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Hellraisers Journal – Saturday May 17, 1913
Mother Jones Writes from West Virginia Bastile to Tom Hickey, Editor of The Rebel
From the Oklahoma City Social Democrat of May 14, 1913:
Tag: Mother Mary Harris Jones
Hellraisers Journal: Senator Kern Pushes for Investigation of West Virginia Situation, Meets with Mother Jones in Washington
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Hellraisers Journal – Wednesday May 14, 1913
Washington, D. C. – Senator Kern Pushes for West Virginia Investigation
-Meets with Mother Jones Who Reports on Brutal Conditions
From The Washington Times of May 13, 1913:
ARMED GUARDS KEPT MINERS FROM MAILS,
AGENTS INFORM KERN
—————
Indiana Senator Expected to Demand Immediate Investigation by
Postoffice Department. Resolution for Probe of West Virginia
Peonage Charges Comes Up Today.
———-LABOR LEADERS ALSO TELL OF ALLEGED
ABUSES PRACTICED BY MINE OWNERS
Charging that armed guards in many of the West Virginia mining districts, acting on orders, either from the operators or the State officials, have prevented the miners from having access to the United States mails, men, backing the miners in their contentions, today laid before Senator Kern information startling in its nature.
Senator Kern thus far has given no inkling as to what course he now will pursue as a result of the data just placed in his hands. Whether the Federal law was violated by the operators when they prevented the miners from making use of the mails, is the serious question raised by the reports.
There is every reason to believe that the Indiana Senator will lay the charges before the Postoffice Department and demand immediate investigation.
Under the rules of the Senate, the Kern resolution, calling for a Congressional probe of alleged militarism, peonage, and denial of constitutional rights to the miners of West Virginia, will automatically come before the Senate at 4 o’clock this afternoon. Senator Kern is confident of its passage.
Many Features.
The disclosure of alleged undue interference with the right of the miners to get their mail was one of several important happenings of the day with respect to the West Virginia situation.
A delegation of nearly a dozen representatives of the West Virginia Federation of Labor and representatives of other labor organizations saw Senator Kern at his office this forenoon and laid before him affidavits telling of peonage in the Paint Creek and Cabin Creek regions, and of the reign of terror which has prevailed there for a year.
The representatives of the State federation consisted of J. W. Swan, J. W. Holder, and Harry Wright. They went into detail in the audience with Senator Kern about the outrages of which they allege the mining interests have been guilty at the expense of the helpless miners, and told of the wrongs endured, as they charge, at the hands of the militia.
Tell of Abuses.
Destruction of property of miners, abuses of women and girls, the holding of miners in a condition bordering on vassalage-all these representations and others were made to the Indiana Senator.
[Mother Jones Meets with Senator Kern]
Moreover, Mother Jones, who addressed a labor meeting here last night, saw Senator Kern and related to him the substance of what she had already set forth in her letters to him. Mother Jones is temporarily released by the West Virginia authorities. She believes they would be glad if she would leave the State and not return, but she has no intention of doing this. She will go back to do what she can for the relief of the miners.
Mother Jones ascribes her temporary release to the introduction of the Kern resolution for an investigation. She has told Senator Kern of the conditions under which she was arrested and detained and she has a much different story to set forth about the brutality of her treatment than the one told by Governor Hatfield, which described her as detained in a comfortable private home.
Hellraisers Journal: A Poem by Gerald Lively for Mother Jones and a Letter from the Military Bastile at Pratt, West Virginia
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Hellraisers Journal – Tuesday May 13, 1913
Mother Jones Writes to Mrs. Jamison from the Military Bastile at Pratt, W. Va.
From Solidarity of May 10, 1913:
Hellraisers Journal: Mother Jones Brought to Charleston, Confers with Governor Hatfield, Not Allowed to Speak in Public
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Hellraisers Journal – Monday May 12, 1913
Charleston, West Virginia – Mother Jones Meets with Governor Hatfield
From The Washington Times of May 8, 1913:
“Mother” Jones Out of Martial Law Zone
———-
CHARLESTON. W. Va., May 8.-For the first time since her arrest last February in connection with the coal mine strike, “Mother” Mary Jones, known as the “Angel of the Mines,” was today outside the martial law zone, although technically under surveillance of the military authorities.
“Mother” Jones was brought to Charleston last night, and had an hour’s conversation with Governor Hatfield. She will talk with the governor again today. The aged woman said today her conversation with the chief executive was purely on economic questions. She is not under guard while here, and will not be placed under strict surveillance unless she attempts to make a speech.
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[Photograph and emphasis added.]
From the Duluth Labor World of May 10, 1913:
HATFIELD ADMITS HE’S AN AUTOCRAT
———-
Governor Of West Virginia Attempts to Deny
Charges of Peonage and Tyranny.
———-MOTHER JONES STILL IN MILITARY PRISON
———-
Hatfield Makes Evasive Statement In Which
He Calls His Accusers Liars.
———-CHARLESTON, W. Va., May 8.-Gov. Henry Hatfield of West Virginia, in a statement last night, attacked Senator John W. Kern of Indiana, who is expected to bring up a resolution which he introduced some time ago in the United States senate providing for federal investigation of conditions in the West Virginia coal fields. The governor declares the senator has been misinformed; that the coal strike is over; that he intends to arrest any person “aiding and abetting lawlessness, and that he courts a thorough investigation.” In his statement the governor says:
“I am informed that Senator Kern has made a statement that peonage exists in West Virginia and that Mrs. Mary (Mother) Jones has been on trial before a drum-head military court for the last 30 days.
“In reply to the senator’s statement relative to peonage, I wish to say that his allegation is a fabrication. Mrs. Jones is not now, nor has she at any time since her arrest been in prison. She is being detained (and is not in any way confined) at a pleasant boarding house with a private family on the banks of the Kanawha River at Pratt, W. Va.
Sure, He Is a Czar.
“I do not intend to permit Mrs. Jones or any other person to come into West Virginia and make speeches that have a tendency to produce riot and bloodshed, such as was evidenced under the administration of Governor Glasscock. We have evidence in abundance to prove that the kind of speeches made by Mrs. Jones and her co-workers did bring about a riotous state which resulted in murder and the destruction of property. We have a dozen of the same class of people confined in different jails of the state, some of them guilty of murder, others guilty of aiding and abetting by furnishing the necessary firearms and ammunition with which to commit murder.
Hellraisers Journal: From the Appeal to Reason: “A Stirring Letter from Mother Jones”-Pratt W. Va., Military Bastile
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Hellraisers Journal – Sunday May 11, 1913
From Pratt, West Virginia, Military Bastile: “Stirring Letter from Mother Jones”
From the Appeal to Reason of May 10, 1913:
———-
A Stirring Letter from Mother Jones
(The following letter to Appeal readers from Mother Jones was sent to Mrs. Ryan Walker who is now in New York City, and by her forwarded to us. Had the letter been addressed to the Appeal to Reason it would never have reached its destination. This letter proves that prison bars, even death itself, has no terrors for this brave heroine of more than a hundred fiercely fought battles on the industrial field. Mother Jones is your mother, and I appeal to you to help us raise such a mighty protest that the outrages against the working class in barbarous West Virginia will cease. You have helped the Appeal win many a contest with plutocracy. We are now engaged in the biggest fight of all its career-a fight the outcome of which is of vital concern, not only to our imprisoned comrades in West Virginia, but to every man, woman and child in America. Read Mother Jones, letter-read it from the housetops, in the mines, in the shops, read it aloud wherever men congregate to work.)
Pratt, W. Va., Military Bastile, April 25, 1913.-This is a very serious situation we have here and is not grasped by the outside world and God knows when it will be. I have been in here about eleven weeks. There are twelve of we poor devils, eleven men and myself, one of them the editor of the Socialist paper in Charleston, and another one of our speakers, John Brown. His wife and three children are left to perish outside. We hear the cry of these little ones for their father; we hear the groans and sobs of his beautiful wife, but the dear, well-fed people don’t care for that. I don’t care much for myself, because my career is nearly ended, but I think of my brave boys who are incarcerated in Harrison county jail in Clarksburg and not a voice of protest raised in their behalf. They have been brave and true. They are now paying the penalty for having dared to fight for right and justice; but it matters not, this fight will go on, and the workers themselves will have to take hold of the machinery and pick out the skypilots and lawyers and quit feeding them and giving them jobs. I have been fighting this machine for years with scarcely any help. I am still in the fight and the pirates can’t shut me up even if I am in jail watched by the bloodhounds.
Mother Jones.
[Emphasis added.]
Hellraisers Journal: Mother Jones to Senator Kern: “I send you groans and tears of men, women and children as I have heard them in this state…”-Plea for Investigation
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Hellraisers Journal – Saturday May 10, 1913
From West Virginia’s Military Prison, Mother Jones Sends Message to Senator Kern.
From The Wheeling Intelligencer of May 6, 1913:
KERN RESOLUTION CALLED IN SENATE
BUT IS HELD OVER
———-INDIANA SENATOR GIVES WAY
TO SUNDRY CIVIL BILL
———-
And Resolution Will Come Up Wednesday
-No Reply to Hatfield’s Attack.
———-Intelligencer Bureau.
Washington, D. C. May 5.
The fight over the Kern resolution calling for a sweeping investigation into the Paint Creek and Cabin Creek coal mine strike conditions did not take place today in the United States senate. There was a flutter of excitement when Senator Kern late this afternoon called up his resolution. The excitement died down quickly. Senator Gallinger, interrupting the Indiana man, suggested that the resolution go over until the sundry civil bill had been disposed of, and Senator Kern agreed.
The resolution it is expected will be called up again by Senator Kern on Wednesday. He stated to the Intelligencer correspondent that he does not expect a vote will be cast against.
Senator Kern was deluged with telegrams today urging an investigation. They came from all parts of the country. He received one from “Mother” Jones, who is figuring in the spicy controversy between the Indiana solon and Governor Hatfield, and who is in the coal strike region. Mother Jones wired him as follows:
“From out of the prison walls where I have been forced to pass the eighty-first milestone of life I plead with you for the honor of this nation. I send you groans and tears of men, women and children as I have heard them in this state, and beg of you to force that investigation. Children yet unborn will rise and bless you.“
Signed, Mother Jones.
Facetious Interview.
Senator Kern gave out a facetious interview in reply to Governor Hatfield’s attack upon him. “I guess I’ll have to inlist the services of the McCoy’s,” said Senator Kern laughingly when asked about the Hatfield attack. He added that he had no reply to make to the governor’s statement assailing him. “I have never pretended to have any personal knowledge about conditions in West Virginia,” he said. “I have stated from time to time facts which were presented to me. I felt warranted from those facts in renewing the resolution put in by Senator Borah last session.
“The opposition to the investigation from various quarters has done more to arouse my suspicions that conditions are rotten, than anything else.”
[Photograph and emphasis added.]
Hellraisers Journal: From The Coming Nation: “Military Despotism in West Virginia” by John W. Brown, Part III
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Hellraisers Journal – Thursday May 8, 1913
John W. Brown on West Virginia Despotism: The Military Court Martial
From The Coming Nation of May 3, 1913:
[Part III of III]
The [Military] “Court” convened about 9 a. m. on March the 7th. Squads of soldiers were sent to the different “Bull Pens” in different parts of the town and marshalled the defendants into the Odd Fellows Hall, where the court was in session. After fifty-three of the defendants were present, the Judge Advocate arose and addressed the court.
During his introductory remarks he advised the defendants that Houston and Belsher [Belcher], the attorneys for the United Mine Workers, had declined to appear in court, (he did not say that they refused to prostitute their profession by appearing before such an institution) but that he, as the Governor, or some one else, solicitous for the welfare of the defendants, had graciously and without any expense to the defendants, selected a couple of military men to defend the accused. It here developed that one of the “military lawyers” who was so chosen to defend the accused was one of the gentlemen who sat on the former commission and whose name was signed to the affidavit that the defendants were all guilty of murder and sundry other felonous crimes.
About this time J. W. Brown, one of the defendants, rose and asked the court to define for him his status in the case. The question was a little too big for the Judge Advocate, whereupon Brown tried to elucidate. He asked the judge if the court took the position that the Governor’s declaration of martial law suspended the state and national constitution, a position which the Judge Advocate took before the Supreme Court. This looked too much like a “leading question,” to use the vernacular of the American bar, for the Judge Advocate. He declined to answer, but told Brown to “proceed.” Brown then stated for the benefit of the court that as a citizen of the state of West Virginia and the United States his rights as such were woven and interwoven into the organic law of the State and the Nation.
If this junta had set aside both the State and National Constitution, then he had no rights to defend, as he would then be a subject and not a citizen. This being the case, he had no use for a lawyer and declined to acknowledge the jurisdiction, or the legality of the court and refused to enter a plea one way or another.
“Mother Jones,” the avenging nemesis of the coal miners, took the same position and added that “she had violated no law of the land; that she had done nothing but what she had done all over the United States and would do again when she got out.” Boswell, Battey [Batley], Parsons, and Paulson [Paulsen] took the same position. Parsons, who was quartered in the freight depot where most of the prisoners were kept, stated that he spoke for the “bunch,” to which the genial (!) Judge Advocate replied that he would enter a plea of “not guilty” for the whole “squad.” How kind, after having signed our death warrant!
This act having been performed, the wheels of justice began to grind, but before they made their first revolution they struck another snag. The attorneys for the United Mine Workers petitioned the District Court for a restraining order prohibiting the military court from trying the cases until after the question of jurisdiction had been determined by the United States Courts. A restraining order was placed in the hands of the Sheriff. This is the same gent who ordered the Baldwin thugs to fire on Holly Grove. Needless to say these papers were never served.
In the meantime one of the defendants, whose brother holds an official position in the Miners’ Union, had engaged counsel, or what is more to the point perhaps, the office holding brother secured counsel for him, in the person of “Mike” Mathny [Matheny] of the firm of Littlepage, Mathny and Littlepage. Mathny was present when the court opened to defend his client. When the Judge Advocate announced that he was going to try the prisoners in “squads” and the prisoners refused to enter a plea Mathny was up a tree.
Now comes about as lowdown and contemptible a trick as ever shyster lawyer pulled off. Between the attorneys for the defence and the Judge Advocate they agreed to take a recess. The prisoners were marched back to the “Bull pens,” after which the “Bunch” which Parsons spoke for in the morning were taken over to the hall where the court held its sessions, leaving Parsons in the “Bull Pen.” Here they were sweated and subjected to the third degree with the horrors of the penitentiary depicted on one side and the hope of acquittal on the other until the “bunch” were wheedled into signing a paper to the effect that the “court was a just and equitable tribunal and that they believed each man would get a fair trial and his just dues and therefore had decided to acknowledge the jurisdiction of the court and enter a plea of “not guilty.”
Hellraisers Journal: From The Coming Nation: “Military Despotism in West Virginia” by John W. Brown, Part II
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Hellraisers Journal – Wednesday May 7, 1913
John W. Brown on West Virginia Despotism: Mother Jones and Organizers Arrested
From The Coming Nation of May 3, 1913:
[Part II of III]
When Governor Glasscock issued his first declaration of Martial law, he seized everything in the shape of guns that could be found in the “War Zone.” After the embargo was raised he returned to the operators and Baldwin guards their gattling guns, high-power rifles and pistols, but not so with the miners guns. Consequently when these midnight assassins made their murderous attack on the sleeping village [of Holly Grove] the miners were practically unarmed.
Saturday afternoon and Sunday [February 8th and 9th, following the attack upon Holly Grove] was devoted to the mobilizing of sufficient guns and ammunition to enable the miners to put up a defence. Some of these men traveled as much as forty miles on foot simply to borrow a gun. In the meantime, all kinds of rumors were flying thick and fast. The governor sent men into the field to investigate, but the miners have long since lost confidence in these investigations. They have seen their comrades murdered before by this band of hired assassins, and then seen the governor send men out to “investigate,” and invariably the investigation resulted in turning the murderers loose to work out their hellish designs.
A well-founded rumor reached Hansford that the guards were going to make an attack on the town and had a gattling gun mounted upon the hill over-looking the main street and in a position that would enable them to rake the town from one end to the other. A small body of men went into the mountains by a round about way and overtook the guards and a pitched battle was fought in the hills from which the guards made a hasty retreat. Just why they should run off and leave a brand new $1,800 gattling gun that shoots three hundred and fifty times a minute, was not clear to the miners, but the secret came out later on when in the trial of “Mother Jones” she was accused of stealing the gun.. These fellows have such a holy horror for Mother that when they saw her coming they just quit that gun and ran. Some went by the way of the creek, but most of them took the Springfield route.
Monday the tenth was a day long to be remembered by the citizens of Hansford and the wives and children of the miners who had sought shelter in the town. During the latter part of the forenoon and up until late in the afternoon people kept streaming out of the main forks of the creek, many of whom were strangers who had been taken into the mines under false representation, and who took this first chance offered to escape the terrible conditions of peonage that now prevails throughout the whole field.
Shortly after noon, a group of men, women and children dragged themselves into Hansford. Everyone that could carry anything had a back load, and the poor women and children were ready to drop at the first friendly greeting.
Aside from what they carried on their backs they brought a new terror with them in that they reported that the guards, driven out of the hills by the miners, had mounted a gattling gun on a hand car and were going to make an attack on the town. This report was somewhat confirmed later in the day when Dr. Hunter of the “Sheltering Arms Hospital,” which is situated on an elevation on the opposite side of the Chesapeake and Ohio tracks from the town of Hansford, sent word through the town to the effect that the town would be fired upon and that the women and children should come to the hospital. There seemed to be an understanding between the hospital authorities and the coal baron’s assassins that the hospital was immune from attack, a thing not to be surprised at when it is remembered that Czar Cabel of Cabin Creek fame is treasurer of the hospital fund.
The miners and citizens of Hansford were not asking for any quarter at this time, though they did accept the hospitality for their wives and children, and by 6 p. m. all the women and children were safely out of range of the assassin’s bullets.
Hellraisers Journal: From the Appeal to Reason: “To The Rescue of Mother Jones! A Clarion Call From Debs”-Declares War
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Hellraisers Journal – Monday May 5, 1913
Eugene Debs: “To the Rescue of Mother Jones!”-Declares War on Coal Barons
From the Appeal to Reason of May 3, 1913:
Appeal Declares War on Coal Barons:
“To Rescue Mother Jones”
Hellraisers Journal: From the Appeal to Reason: May Day and the Proletarian Heroine, Mother Jones by Eugene Debs
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Hellraisers Journal – Monday April 28, 1913
“May Day and Mother Jones” by Eugene Victor Debs
From the Appeal to Reason of April 26, 1913:
