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Hellraisers Journal – Sunday April 10, 1904
“Crimes of Capitalism in Colorado” by Eugene Victor Debs
From The Chicago Socialist of April 9, 1904:
Tag: Telluride Miners Union WFM
Hellraisers Journal: From the American Labor Union Journal: “Climax Reached at Telluride”-Citizen Thugs Deport Miners
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Hellraisers Journal – Saturday March 26, 1904
Telluride, Colorado – Union Men Dragged from Homes and Deported
From the American Labor Union Journal of March 24, 1904:
Hellraisers Journal: Striking Miners of Telluride Attacked and Deported From Their Homes at Night by Citizens’ Alliance
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Hellraisers Journal – Monday March 21, 1904
Telluride, Colorado – Armed Citizens’ Alliance Mob Deports Striking Miners
From The Denver Post of March 15, 1904:
Hellraisers Journal: Telluride, San Miguel County, Colorado – Affidavit of A. A. Pratt Arrested by Militia for Refusing to Scab
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Hellraisers Journal – Saturday March 19, 1904
Telluride, Colorado – Arrested by Militia for Refusing to Scab
March 3, 1904, Telluride, Colorado-Affidavit of A. A. Pratt
AFFIDAVIT. State of Colorado, County of San Miguel, ss.
I, the undersigned A. A. Pratt, make the following statement under oath: On or about February 26, 1904, I was in Denver looking for work. A man by the name of Johnson told me I could get work as a miner in Telluride; that the strike was off and there was no martial law; that the soldiers were all withdrawn, and that transportation was furnished free. I concluded to go, and a Mr. Snodgrass gave me a ticket to Telluride.When I arrived at Telluride, on the evening of the 27th, I was met at the depot and taken to the Victoria hotel to stay all night. The next morning a horse was brought to the hotel for me to ride to the Smuggler-Union mine, about four miles away. On the way to the mine we passed soldiers standing guard. When I got to the mine I made inquires and found out that the strike was on, that the district was under military rule. As the conditions had been misrepresented to me, and I did not want to work under these conditions, I told the boss that I had forgotten something in town and thus obtained a pass to present to the soldiers between the mine and the town.
In Telluride I was arrested on a warrant sworn to by Bulkely Wells, manager of the Smuggler-Union mine and commander of the militia, charging me with obtaining money under false pretenses. He appeared as a witness against me, although there had been no agreement made with him, nor with any one else, that I was to pay anything for fare, hotel or horse hire. These were furnished me without me asking for them, and he admitted that he had no agreement with me. There was no one but myself that knew anything about the matter, so the justice found me not guilty, but it shows to what measures they are willing to resort.
I do solemnly swear that the above statement is true to the best of my knowledge.
A. A. PRATT.
Sworn and subscribed to before me on the 3rd day of March, 1904
ALBERT HOLMES,
Justice of the Peace.[Paragraphs and emphasis added.]
Hellraisers Journal: Brutality Against Striking Miners of Telluride Continues; Many Arrests and Harry Maki Chained to Telephone Pole in Bitter Wind and Cold
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Hellraisers Journal – Tuesday March 8, 1904
Telluride, Colorado – Brutality Against Striking Miners Continues
Guy Miller Reports From Telluride
From the Telluride strike zone comes this disturbing report from Guy Miller, President of the local miners’ union (W. F. of M.):
[On Tuesday, March 2nd] thirty-four men were arrested in the justice court on the charge of vagrancy, twenty-seven of them were fined $25 and costs and given until two o’clock [Wednesday] to pay their fines, leave the county or go to work. Sixteen reported for work…they were taken to the jail by Willard Runnels and put to work on the sewers of the town. One of the men, Harry Maki, refused to work. Runnels led him to a telephone pole, compelled him to put his arms around the pole, then fastened handcuffs on his wrists. The wind was blowing a gale and the snow filled the air. He was left standing chained like a beast for several hours. After many protests had been made against this cruel treatment Runnels took him to the jail….
Brother Maki remains in jail at this time and has not been given anything to eat since his ordeal began.
Brother Miller describes the type of men brought in by the mine owners to lead the fight against the Western Federation of Miners:
Runnels and Robert Meldrum were imported from Wyoming by the mine managers for the avowed purpose of discovering the murderer of Arthur Collins. But their only contact with the union was when some man was held up on his way to town and searched for stolen ore, without warrant or any process whatever. Runnels and Meldrum were pals of Tom Horn, the leader of a band of desperadoes who had been hired by the cattle ranchers to fight the sheep ranchers. Horn was hanged at Cheyenne, Wyoming, in November, 1903, for the murder of little Willie Nickell, the twelve-year-old son of a sheep rancher. The evidence indicated that he received $600 for the murder. It is characters like these who lead the “law and order” brigade for the Mine Owners and Citizens’ Alliance—men skilled and reckless in the use of the gun. When a corporation pays fancy prices for skilled labor of any kind—carpenters, electricians, engineers or man-killers—it expects the employe to give value received for the wages paid, and they never pay for anything they do not expect to need.
Striking Miner Harry Maki, Western Federation of Miners:
Hellraisers Journal: The Denver Post: “Siberian Exiling Scenes Re-Enacted at Telluride” and News from Cripple Creek
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Hellraisers Journal – Wednesday January 20, 1904
News from Colorado Strike Zones of Telluride and Cripple Creek
From The Denver Post of January 15, 1904:
SIBERIAN EXILING SCENES.
Telluride, Colo., Jan. 15-Tears, curses, maledictions and prayers were heard at the depot this morning when the train pulled out of the station having on board six union miners, who were being deported by the military. The men were given breakfast early, the meal being served from the Sheridan hotel, after which the wife of one of them was reluctantly permitted to visit her husband in jail. At 8 o’clock a bunch of blue-coats, under the command of Captain Scholz, marched to the court house and the prisoners were taken to the county jail and formed into line, ready for the march to the station.
A woman with a small child attempted to fall in line with her husband, but was brutally prevented by the soldiers, who forced her back on the sidewalk. With a face drawn with bitter agony and grief she endeavored to keep up with the soldiers as they marched down the streets, but the prisoners had reached the train long before she had gone a block.
At the depot the men were immediately put aboard the train and two soldiers stationed at the car windows. The relatives of the men were allowed to talk to them, and for a moment the air was filled with tearful good-byes and well wishes.
Fifteen minutes before the signal was given to start three women came running down the track. One of them , a Mabel Marchinado, a mere girl, hardly 17 years old, weeping bitterly, rushed over the icy platform to the window in which one of the men was sitting, and exclaimed: “oh, papa, what are they going to do with you?”
Her father, Tony Marchinado, endeavored to comfort her, but the girl continued sobbing pitifully. The sympathy of the entire crowd at the depot went out to this girl, and some turned away. Then the soldiers ordered her to move on.
The girl suddenly ceased weeping and, turning to those standing, and in a voice loud enough for the military to hear, said: “I think it’s living shame for men living in this country to be treated in such a manner.” She was not arrested.
The woman with the small child in the meantime reached the depot almost exhausted. She purchased a ticket and boarded the train on which her husband was about to be sent into exile. She cried bitterly and her baby was blue with cold. “I am too sick to work and look after our baby alone, and I am going with my husband, if it means the jail.” she moaned. If ever volumes of mute sympathy went out from a crowd, it went out greater as she bent down her head and fondly kissed the lips of her offspring, in vain endeavor to hush its cries from the biting cold. It was by far the saddest incident yet recorded in the military occupation of Telluride and the subsequent deportation of striking miners…
[Emphasis added.]
The names of the six deported men are: Tony Marchinado, Tony Sartoris, Louis Sartoris, F. W. Wells, Matt Lingol and Battiste Monchiando.