Tag: Northern Colorado Coalfield Strike of 1910-1912

Hellraisers Journal: From the International Socialist Review: Coal Miners Fight to Win in Colorado by Robert M. Knight, Part II

Janet RayeHellraisers Journal
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Quote John Lawson 1913, after October 17th Death Special attack on Forbes Tent Colony, Beshoar p74—————

Hellraisers Journal – Thursday December 4, 1913
Coal Miners of Southern Colorado Are Fighting to Win, Part II

From the International Socialist Review of December 1913:

Miners, Women, Children Parade at Trinidad, ISR p333, Dec 1913

[Part II of II]

Some one has said, “A fool in revolt is infinitely wiser than a learned philosopher apologizing for his chains.” Believing this, fully 95 per cent of the miners answered the call to strike [September 23, 1913]. Men with families within three days of starvation and without clothes enough to protect their frail bodies from the biting winds of mountain winters came out fully determined to win or die in the attempt. And who will blame them? Work such as the miner does is no longer honorable but has come to mean “drunkenness, vice and superstition.” It makes men and women unscrupulous, hard and restless. It destroys for others the treasure of life-a home. All the noble sentiments of liberty and the joy of labor mean in reality to the miner slavery of the worst type.

With thoughtless hymns of praise of this massacreing of labor, society allows one wholesale slaughter after another without a protest. While I am writing this the news arrived of the Dawson, New Mexico, disaster, in which the lives of 261 miners were lost and the operators refused to allow Secretary Doyle of the miners’ union to give the widows and orphans $1,000 donated by the union because the camp was non-union. And just as certain as that nothing becomes better without the desire to improve it so it is a healthy sign of the times that starvation wages for conscientious drudgery no longer fills the miner with heartfelt gratitude toward the master class.

The mine slaves were so cowed that the operators were sure that not more than 25 per cent would quit and when practically every miner laid down his tools, completely tying up the coal industry of Colorado, the wrath of the masters knew no bounds. They immediately got busy and sent a deputation of their lackeys, consisting of a lawyer, banker and a Catholic priest (Father Malone), to Washington to repeat the lies of the operators that the miners were satisfied with conditions but forced to strike by eastern agitators like Frank Hayes and Mother Jones. Their thugs began to terrorize the country, shoot up the tented camps of the strikers, insult the women and abuse the children and the operators began to call for the militia that the state might pay the cost of breaking the strike and thus save John D. a few paltry dollars with which to build a few more churches and start more Sunday schools where they sing and PREY-“servants obey your masters.”

Failing to get the militia as soon as they called, the operators had to content themselves with filling the jails of Colorado with strikers who dared to exercise their constitutional rights of peacefully asking imported strikebreakers to not work. In the city of Boulder and within the shadow of Colorado’s greatest educational institution, the state university, thirty-six were confined in the county jail until the court permitted the prisoners to bail each other out. Forty-nine others were arrested in Las Animas county and marched seven miles to the Trinidad jail between two rows of armed guards with Belk and Beltcher (out on bond for murder of Lippiatt), following up the rear with a Gatling gun mounted on an armored automobile.

Frank Hayes says, “The operators have several machine guns mounted on autos. They also have what is known as the ‘steel battle ship [Death Special].‘ This is an automobile with a high body of solid sheet steel built up so as to almost conceal the guard inside. The steel furnishes resistance to the bullets and is so arranged that the assassins on the inside may shoot their rifles in perfect safety. It is a splendid refuge for a coward. The body of the machine is shaped like a torpedo and was designed and built for mine guards. It carried a rapid fire machine gun with a range of more than two miles. As bad as West Virginia was there was nothing down there to compare with this latest instrument of murder that the operators of Colorado are using.”

As this procession neared town, G. E. Jones, a member of Western Federation of Miners, attempted to get a picture of the armored car. A. C. Felt beat him insensible and destroyed his camera and had him arrested for disturbing the peace.

Gun men patrol the public roads in armored autos, shooting up first one camp and then another. The first resistance the strikers offered was at Forbes, October 17, one striker was killed, two wounded and a deputy shot in the hip. One hundred and forty-seven bullets from a machine gun passed through a tent occupied by an aged Scotchman, who saved his life by lying flat on the floor. After this battle the miners made preparations to defend themselves from further attacks of the guards.

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Hellraisers Journal: From the International Socialist Review: Coal Miners Fight to Win in Colorado by Robert M. Knight, Part I

Janet RayeHellraisers Journal
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Quote John Lawson 1913, after October 17th Death Special attack on Forbes Tent Colony, Beshoar p74—————

Hellraisers Journal – Wednesday December 3, 1913
Coal Miners of Southern Colorado Are Fighting to Win, Part I

From the International Socialist Review of December 1913:

Mother Jones Marches with Boys in Trinidad, ISR p330, Dec 1913

[Part I of II]

”THE fight is on. We would have avoided it; we still stand ready at any time to meet representatives of the other side with hopes of effecting a settlement. We hold out the olive branch continually. But because we wish for peace must not be construed as a sign that we are not able to fight. Our past record should dispel such idle dreams. We will aid our brothers in the Colorado fields with all of our resources; with the advice of men of experience; with the hearty good will and sympathy of the vast army of sturdy workers that make up our membership. And these will give a good account of themselves against all the powers of darkness the operators may bring against us.”-Mine Workers Journal.

For months the leading newspapers (?) of Denver and all the capitalist sheets throughout the state, both daily and weekly have been repeating the same rigmarole in regard to the coal strike. While they insult the union men, they anxiously defend themselves against any suspicious of sympathy with the Standard Oil crowd. Their excuses are: A strike is an industrial war for more wages and not one of principle, it does not in their opinion affect the question of morality; finally, even if right and justice is on the side of the miner it is a vain attempt to subjugate by force of a strike, the peaceful relations of No. 26 Broadway [Rockefeller’s HQ in New York City]. Would not open shop conditions free the miner of all his trouble? Therefore, should not the miners welcome the open shop as a happy event instead of seeking a recognition of the union through a “bloody and ruinous strike”?

Let us look a little into the real cause of this strike that dates, back to April 1, 1910, a time when there were not over three thousand organized miners in the state. Our contract expired then and the operators knew we would never be any weaker and perhaps they never more powerful. Therefore they sought to force an open shop by refusing to recognize the miner’s right to organize and sell his labor-power collectively. A strike resulted, one that history will perhaps record as the hardest fought mile of the miner’s road to industrial freedom.

There were but few of us and after several months the busy world outside forgot all about the strike in northern Colorado. Strikes were fought and won in various parts of the country; all the while the miners stood firm, fighting injunctions, suffering jail sentences and other hardships without complaining, yet knowing all the time our only hope for victory was an organized strike in the southern part of the state, as we were unable to seriously affect the market. National organizers were sent south and at once began the task of secretly organizing the slaves in John D.’s hell-holes of Colorado. This work was slow and dangerous requiring three and one-half years’ time (and “God knows” how much cash).

When the civil war was ended in West Virginia the militant workers of the union, including Frank J. Hayes and “Mother Jones” were sent to Colorado to assist in the organization work and with their arrival things began to move apace. Hayes soon asked the operators for a conference and demanded recognition of the union in the name of 15,000 newly organized slaves. The operators ignored all invitations to arbitrate boasting they had five millions of dollars for defense. They began preparing for a strike by importing gun men and thugs from West Virginia through the Baldwin Feltz detective agency. W. H. Reno, chief detective for C. F. & I., also opened a recruiting station in the Dover Hotel, 1744 Glenarm place, and succeeded in sending out of Denver some of the most notorious characters from the red light district and barrel house bums. Upon the arrival of these criminals in the strike zone Sheriffs Gresham and Farr (appointed by the coal companies), gave them deputy sheriff commissions.

The State Federation of Labor held its annual convention at Trinidad August 18 and when the U. M. W. of A. delegates began to arrive in town late Saturday afternoon G. W. Beltcher and Walter Belk, two Baldwin-Feltz heroes, shot and instantly killed Gerald Lippiatt, a district organizer on the main street of Trinidad. A coroner’s jury, composed of “good” business men, rendered a verdict of “justifiable homicide”; District Attorney Hendricks later preferred a charge of murder against them but the courts of Colorado do not value a coal miner’s life very high and Lippiatt’s murderers were promptly released on bond because such human hyenas are needed by the operators to maintain law and order during a strike.

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Hellraisers Journal: Whereabouts and Doings of Mother Jones for March 1912, Part I: Found Speaking in Illinois, Denver, Colorado and Tacoma, Washington

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Quote Mother Jones Master Class Creates Violence, LA Rec p4, Dec 21, 1911—————

Hellraisers Journal – Monday April 15, 1912
Mother Jones News Round-Up for March 1912, Part I
Found in Illinois, Denver, Colorado and Tacoma, Washington

From The Sibley Journal of March 1, 1912:

Walker to Head Miners.

Mother Jones, Tacoma Tx p3, Feb 14, 1912

The closing day of the Illinois Mine Workers’ state convention was featured by the announcement of election from the vote held December 14, 1911.

It was generally thought at that time that all the officers would be re-elected. There was but one exception in this, Paul Smith defeating Adolph Germer for the vice presidency. President Walker and Secretary Treasurer McDonald were re-elected by large majorities…..

Aside from the announcement of the election results, a two-hour address by ”Mother” Jones, a woman, eighty years old, who is a Socialist lecturer of national prominence and called the “Miners’ Mascot,” in which she denounced woman suffrage, was the feature. She declared that women are not mentally equipped to acquire a proper knowledge of politics, and she attributed the defeat of the recall in Colorado to the women voters. In closing her address, “Mother” Jones detailed the conditions brought about by the railroad strike in Colorado and asked the miners of Illinois to donate a benefit fund of $1,000 to the strikers. A committee was named to investigate the matter…..

[Photograph added.]

From The Illinois State Journal of March 2, 1912:

Mother Jones, IL State Jr p2, Mar 2, 1912

From the Denver Rocky Mountain News of March 5, 1912:

NORTHERN COLORADO COAL
STRIKE ENDS IN 8 MINES
———-

6 KILLED, 10 MAIMED 100 BEATEN,
BLOODY RECORD OF WAR
———-
Strikebreakers’ Refusals to Quit Fields Cause
of Most Serious Outbreaks.
———-

“Six men killed, ten maimed for life and more than 100 waylaid and beaten.” This is the record of bitterness between the opposing forces of the labor war in the Northern coal were from the ranks of both strikers and strike breakers…..

One of the striking features of the struggle occurred a few months ago, when “Mother Jones,” a well known national figure in the labor world, went into the district to organize the wives and sisters of the striking miners. She received an enthusiastic reception, but when the women attempted to carry out their ideas the strikers objected so strenuously that they were forced to abandon their militant plans for a campaign.

———-

No CO Coal Strike Chronc, Rky Mt Ns p2, Mar 5, 1912

From the Denver United Labor Bulletin of March 21, 1912:

“MOTHER” JONES LEAVES DENVER.
———-

“Mother” Jones, who has been in Denver for several days, addressed the Federated Shopmen in their convention in Machinists’ hall this week. She is preparing to tour the northwest in the interests of the shopmen. She will go to Tacoma and then travel East as far as St. Paul. 

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Hellraisers Journal: Whereabouts & Doings of Mother Jones for August 1911, Part II: Found Visiting Colorado Miners Jailed by Injunction Judge Whitford

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Quote Mother Jones, Injunction Shroud, Bff Exp p7, Apr 24, 1909—————

Hellraisers Journal – Friday October 27, 1911
Mother Jones News Round-Up for August 1911, Part II
Mother Jones Accompanies Samuel Gompers on Visit to Jailed Miners

On Sunday, August 20th, Mother Jones accompanied Gompers on his visit to the miners jailed by Injunction Judge Whitford, which visit was described in the August 29th edition of The Joliet News (Illinois):

Mother Jones crpd ed, WDC Tx p5, June 18, 1910

President Gompers [while in Denver] en route to the Pacific coast expressed a desire to visit the coal miners who have been made the victims of the abuse of the injunction writ in the strike in the northern coal fields of the state. The committee in charge made suitable arrangements and a trip was made to the quarters of the miners in the jail, where Mother Jones, on behalf of Mr. Gompers, presented the prisoners with a large bouquet of flowers. An informal and impromptu meeting was held and a few remarks made by Mr. Gompers. The prisoner have been accorded the privileges of the court yard and following the meeting inside the jail all retired to the court yard where, with the grated windows of county jail serving as a background, a group picture was taken, President Gompers and Mother Jones being the central figures.

[Photograph added.]

—————

From The Denver Post of August 21, 1911:

GOMPERS VISITS MINERS IN JAIL
———-

“Distortions of law” and “byplays of justice” were terms applied to the injunctions issued by District Judge Greeley W. Whitford in the miners’ trouble of northern Colorado by Samuel Gompers, president of the American Federation of Labor, in a speech at Eagles’ hall in the Club building at 2 o’clock Sunday afternoon [August 20th].

Later in the day he visited the miners in jail and told them they were martyrs to labor’s cause and deserved to be ranked with Lincoln and Jefferson in their devotion to the people. He told the men thy suffered no moral stigma and the good their imprisonment is doing for labor could not be measured in words…..

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Hellraisers Journal: Whereabouts & Doings of Mother Jones for July 1911, Found at Greensburg, Pennsylvania; Miners Meet to Call Off Strike

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Quote Mother Jones, Greensburg PA Cmas 1910, Steel 2, p83—————

Hellraisers Journal – Wednesday October 25, 1911
Mother Jones News Round-Up for July 1911
Found at Greensburg, Pennsylvania, Where Miners Meet to Call Off Strike

From Pennsylvania’s Latrobe Bulletin of July 3, 1911:

The Calling Off of the Strike Is
Declared To Be In Sight
———-

Greensburg the Scene of Special Convention.
Ten Delegates Are Present From the Local Union

Mother Jones crpd ed, WDC Tx p5, June 18, 1910

Behind closed doors, with Francis Feehan presiding, with Mother Jones, Van Bitner and others prominently identified with the strike present, the convention of miners is now on in full swing in Tonkay’s hall, at Greensburg…

The Greensburg Tribune claims to have received authentic information from Indianapolis to the effect that the executive board decided that the strike should end.

Mother Jones, who is at the convention, was in attendance at the International board meeting, last week, and it is said that she made a plea for the strikers…..

[Photograph added.]

From the Pittsburgh Gazette Times of July 6, 1911:

Greensburg Westmoreland PA Miners Give up Strike in Irwin Field, Ptt Gz Pst p1, July 6, 1911

The long and bitter labor struggle of the coal miners in the Irwin-Greensburg field for recognition of the union was brought to a close yesterday. Locals of the United Mine Workers of America met and adopted a resolution to return to work. This action was taken under instructions from the international executive board of the United Mine Workers, which held a special meeting last Monday that resulted in the decision to call a meeting of the locals and order the return to work.

It is believed the miners welcomed the instructions from their executive board. They had been idle for 16 months, during which time many hardships were endured. When notice was served that the payment of strike benefits would cease next week, the men realized that their cause was lost and the struggle hopeless…..

The abrupt ending of the long strike resulted in a divided sentiment among union miners. When it became known yesterday that the locals had concurred in the action of their international executive board, the following circular was sent out to the various locals, signed by Robert Gibbons, Abe Kephart and Andrew Puskar of the miners’ organization of District No. 5:

The miners throughout the Irwin-Greensburg fields today held local meetings at which in every case a vote was taken to call off the strike which has lasted for 16 months. This was compulsory for these poor, misguided brothers, as the International Executive Board in session at Indianapolis headquarters last week voted to discontinue paying strike benefits to them and directed Francis Feehan to call their leaders and arrange to have the strike terminated without recognition or concessions whatever.

Meeting of Leaders.

A meeting of these leaders was held in Greensburg on Monday. International Board Members A. R. Watkins of Ohio, George Dagger of Western Pennsylvania, and Thomas Haggerty of Central Pennsylvania had been delegated to represent the International Union. Mother Jones told the International Board at Indianapolis that it had been a lost cause since last summer. But it was continued until there had been the loss of 18 lives and the useless expenditure of a $1,000,000 of the miners’ money, besides large donations from many of our people and others in sympathy……

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Hellraisers Journal: Whereabouts and Doings of Mother Jones for March 1911: Found in Denver, Colorado, Standing for Freedom of Sixteen Jailed Miners

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Quote Mother Jones, Powers of Privilege ed, Ab Chp III———–

Hellraisers Journal – Monday April 17, 1911
Mother Jones News Round-Up for March 1911:
–Found in Denver Fighting for Sixteen Miners Jailed by Judge Whitford

From the Black Hills Daily Register of March 6, 1911:

Accuses Judge of Bribery
———-

(By Pan-American Press.)

CO Miners in Dnv Co Jail by Jdg Whitford, ISR p525, Mar 1911
Sixteen miners freed from jail with assistance of Mother Jones.
—–

Denver, March 6.-The impeachment investigation against Judge Greeley W. Whitford, which is being conducted by a committee of the Colorado house of representatives, took a most sensational turn when the committee was told by Mrs. Margaret Miller that prior to his sentencing sixteen union men to jail a few mouths ago, she had delivered a package to Whitford which, she alleged, contained $3,000.

Mrs. Miller said she had been on terms of close relationship with Whitford for eight years. She testified that during the Cripple Creek mining troubles she was in the employ of the Mine Owners’ Association. She alleges a man associated with her in those troubles, gave her the money to give to Judge Whitford.

The sixteen miner were released from jail recently by Judge Whitford after serving two months of their sentence.

Union labor organizations all over the state of Colorado united in petitioning for Judge Whitford’s removal from the bench, declaring that the court in sentencing the miners, had found them guilty of a criminal charge without giving them the right of trial by jury. “Mother Jones” played an important part in the freeing of the men by holding immense meetings in all the large cities of the state.

—————

[Photograph added.]

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Hellraisers Journal: Ten Thousand March in Denver, Colorado, to Protest Whitford’s Injunction, Jailing of 16 Union Miners

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Quote Mother Jones, Powers of Privilege ed, Ab Chp III

———-

Hellraisers Journal – Thursday March 16, 1911
Denver, Colorado – “A Living Protest” by William D. Haywood

From the International Socialist Review of March 1911:

Living Protest by BBH, CO Miners in Jail, ISR p525, Mar 1901
This picture was taken in Denver County Jail where Pettibone,
Moyer, and Haywood were confined previous to being taken
to the penitentiary in Idaho. The men occupy the same
corridor where Haywood’s cell was located.

FEBRUARY the second was a memorable day in Denver, Colorado. Government by injunction received a jolt in the solar plexus that if followed up by a united working class will put the courts out of business.

Ten thousand men and women unionists and Socialists paraded the streets of the Queen City of the Plains, demanding that government by injunction be abolished. They marched in fours and sixes to the capital building. When the Socialist section arrived at the law factory, their band started up the Marseillaise, every red, big and little, singing the battle song of all nations.

From the capital building the parade marched to the city auditorium, where a monster protest meeting was held. Judge Greeley W. Whitford was damned, and denounced for sending sixteen coal miners, members of the U. M. W. A., to jail for a term of one year for the alleged violation of an injunction issued by him. The injunction was one of the blanket style that covers everything and everybody. Prohibited one from breathing in the vicinity of the coal company’s property or looking at one of their strike-breaking pets that they have imported from West Virginia.

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Hellraisers Journal: Mother Jones Speaks at Convention of United Mine Workers of America, Held at Columbus, Ohio

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Quote Mother Jones, Grow Big Great Mighty Show CFnI, UMWC p269 Jan 21, 1911———-

Hellraisers Journal – Monday January 23, 1911
Columbus, Ohio – Mother Jones Speaks at Miners’ Convention

From the Washington Sunday Star of January 22, 1911:

LIE IS PASSED FREELY AT MINERS’ CONVENTION
—–
“Mother Jones” Makes Address Calling
Supreme Court Judges Real Anarchists.
———

Mother Jones crpd ed, WDC Tx p5, June 18, 1910

COLUMBUS, Ohio, January 21.-Control of the United Mine Workers’ convention came to a severe test in the contest for the seating of delegates from nine locals of district No. 2 of central Pennsylvania. Charges of falsehoods were made freely by each side and the convention finally adjourned to continue the fight Monday.

Expected contests over the seating of President Francis Feehan of the Pittsburg district did not materialize and he was seated without final objection.

“Mother” Jones spoke before the convention. She classes members of the United States Supreme Court and Gov. Harmon of Ohio among “the real anarchists of the country.”

[…..]

[Photograph and emphasis added.]

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Hellraisers Journal: Whereabouts and Doings of Mother Jones for November 1910, Part I: Holds Roosevelt Responsible for Ruin of Mine Workers in Anthracite

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Quote Mother Jones, Oligarchy, Sops, Rise Up, Giants, Clv Oct 12, Lbr Arg p1, Oct 13, 1910———-

Hellraisers Journal – Wednesday December 28, 1910
Mother Jones News Round-Up for November 1910, Part I:
–Blames Roosevelt for State of Miners Union in Anthracite Field

From the Muskegon News Chronicle of November 4, 1910:

Workers of the World Peter Power, Muskegon MI Chc p5, Nov 4, 1910

[Mother Jones] Holds T. R. Responsible
for Ruin of Coal Union.

Mother Jones, Tacoma Tx p7, Oct 24, 1910

That man Roosevelt is responsible for the wrecking of the once powerful union of anthracite miners; he turned John Mitchell’s head by flattery and did what Geo. F. Baer and the combined hard coal barons couldn’t do. I repeat, the overrated Roosevelt wrecked the anthracite miners union.

These startling words were uttered by Mother Jones in conversation with the writer a few days ago, while en route to the Irwin-Greensburg coal field to assist the 20,000 striking miners who have been locked out since last spring [Westmoreland County Coal Strike].

Mother Jones is unquestionably the most influential figure among the American miners today, and has been for a decade. If she were a man she would be the life president of the United Mine Workers of North America. It was Mother Jones more than any other human being who rallied the hard coal miners in their helpless slavery 10 years ago and cheered them on a fight their way out.

[Said Mother:]

Now, after ten years of open shoppery, the boys are back in the old rut, back on the treadmill, not daring to call their souls their own, thanks to the scheming and hypocrisy of Roosevelt. And then that bluffer had the audacity to go down into the Scranton district recently, accompanied by photographers and press agents, and gloat and grin at the poor miners and announce ostentatiously, “I am ex-President Roosevelt.”

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