Hellraisers Journal: From the Spokane Industrial Worker: Magonista Rebels Defeated at Tijuana, But Not Conquered

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Quote Joe Hill, All aboard for Mexico, IW p1, May 25, 1911—————

Hellraisers Journal – Saturday July 8, 1911
Second Battle of Tijuana Ends in Defeat for Rebel Forces

From the Spokane Industrial Worker of July 6, 1911:

REBELS ARE DEFEATED BUT NOT CONQUERED
—————

Tijuana Tierra y Libertad May 29, 1911, Wike n Bartoli, 11of 32

The liberal campaign in Lower California was practically ended with the defeat of the hundred men under General Jack Mosby at Tijuana, Mexico, on June 22nd, although there is yet two bands of armed rebel Mexicans, one near Santa Rosalia, in the southern end of the peninsula and another of about twenty-five men in the mountains between Tijuana and Mexicali in the north

[…..]

The rebels who surrendered were held at Fort Rosecrans for three days and then released with the exception of thirteen who were deserters from the army and navy and Mosby and [Adjutant Bert] Laflin, whom the Madero government is trying to extradite to torture and murder in Mexico. Boys, will we stand for it? I’ll leave it to your actions. Will you act?

About the same time the battle took place the Liberal Junta in Los Angeles were arrested. They have already served three years in our vile American prisons and we must not let them serve any more years.

Subscribe for “Regeneracion” (address 519½ East Fourth street, Los Angeles) and learn the facts of the case.

Remember although the little campaign in Lower California has been smashed the Mexican people are not through revolting. Madero did not start the revolution NOR WILL HE END IT.

Yours in the eternal revolution,
CHILI-CON-CARNE.

—————

[Photograph and emphasis added.]

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Hellraisers Journal: From the Industrial Worker: New Songbooks Available with New Song: “Long Haired Preachers”

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Quote Richard Brazier, BRSB p388 from Lbr Hx Winter 1968—————–

Hellraisers Journal – Friday July 7, 1911
New I. W. W. Songbooks with New Song: “Long Haired Preachers”

From the Spokane Industrial Worker of July 6, 1911:

Ad LRSB, Long Haired Preachers, IW p3, June 6, 1911

Songs to Fan the Flames of Discontent
-Published by Spokane Local, I. W. W.
-New Song: “The Preacher and the Slave”

1911 LRSB by Spokane Local IWW, Preacher n Slave, Gibbs p232-3

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Hellraisers Journal: From the Appeal to Reason: Elizabeth Gurley Flynn Arrested in Philadelphia for Talking Unionism

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Quote EGF, Heaven n Hell, ISR p617, Jan 1910—————

Hellraisers Journal – Sunday June 25, 1911
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania – Arrested for Talking Unionism

From the Appeal to Reason of June 24, 1911:

EGF, ISR p606, Apr 1911

Gurley Flynn Arrested in Philadelphia

The police arrested Elizabeth Gurley Flynn while talking unionism before the Baldwin Locomotive works at Philadelphia, the other day, and that will help some. The bosses are blind as bats, for they are helping the agitation more than all we Socialists can do. In fact we could make poor progress if they were not such fools as to show the workers they are the kind that we Socialists proclaim them. They furnish the proof. She was held in $400 bail, took down the court proceedings in short hand, and went to the cell for free speech sake. The mass of men who were listening intently could hardly be restrained from knocking out the police for their brutality. It made many Socialists when no other kind of an argument could.

[Photograph and emphasis added.]

From the Spokane Industrial Worker of June 22, 1911:

EGF Acquitted Disturbing Peace in Phl, IW p2, June 22, 1911

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Hellraisers Journal: From the Industrial Worker: Life and Work of James Kelly Cole, Martyr of Spokane Free Speech Fight

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Quote James Kelly Cole, Martyr Spk FSF, ISR p557, Dec 1909—————

Hellraisers Journal – Friday June 23, 1911
Poems of James Kelly Cole, Martyr of Spokane Free Speech Fight

From the Spokane Industrial Worker of June 15, 1911:

THE LIFE WORK OF KELLY COLE
—————

By Frank Bohn.

James Kelly Cole, Cover Rev Writings Poems ed w text, 1910

James Kelly Cole was killed in a railway accident at Tomah, Wisconsin, November 17th, 1909. He was on his way to take part in the Spokane free speech fight and was riding free.

At that time I wrote a short letter in the [New York Socialist] Call, drawing attention to the self-forgetfulness which led to the untimely death of this young comrade. To me he was simply one of many who were then fighting for freedom of speech in Spokane and elsewhere. I had not even learned his name. It is therefore a peculiar pleasure to discover that, dying in the cause, he left us something very much worth while. A little book of poems entitled “Revolutionary Writings” suggest to us the deep loss suffered by the movement when he went to his death.

His picture as well as his poems makes one regret not to have known him personally. He was a representative of a type-the type of idealistic young Americans of both sexes who are now thronging into the Socialist movement. He was fortunate in having had educational advantages. He had been a student at one of the Chicago High schools and abundant leisure during his youth afforded him opportunity for wide reading on a variety of subjects.

The most significant feature about his personality and his work was the revolutionary spirit. His intense hatred for misrule coupled with his desire for emancipation from wage slavery once led him into a tactical error. He was forced to spend more than a year in the federal prison at Leavenworth, Kansas.

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Hellraisers Journal: Elizabeth Gurley Flynn Wins Fight for Free Speech in Philadelphia for Second Time

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Quote EGF, Heaven n Hell, ISR p617, Jan 1910

—————

Hellraisers Journal – Wednesday June 14, 1911
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania – Elizabeth Gurley Flynn Freed

From The Philadelphia Inquirer of June 13, 1911:

WOMAN SOCIALIST FREED
———- 
Court Grants Appeal From
Magistrate and Remits Fine

EGF, ISR p606, Apr 1911

Appealing from the decision of Magistrate Scott, who fined her $10 for obstructing the highways, Elizabeth Gurley Flynn, a labor organizer and social worker, received a favorable decision from Judge Kinsey in Quarter Sessions Court yesterday by having the magistrate’s action reversed and the fine remitted.

This is the second time within a week that Miss Flynn has succeeded in having the court overthrow the action of the police of the Twentieth and Buttonwood streets station. She was arrested twice while speaking in the vicinity of the Baldwin Locomotive Workers.

———-

[Photograph and emphasis added.]

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Hellraisers Journal: From the Industrial Worker: “Women in Industry Should Organize” by Elizabeth Gurley Flynn

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Quote EGF Organize Women, IW p4, June 1, 1911———-

Hellraisers Journal – Saturday June 3, 1911
Elizabeth Gurley Flynn: Organize Women in Strong Industrial Unions

From the Spokane Industrial Worker of June 1, 1911:

WOMEN IN INDUSTRY SHOULD ORGANIZE
———-

BY ELIZABETH GURLEY FLYNN

EGF, ISR p606, Apr 1911

From the viewpoint of a revolutionary socialist there is certainly much to criticize in the present labor organizations. They have their shortcomings, of so pronounced a character that many thoughtful but pessimistic workers despair of practical benefit from assisting or considering them further. Yet unionism remains a vital and a burning question to the toilers, both men and women.

[…..]

Little need be said of he seven million wage-earning women. That unionism is their one great weapon, hardly admits of argument. Even more than their brother toilers do these underpaid and overworked women need co-operative effort on their own behalf. Yet many of their experiences with the old unions have been neither pleasant nor encouraging. Strike after strike of cloak makers, shirt waist makers, dressmakers, etc on the East Side of New York has been exploited by rich faddists for woman’s suffrage, etc., until the points at issue were lost sight of in the blare of automobile horns attendant on their coming and going. A band of earnest, struggling workers made the tail of a suffrage kite in the hands of women of the very class driving the girls to lives of misery or shame, women who could have financed the strike to a truly successful conclusion were they seriously disposed, is indeed a deplorable sight. But the final settlement of the many widely advertised strikers left much to be desired.

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Hellraisers Journal: “All Aboard for Mexico!” -Joe Hill; Reds Gain Great Victory at Tijuana, Report from “S. G.”

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Quote Joe Hill, All aboard for Mexico, IW p1, May 25, 1911—————

Hellraisers Journal – Saturday May 27, 1911
Tijuana, Baja California, Mexico – Rebels Win Great Victory

From the Spokane Industrial Worker of May 25, 1911:

Joe Hill, Vote Right, All aboard for Mexico, IW p1, May 25, 1911

———-

REDS GAIN A GREAT VICTORY
———–

TURNING POINT IN LIBERAL REVOLUTION
-MANY DEEDS OF BRAVERY
-I. W. W. BOYS IN INSURRECTO ARMY.

Special to the “Worker.”

TIJUANA, Baja, Cal., May 10.-At last the victory of social revolutionists in Lower California is assured. The workers of America and Mexico are awakening, and brave men are sacrificing their lives for the cause of Freedom, and their sacrifice shall not be in vain. All opposition is being swept aside by “la Bandera Roja” (the red band), the latest victory being the capture of this little Mexican village, situated in the Tijuana river valley right on the International boundary line, and fifteen miles southeast of San Diego, Cal.

The fall of Tijuana, means the turning point in the campaign against Diaz tyranny in Baja, California. The rebels now control the whole peninsula excepting the capital of the state, Ensenada, and the acquisition of Tijuana gives the “red army” an excellent base of supplies, and a military headquarters from which to conduct the rest of the campaign.

The battle [of May 8th and 9th] was by far the biggest battle that has been fought since the Mexican Liberal party [P. L. M.] placed their army in Lower California. It lasted nearly 36 hours, and about 400 men were involved. Many brave acts were recorded, one was the firing of the Catholic church, and the “Bull pen” by the rebels. At an early stage of the fight four men crawled from the rebel ranks through Tijuana, and slipped into a federal trench and from that point these four insurrectos poured a deadly fire into the ranks of the Mexican federal troops, the latter being unable to locate the four men until too late, as by that time the rebels had completely surrounded the town and were advancing on all sides, steadily pouring a well directed fire into the Diaz camp. 

[…..]

[A]t 8:30 a. m., Tuesday, May 9th, the Liberal Army was in full possession of Tijuana, Mexico, a port of entry and a valuable recruiting station for the Liberals in Lower California.

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Hellraisers Journal: From the Spokane Industrial Worker: “Child Labor” -a Poem by Charlotte Perkins Gilman

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Mother Jones Quote, Child Labor Man of Six Snuff Sniffer—————

Hellraisers Journal – Friday April 28, 1911
“Child Labor” by Charlotte Perkins Gilman

From the Spokane Industrial Worker of April 27, 1911:

POEM Child Labor, by CP Gilman, IW p2, Apr 26, 1911

“Little Spinner” by Lewis Hine, North Carolina , December 1908:

Child Labor ed, L Hine, Spinner, Whitnel Cotton Mill, NC, Dec 1908

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Hellraisers Journal: International Socialist Review: How Solidarity Won the Fresno Free Speech Fight -by Press Committee

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Quote John Whyte, re Fresno Aroused Working Class, IW p1, Dec 22, 1910—————-

Hellraisers Journal – Thursday April 20, 1911
News from California – “Solidarity Wins in Fresno” by Press Committee

From the International Socialist Review of April 1911:

Fresno FSF, Solidarity Wins, ISR p634, Apr 1911

BECAUSE we tried to organize the workers in Fresno, the authorities denied us the streets for agitation meetings. After persecuting our members for their activity; after throwing them into jail and subjecting them to the greatest brutality and passing a city ordinance denying the rights of free speech, the authorities have turned around and granted us all these things for which we have been fighting. Hereafter we shall be permitted to speak on the streets unmolested and unrestricted.

Fresno FSF, IWW Wins Complete Victory, IW p1, Mar 9, 1911
Spokane Industrial Worker of March 9, 1911

How was this victory accomplished? The answer is simple. Two hundred workingmen, roused by acts of violence against the organization of which they were members, moved on to Fresno from various points on the Pacific Coast to fight the Capitalist enemies. They realized that if our organizers were not to be permitted to speak and agitate, they would be seriously hampered in the work of organization for the great approaching conflict. From first to last both sides of the struggle clearly recognized Class Lines and freely admitted them. One of the most intelligent members of the opposition stated in an early stage of the struggle that this was a skirmish in a great war.

Antiquated methods were generally abandoned. It was decided that no money should be wasted on lawyers to expound the meaning of the first amendment to the Constitution of the United States. However, the court was used effectively for propaganda. Trial after trial was held and each time our position was presented to a crowded court room, by some member of the group on trial. Incidentally about 500 residents of Fresno, chiefly business men, were summoned to serve on juries. Not one of these was so disloyal to his class as to “hang a jury.” Workingmen were promptly challenged by the prosecuting attorney. They might not have been so pliable.

The antagonism with the local press with its malicious misrepresentation, perfectly reflected the attitude of the employing class in Fresno. But our appeals for aid, made only to the working class, found a ready response. Perfect discipline was maintained inside the jail. Things were kept in a sanitary condition. Educational work was carried on systematically. The fight was directed throughout by the men in jail. The outside work was executed by an outside committee, also directed by the imprisoned men. Funds contributed were spent economically and to the best advantage.

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