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Hellraisers Journal – Friday April 3, 1914
Artwork by Sloan, Glintenkamp, and Young Depicts Cossacks and Unemployed
From The Masses of April 1914:
“Shall We Have a State Constabulary in New York?” by John Sloan
Discussing Pennsylvania Cossacks by H. J. Glintenkamp
Mill Owner Wants Three-Year-Old to Replace Father by Art Young
“Calling the Christian Bluff [Concerning Unemployment]” by John Sloan
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Hellraisers Journal – Thursday August 10, 1922
U. S. Department of Labor Report States 610,000 Coal Miner Now on Strike
From the Duluth Labor World of August 5, 1922:
610,000 MINERS IN COAL STRIKE
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Department of Labor Completes
Coal Fields Survey.
Washington, Aug. 3.-Following a survey of the coal industry, the department of labor announces that there are 610,000 miners on strike and 185,000 miners at work. Listed with the latter are 10,000 union pump men and firemen who have remained at work to keep the properties from being destroyed by water flooding the mines.
A significant part of the report is the statement that of the 13,000 Kansas miners, but 1,000 are working. This is the state it will be remembered, that prevents strikes by law. Colorado, also, has a law which outlaws strikes under certain conditions, but only 4,000 of the 19,000 miners before the strike was called are working.
Cossack-ridden Pennsylvania reports that not a man of the 155,000 anthracite miners are working, and but 20,000 of the 175,000 bituminous men are working.
Despite the terroristic policy of West Virginia coal owners, and the aid given them by the state, there are 40,000 of the 90,000 coal miners on strike.
The states that report a 100 per cent strike are: Illinois, 90,000 out; Ohio, 50,000 out; Indiana, 30,000 out; Iowa, 15,000 out; Montana, 5,000 out; Michigan, 3,000 out.
Wyoming reports 7,000 on strike while 8,000 were employed before the strike. The same situation is reported by Arkansas, New Mexico, Oklahoma and several other states.
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[Photograph and emphasis added.]
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Hellraisers Journal – Tuesday May 27, 1902
Eugene Debs Opines on Pennsylvania’s Great Anthracite Coal Strike
From the Social Democratic Herald of May 24, 1902:
EUGENE V. DEBS ON THE MINERS’ STRIKE
The miners’ strike is on in the anthracite coal regions of Pennsylvania. The operators were defiant and eager for the fray. The miners pulled every wire to prevent the collision and finally voted to go out in the very last extremity. A large minority voted against the strike and President Mitchell, all accounts agree, did his best to prevent it.
Most earnestly do I hope the poor devils will win, but there is no use trying to conceal the fact that they are up against it and that the coal and railroad companies have been preparing for the fight, openly courted it, and are determined to wipe out the union and run their mines to suit themselves.
At this writing everything is quiet as a graveyard in the anthracite region, but nevertheless the Republican governor [William A. Stone], elected largely by the votes of coal miners who don’t believe in going into politics, has already sworn in an army of special coal police, armed with Winchesters, to protect “property” and incidentally to perforate the hides of the striking miners if this becomes necessary to break up their strike, and force them back into their holes through starvation tunnel, to dig for their masters.
That is all they are fit for; at least that is what they themselves seem to think, for that is what they voted for under the direction of some of their district officers, who are simply the political pluggers of the gang of robbers that fleece the poor coal diggers when they work and have them murdered when they strike.
Pennsylvania, where hell is active as Mt. Pelee, and slavery in full blast, has a Republican majority of 300,000, made up quite largely of the poor devils now on strike.
The governor is already making active preparation to return bullet for ballot in accordance with the invariable program of the capitalist class, whom the miners and other workingmen have made the ruling class of the country.
President Mitchell will do the best he can in a trying position. He has issued a request that miners abstain from the use of liquor during the strike, and, acting upon his advice, they thronged the churches on Sunday last and took the oath of total abstinence and the pledge to entirely keep out of saloons till the strike is settled.
As for the Civic Federation, it has already done its worst. It has delayed and dallied six weeks, taken the heart out of many of the strikers and set them by the ears among themselves. Had the miners struck April 1, as they intended, they would have been far stronger than they are today.
My advice to you, striking miners, is to keep away from the capitalistic partnership of priest and politician, to cut loose from the Civic Federation, and to stand together to a man and fight it out yourselves. If you can’t win, no one else can win for you; and if in the end you find that the corporations can beat you at the game of famine, you may, and it is hoped that you will, have your eyes opened to the fact that your vote is your best weapon and that if the 140,000 miners of Pennsylvania will cast a solid vote for socialism, they will soon drive the robbers from the state and take possession of the mines and make themselves the masters of their industry, and the workingmen the rulers of the state.
As for the army of coal police already marshaled and armed by the governor to shoot the strikers upon the assumption that they are criminals, I advise that the miners in convention assembled unanimously resolve that, while they propose to keep within the law, they also propose to exercise all the rights and privileges the law grants them; and, furthermore, that the monstrous crime of Latimer shall not be repeated, and if any striker is shot down without good cause the first shot shall be the signal for war and the miners will shoot back; and if killing must be the program of the coal barons, let it be an operator for a miner instead of miners only, as in the past.
Terre Haute, Ind., May 19.
Eugene V. Debs [Signature]
[Photograph and emphasis added.]
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Hellraisers Journal – Monday May 20, 1912
Mother Jones News Round-Up for April 1912, Part II
Found Traveling Through Montana, North Dakota and Minnesota
From The Butte Miner of April 1, 1912:
“Mother” Jones, a national figure in labor circles, a woman who has done a life’s work in the furtherment of the cause of humanity, regardless of position or circumstance, last night, with a vigor at her 89 years that would put to shame the lassitude of her sisters with less milestones to account for, made a stirring address before the Silver Bow Trades and Labor council that, in lasting an hour or more, was considered too short.
She spoke first as an accredited representative of the federated employes of the Harriman system of railroads, now on strike. But she went further and covered details of the labor situation generally that appealed with telling force to her audience. Her talk was frequently interrupted by applause and was given with a spirit of conviction that carried weight…..
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From The Fargo Forum of April 9, 1912:
MOTHER JONES SCORED TEDDY
———-NOTED INDUSTRIAL WORKER’S LECTURER WHO APPEARED AT ASSEMBLY
HALL LAST NIGHT, SCORED ROOSEVELT AND J. P. MORGAN.
———-“Mother” Jones, 80 years of age and well known the country over as the industrial worker’s lecturer, appeared at the Assembly hall last night in a lecture on Social Conditions, which was heard by a large number of laboring men and others. “Mother” Jones is the official organizer of the United Mine Workers of America, and has traveled the world over in her efforts in this movement. Last night she was introduced “from God Knows where.”
“Mother” Jones took a fling at Col. Theodore Roosevelt in her address last night. She accused him of selling out the coal miners in the strike of 1912 [1902] soon after he came into the White House.
Then she also rapped the Men and Religion Forward movement, which she said was but another scheme of J. Pierpont Morgan to get money from the laboring men and classes he could not otherwise reach. Her speech was a firey one and she electrified her audience with her denunciations of different nation-wide movements.
She was accompanied here to Fargo by Rev. C. H. Doolittle of Chicago, called the workingman’s friend, who opened the meeting last night with prayer which he followed with a short address on the present situation of the strike on the Harriman lines.
Another speaker at the meeting was C. M. Fielder, organizer of the journeymen barbers, who has been here for several weeks, who also talked about the Harriman strikers.
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Hellraisers Journal – Thursday October 20, 1910
“Have you ever been clubbed by a Cossack” -Louis Duchez
From the International Socialist Review of October 1910:
ERE you ever on strike? Sure, you’ve been- or else you’ve never been a workingman, or woman. Very well! It’s you I am talking to.
Now, have you ever been clubbed by a Cossack? Have you ever had these brutal servants of capitalism ride into you and your fellow workers on strike, like so many sheep, and club right and left and shoot without reserve?
Perhaps the Cossacks have not been established in your state yet? Then you’ve had similar dealings with the militia, the the local “cops” or the deputies of the firm you were striking against. They’re all about the same thing. They are part of the capitalist machine to keep you and your class-my class—in submission-in slavery.
Well, I’ve had them club me when I was on strike! I’ve seen “the man on horse back” come “over the hill.” And I’ve seen the bloody trail he left behind. I’ve seen it at McKees Rocks, at Butler, at New Castle and elsewhere in Pennsylvania.
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Hellraisers Journal – Saturday September 24, 1910
“Westmoreland Miner’s Strike” -a Poem by James Coles
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Hellraisers Journal – Friday September 23, 1910
Westmoreland County, Pennsylvania – Cossacks Terrorize Irwin Coalfield Strike
From the International Socialist Review of September 1910:
Cossacks vs. “Black Hundreds.”
Brutal as the state constabulary have shown themselves on numerous occasions the testimony on all sides is overwhelming that compared with the thugs and bums engaged as deputies by the coal companies the State Police are gentlemen.
One of the odd developments is the cordial dislike of the State Police for the deputies. The State Police are not backward about declaring that practically all of the rioting and killing has been caused by the deputies. You must understand that economic interests are at the bottom of this feeling of these two forces for each other. The rank and file of the Police get $60.00 a month and board, no matter what is doing. When all is quiet they get their pay for patroling some country road on a well groomed saddle horse. If there must be a strike they would much rather see a nice quiet orderly one where there are no riots.
But the deputies are in a different boat. If all were quiet they would have no occupation. So to make their jobs secure they must keep something doing all the time. They explode a charge of dynamite under the corner of an unoccupied house, fire a lot of shots some night or when they meet an unarmed striker on the highway slug him or arrest him. When there is any real duty to perform, when there is a batch of strike breakers expected who must be prevented from talking to the strikers the first thing they do is fill up with whiskey. At one hotel where a bunch of them stopped, six drinks of whiskey in their stomachs and a half pint in their pockets was the regular ration, before going out on any special duty.
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Hellraisers Journal – Sunday September 18, 1910
Mother Jones News Round-Up for August 1910, Part II:
-Found Speaking to Mine Workers at Shenandoah, Pennsylvania
From the Shenandoah Evening Herald of August 27, 1910:
MOTHER JONES WAS IN SCOLDING MOOD
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“Mother” Jones was the big noise at the open air mass meeting of mine workers at Main and Centre streets last night, and despite her seventy-five years of terrestrial pilgrimage she was in excellent physical trim.
“Never felt better In my life,” she said to a friend who commented upon her fine appearance, and added,
You know I’m good for seventy-five more years. I don’t think I’ll ever die, so long as I want to live.
“Mother” Jones was in fine voice and the verbal lambasting she administered to John Mitchell, former head of the United Mine Workers of America, ex-President Roosevelt and President Taft caused her hearers “to sit up and take notice,” as the phrase goes when something surprising and unexpected is sprung on an unsuspecting audience. There were other speakers, but “Mother” Jones was the attraction, and she certainly furnished the necessary entertainment, but her denunciation of John Mitchell as a traitor to the cause of labor did not gain her many sympathizers. She excoriated Mitchell for hobnobbing with Roosevelt and declared that both Mitchell and Roosevelt were the “two biggest bluffs at large.” She found fault with Bishop Hobin, of Scranton, for a humorous reference of the Bishop’s at a dinner to Roosevelt and Mitchell that it was the first time he had the honor of sitting between two presidents. She was quite emphatic in utterance and her oratory was attended by the usual gesticulations so familiar during the troublous times of some years ago.
She was more rabid of utterance last night than on any former occasion in this region, and she waved red-flag sentiments with defiance.
Speaking of the State Police she declared they were patterned after the Irish Constabulary.
[She fairly shrieked:]
I was six years old when I was driven from home at the bayonet point by the constabulary in Ireland, and I have never forgot it, and never shall.
I’d sooner go to heaven with a union card as a passport than as a pious Christian of the employer class who have accumulated their millions by grinding the lives out of the down trodden women and children.
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Hellraisers Journal – Thursday March 10, 1910
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania – Thousands Quit Work to Support Carmen
From the Duluth Labor World of March 5, 1910:
Philadelphia, March 4.-Ten times ten thousand union workers of this city have consented to quit work and to join forces with the striking carmen as a rebuke to the arrogant attitude of the officials of the Philadelphia Transit company towards the strike.
This action was decided on at a meeting of the union workers of this city Wednesday night and promptly at midnight Friday went into force.
Throughout the week the company’s officials have been obdurate in regard to arbitration. Delegations of business men, ministers and other Quaker City interests have appealed to them in vain but could not induce them to recede from their position.
Late last week after a few gays of turmoil they with Mayor Reyburn and Director of Safety Clay weakened and were ready to go to arbitration.
The overwhelming force of “Cossacks” as the State constabulary is called, which was poured into Philadelphia to awe the striking carmen, however, stiffened the spines of the autocrats and they now refuse to entertain anything but an absolute surrender on the part of the men.
Strike-Breakers Can’t Mend Traffic.
But a small portion of street car traffic has been resumed and the force of strike-breakers brought into the city, the scum of the big cities of the continent, has been entirely inadequate to cope with the situation.
The general strike was the only weapon left the men in the face of the insolent and defiant attitude of the street car officials and the sympathy of the public, at first withheld, has now turned to the men fighting for better wages and conditions of work.
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Hellraisers Journal – Tuesday January 6, 1920
Braddock, Pennsylvania – Father Kazincy Stands with Strikers
From the Topeka Kansas Trades Unionist of January 2, 1920:
STEEL OWNERS FEAR POWER
-PASTOR ST. MICHAEL’S CHURCH[by Edwin Newdick.]
The steel strike has revealed no more glorious devotion to the cause of workingmen than that of Reverend Father Adalbert Kazinci [Kazincy], pastor of St. Michael’s Roman Catholic Church at Braddock, Pa., where one of the huge mills of the Carnegie Steel Company is situated and near which are also the big mills of Homestead and Rankin. Today there probably are many more than 10,000 men on strike who would have been cajoled, discouraged or frightened back into the mills but for the clear, fearless stand of Father Kazinci in the teeth of everything which the steel companies could devise to calumniate him, destroy his influence and wipe out his parish.
The end is not yet. The despots of steel never forgive and never forget. Father Kazinci at this moment is calmly facing the possibility that the steel-companies will, whatever the outcome of the strike, employ discrimination and discharge to disperse his congregation. He is too clear visioned not to have realized this possibility from the first; but he is too courageous to waver from any consideration of expediency or personal comfort.
Only a part of the story of blackmail, intimidation and every device or conscienceless desperation employed by the steel magnates against him and his parishioners can be told in the space available. Every friend of labor who reads it should engrave indelibly in his memory the name of an apostle of applied Christianity, a hero-in labors struggle for freedom, Father Kazinci.
