drunk. In my opinion they constitute one of the most dangerous gangs of men I ever came in contact with.

[Newsclip added from Ellsworth County Leader of Kansas of June 24, 1920.]

From the Duluth Labor World of June 26, 1920:

MINERS HAVE NO TIME FOR
W. VA. PRIVATE POLICE
—–
Protest Against Continued Use-
Demand That U. S. Senate
Make Investigation.
—–

INDIANAPOLIS, Ind., June 25.— Every possible effort is being made by the United Mine Workers of America to bring about a full and thorough investigation of conditions in West Virginia under which coal miners are employed. The recent battle between coal miners and coal company gun­men at Matewan, W. Va., in which 10 men were killed, has caused the officials of the union to redouble their efforts to induce congress to make a sweeping probe of the situation.

Operating under the guise of private detectives, hundreds of gunmen and thugs, nearly all with criminal records, are employed by coal operators of some fields of West Virginia, and these men enforce a reign of terror among the miners and their families. Miners are beaten, slugged and shot. They are arrested and thrown in prison on no valid pretext whatever.

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Hellraisers Journal: Mother Jones Speaks at Public Meeting in Front of Court House at Williamson, West Virginia, Part II

Janet RayeBattle of Blair Mountain of 1921
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Quote Mother Jones, Every Damned Robber, Wmsn WV, June 20, 1920, Speeches Steel p222———-

Hellraisers Journal – Wednesday June 23, 1920
Williamson, West Virginia – Mother Jones Speaks at Public Meeting, Part II

Williamson, West Virginia – Sunday Evening June 20, 1920
-Mother Jones Speaks at Public Meeting in Front of Courthouse.

SPEECH OF MOTHER JONES at WILLIAMSON, PART II.

[Mother Jones on Agitators.]

Matewan, re Grand Jury, WVgn p1, June 22, 1920
The West Virginian
June 22, 1920

I went to a meeting and the secretary of the steel workers went with me. He got up to speak. They took him. The next fellow got up; they took him. I got up. They arrested me. I wouldn’t walk. They had to ride me. A big old Irish buck of a policeman said, “You will have to walk.” “No, I can’t.” “Can you walk?” “No, I can’t.” “We will take you down to jail and lock you up behind the bars.”

After a few minutes the chief came along.
“Mother Jones?”
“Yes, sir.”

“There is some of the steel managers here want to speak to you.”
“All right, let the gentlemen come in. I am sorry gentlemen, I haven’t got chairs to give you.” (Laughter.)

One good fellow says, “Now, Mother Jones, this agitation is dangerous. You know these are foreigners, mostly.”
“Well, that is the reason I want to talk to them. I want to organize them into the United States as a Union so as to show them what the institution stands for.”

“They don’t understand English,” he says.
I said, “I want to teach them English. We want them into the Union so they will understand.”
“But you can’t do that. This agitation won’t do. Your radicalism has got to go.”
I said, “Wait a minute, sir. You are one of the managers of the steel industry here?”
“Yes.”
“Wasn’t the first emigrant that landed on our shore an agitator?”
“Who was he?”
“Columbus. Didn’t he agitate to get the money from the people of Spain? Didn’t he agitate to get the crew, and crossed the ocean and discovered America for you and I?

“Wasn’t Washington an agitator? Didn’t the Mayflower bring over a ship-full of agitators? Didn’t we build a monument to them down there in Massachusetts. I want to ask you a question. Right today in and around the City of Pittsburgh I believe there has assembled as many as three hundred thousand people [bowing the knee to Jesus during Easter season.] Jesus was an agitator, Mr. Manager. What in hell did you hang him for if he didn’t hurt your pockets?” He never made a reply. He went away.

He was the manager of the steel works; he was the banker; he was the mayor; he was the judge; he was the chairman of the city council. Just think of that in America—and he had a stomach on him four miles long and two miles wide. (Laughter.) And when you looked at that fellow and compared him with people of toil it nauseated you.

Continue reading “Hellraisers Journal: Mother Jones Speaks at Public Meeting in Front of Court House at Williamson, West Virginia, Part II” →

Hellraisers Journal: Mother Jones Speaks at Public Meeting in Front of Court House at Williamson, West Virginia, Part I

Janet RayeBattle of Blair Mountain of 1921
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Quote Mother Jones, Wmsn WV, June 20, 1920, Speeches Steel, p213———-

Hellraisers Journal – Tuesday June 22, 1920
Williamson, West Virginia – Mother Jones Speaks at Public Meeting, Part I

From the Tuscaloosa News of June 21, 1920:

THE GRAND JURY IS INVESTIGATING
THE MATEWAN SHOOTING
—–
“Mother Jones” in West Virginia Coal Fields
Making Speeches to Excite Miners
—–

(By Associated” Press)

Mother Jones, NYC Dly Ns p12, May 7, 1920

WILLIAMSON, W. Va., June 21.-Investigation of the fight between Baldwin-Felts detectives and citizens at Matewan, May 19, in which ten persons were killed, was commenced here today by a special grand jury. Deliberations of the jury will be behind closed doors, and nothing be known of its work until its report is made to the court.

Fifty men of the state constabulary were on duty here following a meeting last night in front of the court house at which “Mother” Jones was the principal speaker. Announcement was made that she would speak tonight at Matewan.

[Photograph and emphasis added.]

Williamson, West Virginia – Sunday Evening June 20, 1920
-Mother Jones Speaks at Public Meeting in Front of Courthouse.

[SPEECH OF MOTHER JONES at WILLIAMSON, PART I.]

[The Pagan Agitator]

The old condition is passing away. The new dawn of another civilized nation is breaking into the lives of the human race.

Away back, eighteen hundred years ago, two hundred years after the world’s savior was hung there arose an agitation. The Roman lords got uneasy about it, and they said, “We have got to stop this agitation and this education. If we don’t they will get the best of us. That won’t do.” They sent down and brought up all those they could get together to come in a hurry to Rome. They either sold them into slavery or held them, and among those that was brought in was a young man. When he came into the Roman court to get his decision the Judge said, “Who are you?”

“I am a man, and a member of the human family.”

“Then why do you carry on this agitation?”

“Because I belong to a class that all down the ages have been robbed, murdered, maligned, crucified, deluded, and because I belong to that class I think it is my duty to be with that class and to put a stop to these crimes.”

I wish I could convey that same spirit that possessed this pagan slave eighteen hundred years ago to every working man in my hearing today. If he possessed that spirit of manhood the other fellow would come and ask us for the right to eat instead of asking him for the right to eat. But we haven’t come to that spirit yet, because all down the ages the system has been going on to enslave us. This pagan slave was not a Christian. By no means. He was a pagan in those days, but he was teaching real Christianity. He was teaching Christ’s Christianity, that an injury to one working man is an injury to all. But they called him a pagan.

Continue reading “Hellraisers Journal: Mother Jones Speaks at Public Meeting in Front of Court House at Williamson, West Virginia, Part I” →

Hellraisers Journal: Whereabouts & Doings of Mother Jones for May 1920, Part II: Found Described by John D. Barry and Speaking in Streator, Illinois

Janet RayeHellraisers Journal
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Quote Labor Unions for Humanity, Streator Dly Free Prs p3, May 24, 1920———-

Hellraisers Journal – Sunday June 20, 1920
-Mother Jones News for May 1920, Part II
Found Described by John D. Barry and Speaking in Streator, Illinois

From The Pacific Commercial Advertiser of May 15, 1920:

Ways of the World by John D Barry, Pacific Com Adv p4, May 15, 1920

AN EVENING WITH MOTHER JONES

BY JOHN D. BARRY

Mother Jones, NYC Dly Ns p12, May 7, 1920
The News
“New York’s Picture Newspaper”
May 7, 1920

A few months ago I heard someone say: “I wonder where Mother Jones is now. I suppose that, like many an other she has pulled in her horns and gone into retirement.”

I thought of those words as I listened to the old lady in Los Angeles recently, on her way to San Francisco, and heard her declare in that deep, strong voice of hers, the highly developed voice of the practiced orator, that she had passed her ninetieth milestone.

“You’ve got a lot of fight in you yet,” said a man who had himself long been a fighter for good cause.

[Mother Jones announced:]

Whenever there’s a fight for labor, I want to be there. I’m still in the ring.

I wondered if those fights hadn’t been the means of keeping her so well and young. She fulfilled the law emphasized by the psychologists, that life, to be a success, must mean persistent devotion to the ideals of the mind and the spirit. Her ideals had been high. They had exacted hard service. She had lived up to them devotedly.

* * *

She knew that a group of us had come to hear her talk and it was characteristic of her good humor to talk freely for our entertainment and enlightenment. She was evidently a born story teller. She had a dramatic quality that, under different circumstances, might have made her a great actress or a great playwright. Her memory was like a series of brilliant slides. Now she would give us one picture, now another.

Continue reading “Hellraisers Journal: Whereabouts & Doings of Mother Jones for May 1920, Part II: Found Described by John D. Barry and Speaking in Streator, Illinois” →

Hellraisers Journal: Whereabouts & Doings of Mother Jones for May 1920, Part I: Found in Washington, DC: Age 90, Still Fit to Battle “Wall Street Sewer Rats.”

Janet RayeHellraisers Journal
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Quote Mother Jones Likes Fighters, WDC Eve Str p4, May 11, 1920———-

Hellraisers Journal – Saturday June 19, 1920
-Mother Jones News for May 1920, Part I
Found in Washington, D. C., Age 90 and Fit to Fight Another 40 Years

From The Washington Times of May 4, 1920:

“SISSIES”
—–
Mother Jones on 90th Birthday Pays Respects
to Prohibition Advocates.
—–

‘SUFFS” GIVE HER PAIN
—–
Wants to Live Forty Years More
to Fight “Wall Street Rats.”
—–

Mother Jones v Suffragists, Topeka St Jr p3, May 4, 1920
The Topeka Daily State Journal
May 4, 1920

Mother Jones came to town today breezily announcing that she had just observed her ninetieth birthday and was fit for forty more years of battle against “them Wall Street sewer rats.”

It was suggested that she might live long enough to see a woman President of the United States.

“May God save us!” she said.

She looked sharply at the reporter.

[She said:]

Maybe you’re one of them fools who’s worrying about the women not getting the ballot. It won’t hurt the country any if they don’t. It’ll help. Colorado elected some good men until them women out there got to voting.

The women of today give me a pain. Whining for the ballot like sick cats! Do you find ’em at home rearing their babes in fine ideals. No, you find ’em at the club uplifting the nation smoking cigarettes or dancing the fol-de-rol, looking like naked hussies. Ask ’em why they don’t put their nightgowns on and they get insulted. Say ‘Hell’ before them like an honest woman and they faint with shame. And where d’ye find their babes? At the picture show.

Reminiscing, she lamented the passing of the era “when the America of Patrick Henry was still on the throne and people were clean and fine and you got pure whiskey.”

“That was seventy-five years ago,” she said. “None of them prohibition sissies running around taking nourishment out of the mouths of honest working men.”

[Newsclip added.]

Continue reading “Hellraisers Journal: Whereabouts & Doings of Mother Jones for May 1920, Part I: Found in Washington, DC: Age 90, Still Fit to Battle “Wall Street Sewer Rats.”” →

Hellraisers Journal: Arthur Gleason on Industrial Feudalism in Logan County, W. V., “Company-Owned Americans”

Janet RayeBattle of Blair Mountain of 1921
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Quote Mother Jones, Organize Logan Co, Nation p724, May 29, 1920———-

Hellraisers Journal – Tuesday June 15, 1920
Logan County, West Virginia – Bastion of Industrial Feudalism

From The Nation of June 12, 1920:

Company-Owned Americans

By ARTHUR GLEASON

Montani semper liberi
(Motto of West Virginia)

WV UMW D17 50 Orgzrs v Don Chafin Logan Co, Hbrg PA Tph p7, Oct 16, 1919
Harrisburg Telegraph
October 16, 1919

THE attorney of the Mine Workers has filed suits against the coal companies who have evicted miners. Each suit is for $10,000 damages for unlawful eviction. This touches the heart of the West Virginia trouble. In the non-union counties, houses are owned by the coal companies. Justice is administered by the coal companies. Constitutional rights are interpreted by the coal companies. Food and clothing are sold (though not exclusively) in company stores. The miners worship in a company church, are preached at by a company pastor; play pool in the company Y. M. C. A.; gain education in a company school; receive treatment from a company doctor and hospital; die on company land. From the cradle to the grave, they draw breath by the grace of the sometimes absentee coal owner, one of whose visible representatives is the deputy sheriff, a public official in the pay of the coal owner. As a worker under similar conditions once said: “We work in his plant. We live in his house. Our children go to his school. On Sunday we go to hear his preacher. And when we die we are buried in his cemetery.”

The employees live in company houses. Everything belongs to the mine owners, and home ownership is not permitted. The lease of the Logan Mining Company reads that when the miner’s employment ceases, “either for cause or without cause the right of said employee and his family to use and occupy premises shall simultaneously end and terminate.” The miners generally pay $8 a month for a four room house, a dollar for coal, 50 cents to a dollar for lights. Fulton Mitchell, deputy sheriff, states:

My understanding is that most of the companies have a form of lease, and when they lease to miners they reserve the right to object to any person other than employees coming on their possessions.

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Hellraisers Journal: From The One Big Union Monthly: Butte Miners’ “Picket Line of Blood” by Ralph Chaplin

Janet RayeHellraisers Journal
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Quote re IWW Martyr Manning ACM Massacre, BDB p1, Apr 26, 1920———-

Hellraisers Journal – Thursday June 10, 1920
Butte, Montana – Metal Miners’ Honor Picket Line of Blood

From The One Big Union Monthly of June 1920:

ACM Massacre Butte, by Ralph Chaplin, OBU Mly p9, June 1920

“The Richest hill in the world” has once more been stained with the blood of workers. Its arrogant industrial autocrats of Butte have again taken refuge in murder to shield themselves from the organized power of the union miners. The lynching of Frank Little has been paralleled by the massacre on Anaconda road. Butte-naked, barren, black—the city of gun-men and widows, of “sweat-holes” and cemeteries, stands out before the world today a blot on what we call civilization. Machine guns and searchlights command the city from the heights. Armed soldiers guard the approaches to the mines and gun-men loiter at every corner, or whiz up and down the streets at all hours of the day and night. There is one place on Anaconda road where everything in sight has been riddled with bullets. The blood of the dead and wounded has hardly dried in the dust. Miners have been told in unmistakable language that their constitutional right to picket means nothing and that the will of the copper trust is mightier than the law of the land. Bloody Butte! It is an ignoble title—ignobly won. But it is a fitting title.

The overlords of Butte will not permit their right to exploit to be challenged. Drunk with unbridled power and the countless millions profiteered during the war, with lying phrases of “law and order” on their lips, the blood of workingmen dripping from their hands and the gold of the government bursting their coffers they face the nation unreprimanded and unashamed—reaction militant, capitalism at its worst. The copper trust can murder its slaves in broad daylight on any occasion and under any pretext. There is no law to call a halt. In the confines of this greed ruled city the gun-man has replaced the Constitution. Butte is a law unto herself.

This huge mining camp is typical of the present stage of capitalism. The parasites of big business, furious with the realization of their approaching doom, are striking at the working class more blindly,more ferociously and more frequently than ever before. Even their most savage anti-labor laws are proving themselves inadequate to darken the rising sun of solidarity.

The gunman and lynch-mob are more and more replacing the law as measures of labor repression. The old maxim “whom the gods would destroy they first make mad” is finding daily confirmation.

Holy grove, Ludlow, Calumet, Everett and Bisbee still stand as grewsome monuments to the White Terror in America. Butte has been added to the list for a second time. Armistice Day in Centralia is only a few month past yet we can no longer refer to it as “yesterday” but the day before. Yesterday was the massacre on Anaconda road. Nobody knows where the blow will fall tomorrow. Things are moving rapidly these days.

Continue reading “Hellraisers Journal: From The One Big Union Monthly: Butte Miners’ “Picket Line of Blood” by Ralph Chaplin” →