Hellraisers Journal – Sunday May 8, 1921 Bogalusa, Louisiana – Widows of Murdered Union Men Seek Measure of Justice
From the Duluth Labor World of May 7, 1921:
COURT FINALLY TELLS MOBBERS TO FACE TRIAL ———- Southern Lumber Company and Its Agents Must Answer for Murder of Union Men. ———-
The New York Times November 23, 1919
NEW ORLEANS. May 5.—After resorting to technicalities for 18 months Federal Judge Foster has ordered the city of Bogalusa, the Great Southern Lumber company and other persons sued for damages as the result of killings at Bogalusa, in November [22nd], 1919, to stop fighting for delay and get ready for trial. It will probably be another year before the mobbers will be placed on the witness stand and forced to tell of their connection with the murder of several trade unionists and the attempted lynching of Sol Dacus, influential negro in Bogalusa, who urged fellow negro workers to stand with the white workers in the mill strike of that year.
The suits were started by the widows of the mudered unionists. In the case of George Williams the charge is made that he was beaten nearly to death because he refused to quit his business of draying and return work in the mill.
The widows charge that their husbands were killed for the “sole purpose of destroying organized labor” in Bogalusa, and that the company sounded the mill’s siren whistle to assemble the mob.
The mob first went to the home of Dacus, but the negro hid in the swamp, and with the aid of white workers made his way to New Orleans and later to Gulfport, Miss. When the mob failed to find Dacus his home was demolished, his family terrified and $1,300 worth of war savings stamps stolen.
Hellraisers Journal – Friday March 17, 1911 Mother Jones News Round-Up for February 1911, Part I: –Found in Denver Speaking Out Against Government by Injunction
From The Rocky Mountain News of February 3, 1911:
1,000 WOMEN, SOME WITH BABIES, JOIN PROTEST ———- Twelve Thousand, Including Legislators, Parade as Rebuke to Judge Whitford for Recent Injunctions. ———-
OUST HIM, SAY RESOLUTIONS ———- Auditorium Packed Until Dark; Thomas Urges Change in Laws; Asks Recall. —–
The biggest trades union demonstration ever seen in Denver was that which took place yesterday in the form of a parade of the downtown streets and a mass meeting at the Auditorium as a protest against the decisions of Judge Greeley W. Whitford in the injunction cases against the union coal miners of the northern Colorado district and the striking machinists of the Denver Rock Drill and Machinery company.
The actual number in the parade was estimated at 12,000. The Auditorium was packed to its capacity and 2,000 were unable to get in…..
Former Governor Charles S. Thomas was the first speaker and from the time he began his address until “Mother” Jones closed at 6 o’clock the meeting was almost a continual demonstration of enthusiasm, with bursts of stormy applause whenever any especially strong denunciation of the decisions of Judge Whitford or or what the speakers designated “government by injunction” was uttered…..
Big Garment Workers’ Force.
The greatest number of women was in the first division. The Garment Workers’ union, the largest union of working girls in the city, marched in this division. So also did the woman’s auxiliary to the machinists…..
[Former Governor Thomas] urged the enactment of a recall law as one of the most effective means of putting an end to existing conditions, and the unanimity of the sentiment in favor of such a law was evidenced by vigorous applause.
E. E. [E. S.] McCullough, former vice-president of the United Mine Workers of America; John M. O’Neill, editor of the Western Federation of Miners’ magazine, and “Mother” Jones were the other speakers. O’Neill termed Whitford the Pontius Pilate of Colorado.
Hellraisers Journal – Friday November 16, 1900 Anthracite Coalfields of Pennsylvania – Hard Lot of Boys in the Mines
From the Duluth Labor World of November 10, 1900:
BOYS IN THE MINE ———-
HARD LOT OF THE YOUTHFUL SLATE PICKERS. ——-
Philadelphia Inquirer of September 30, 1900 —–
Miners Robbed That the Trust May Monopolize the Coalfields For All Time—At the Mercy of the Barons and Their Rake of Partners—The Public ls More Than Interested in Their Cause. ———-
D. L. Rhone, a resident of Wilkesbarre, Pa., writes as follows to the Philadelphia Times: The total number of employes of the anthracite mines in the year 1899 was 140,583, classified as follows:
In 1899 these 140,583 employes prepared for market 54,000,000 tons of coal. In 1898 it took 142,000 employes to prepare 47,000,000 tons for market, and in 1897 149,000 employes only prepared 47,000,000 tons. This shows a decrease in the number of employes of 7,000 from 1897 to 1899 inclusive and an increase of 7,000,000 tons of coal produced. The men are still going away.
The lot of the coal miner is hard indeed, and that of his laborer is still harder, while no one can uphold the lot of the little mule drivers, the runners and the slate pickers without a sigh of sympathy. The most appalling thing about the whole business is that there are 34,000 of these boys, ranging from 10 years of age upward. These 34,000 infants are confined for ten hours per day in the dark, damp mine chambers fighting, training and driving vicious mules, with no light but the greasy lamp on their caps, or for the same number of hours they are engaged in the roaring, smoking breaker, grabbing out the slate as it rattles over the iron bars.
Hellraisers Journal – Sunday October 30, 1910 Fresno, California – Editorial Advocates Whipping Post to Suppress Free Speech
From the Spokane Industrial Worker of October 26, 1910:
[…..]
ADVOCATES WHIPPING POST TO SUPPRESS FREE SPEECH.
General Headquarters I. W. W., 518 Cambridge Bldg., Chicago, Ill.
The Fresno Herald and Democrat, published at Fresno, Cal., for which one John Hamilton Gilmour assumes responsibility as publisher, has an editorial in the issue of October 12th commenting on the fight for free speech that is being made by the I. W. W. at Fresno, which ends by saying:
“It is incumbent upon all classes of citizens to aid the police in the suppression of these Industrial Workers of the World if they attempt to disturb the peace of the city.* * * For men to come here with the express purpose of creating trouble a whipping post and cat-o’-nine-tails well seasoned by being soaked in salt water is none to harsh a treatment for peace breakers. Indeed, such a punishment would prove more efficacious than a term in a dark cell.”
The editorial is an indication of what the membership for the I. W. W. have to fight against in carrying on the campaign for education and organization amongst the workers of the San Joaquin valley.
A whipping post and cat-o’-nine-tails seasoned with brine! For what? because workers of that sections-a few of them insist that they have an opportunity of holding meetings, to discuss matters of interest to their class, and to devise ways and means to educate, and organize the wage slaves of the farms, factories and railroads into an effective organization. The master class of the San Joaquin valley have throws off the mask. Through the mouthpiece of their class they have made known to what extent they are willing to go in order that they may continue to plunder the workers of that section, in PEACE.
Hellraisers Journal – Tuesday October 5, 1920 Bogalusa, Louisiana – Widows of Four Murdered Trade Unionists Demand Justice
From the Duluth Labor World of October 2, 1920:
WIDOWS OF FOUR DEAD UNION MEN DEMAND JUSTICE ——- Murderers of Timber Workers, Although Known, Have Not Been Arrested. ——-
The New York Times November 23, 1919
BOGALUSA, La., Sept. 30.-Widows of four trade unionists who were murdered by a mob last November have asked Governor Parker to order the state attorney general to prosecute the murderers.
The petition states that the men were slain “without just cause or excuse by employes of the Great Southern Lumber company,” and that two grand juries have considered the killings without taking action, and that the district attorney has admitted under oath that he did not summon a state witness but did summon witnesses for the defendants, including the defendants themselves.
The murders, were the [result?] of attempts by the lumber company to destroy trade unionism. After failing to divide the workers on racial lines a lynching party started for the home of an estimable negro [Sol Dacus] who was influential among his fellows. The negro hid in the swamps and escaped. The mob then came to the headquarters of the trade unionists and demanded the negro. They were told that the man was not there, and they were invited to search the building. The lynchers replied with a volley from shotguns and revolvers, killing several workers .
[Note: four trade unionists were murdered by the mob: L. E. (Lum) Williams, President of Bogalusa Trades Council, and Carpenters Thomas Gaines, J. P. Bouchillon, and S. J. (Stanley) O’Rourke.]
Hellraisers Journal – Tuesday October 4, 1910 Irwin Coal Field, Pennsylvania – Report from Strikers’ “Starvation Camp”
From the Duluth Labor World of October 1, 1910:
Keystone State Awakens to Hunger-Driven Peonage Practiced Within Its Confines
PITTSBURG, Pa., Sept. 30—Thousands of Pittsburg women, influential club women as well as the wives of storekeepers and mechanics, are signing a petition to Governor Edwin S. Steuart asking that he intervene and compel the coal companies to arbitrate the strike in the Erwin [Irwin] and Greensburg coal fields.
Piloted by the “Angel of the Camp,” Miss Emmeline Pitt, committees from various women’s clubs have visited the frail tents in which are huddled the thousands of miners’ wives and children, and, after hearing the stories of eviction and brutality committed by the deputies, have gone back to their organizations burning with indignation against the coal barons and determined to force action from the state authorities.
[Asserts Francis Feehan, president of district No. 5:]
The operators could settle this strike, settle it and give the miners all that they demand and then operate their mines at 20 per cent less than it is costing them now. It’s the strike-breakers that cost. They’re paying them $2.50 and $3 a day with rations—and that’s more than the skilled union miners ask.
Experienced miners say that the United Coal company is paying at the rate of $3 a ton to have its coal mined, while the market price is just half that amount.
Three things the striking miners want: 1. Recognition of the union. 2. Check-weighmen on the tipples. 3. Payment of the Pittsburg Scale.
And these three things the miners will win, coal barons or no coal barons, for the entire power of the United Mine Workers of America is gathering behind them.
————
GAUNT MOTHERS, THEIR BABES STARVING, HERE ——-
Special Correspondence of Labor World.
NEW ALEXANDRA, Pa., Sept. 30.—Three hundred puny babies, thinly clad and underfed by half-starved mothers who have nothing to give, live beneath canvas roofs and within canvas walls these chilly days and shivery nights in the Erwin coal regions of western Pennsylvania.
A thousand other little children, barefoot and almost barebacked, “live” on bread and water in that starvation camp among the foothills of the Alleghenies.
Hellraisers Journal – Tuesday July 19, 1910
Mother Jones News Round-Up for June 1910, Part III:
-Interviewed by Selene Armstrong in Washington, D. C.
From The Washington Times of June 18, 1910:
Thus spoke Mother Jones, the plucky little white-haired woman, whose home, to use her own words, is “wherever there’s a labor war, and the President of the United States, when she had journeyed across half a continent to lay before him for the first time the cases of a number of political refugees in prison in Arizona, Kansas, and other Western States.
Today and on other days this week, Mother Jones has been busy at the Capitol, where it said that members of certain committees before which she has appeared have gasped for breath and begged for mercy before she had finished outlining to them their duties in regard to the Mexicans whose freedom she seeks from the Government.
Meets Old Friends.
She has hobnobbed with her old friends Representatives Wilson and Nicholls of Pennsylvania, and has made new friends of many other statesmen, who, however little they sympathize with her decided views on this or that public question, cannot harden their hearts against the cheery good humor and keen wit which radiate from her.
When asked by Chairman Dalzell of the Rules Committee of the House, before which she has appeared this week, to state her place of residence, Mother Jones replied:
My home is wherever there a labor war, sir.
The life story of this little woman with the snow white hair, the childlike blue eyes, and the look of perennial youthfulness on her face, would, if it were written, be the history of the of cause of organized labor. For thirty years she has traveled throughout the length and breath of the land in order to stand by the workers in time of stress. In the roughest mining camps of the West, and in the crowded tenement districts of eastern cities, she has brought to the women of the working class a woman’s gentle counsel, and to the men sagacity and keen judgement the equal of a man’s.
Hellraisers Journal – Wednesday July 13, 1910
2805 Miners Killed in the United States During 1909
From The Labor Argus of July 7, 1910:
SLAUGHTER OF MINERS
—–
Nearly 3000 Wafted into Eternity in
the “Model” Mines in 1909
-Thousands Crippled.
—–
The Cherry Ill. Mine Disaster of November 13, 1909 killed 259 miners. —–
Washington, July 1-The statistics of coal mining casualties in the United States, compiled by the geological survey for the calendar year 1900, show an apparent falling off in fatalities during the year, but since the special bulletin on the subject states that no account is taken of the year’s greatest disaster, that, at Cherry, Ill., in November last, the facts are that 1909 was exceeded only by 1907 as one of heavy catastrophe years.
The report explains that the toll of the Cherry mine disaster is not counted in with the year’s figures because it will not be reported by the Illinois officials until the close of the fiscal year in June.
The government depends for its information in all but four states on the reports of the local officials, and although last year four more states-Georgia, Oregon, Texas and Virginia-were added to the figures through reports received from the operators, the returns are still far from complete, a situation which will be relieved, the report points out, when the newly established bureau of mines is completely organized.
Last year, leaving out the Cherry mine disaster, in which 393 miners and rescuers were burned to death or suffocated, there were 2,412 deaths from coal mine accidents, against 2,450 in 1908 and 3,125 in 1907, the most disastrous year in mining history in this country.
This disaster brings the total of fatalities in 1909 up to 2,805.
Hellraisers Journal – Saturday June 26, 1920
Pike County, Kentucky – Miners Marched in Chains by Company Gunthugs
From The Buffalo Labor Journal of June 24, 1920:
EVICTED MINERS IN CHAINS
—–
Charleston, W. Va.-When Pike county (Ky.) miners joined the union they were evicted from company houses, chained together and marched in mud and rain 30 miles by armed guards.
This is one of the sensational statements made in a report to President Keeney, district No. 17, United Mine Workers’ union, by Thomas West, attorney, who investigated Pike county mining troubles. Pike county is opposite Matewan, where several persons were recently killed by Baldwin-Feltz detectives.
[Said the investigator:]
The miners were chained together and were walked in a pouring rain to Pike, 25 or 30 miles away. Mud was almost knee deep. Pike county deputies shot a man’s hands off on the Kentucky side of Borderland. About 30 of them were terrorizing both sides of the river. The Pike county deputies were all drunk. In my opinion they constitute one of the most dangerous gangs of men I ever came in contact with.
[Newsclip added from Ellsworth County Leader of Kansas of June 24, 1920.]
From the Duluth Labor World of June 26, 1920:
MINERS HAVE NO TIME FOR
W. VA. PRIVATE POLICE
—–
Protest Against Continued Use-
Demand That U. S. Senate
Make Investigation.
—–
INDIANAPOLIS, Ind., June 25.— Every possible effort is being made by the United Mine Workers of America to bring about a full and thorough investigation of conditions in West Virginia under which coal miners are employed. The recent battle between coal miners and coal company gunmen at Matewan, W. Va., in which 10 men were killed, has caused the officials of the union to redouble their efforts to induce congress to make a sweeping probe of the situation.
Operating under the guise of private detectives, hundreds of gunmen and thugs, nearly all with criminal records, are employed by coal operators of some fields of West Virginia, and these men enforce a reign of terror among the miners and their families. Miners are beaten, slugged and shot. They are arrested and thrown in prison on no valid pretext whatever.
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Thus spoke Mother Jones, the plucky little white-haired woman, whose home, to use her own words, is “wherever there’s a labor war, and the President of the United States, when she had journeyed across half a continent to lay before him for the first time the cases of a number of political refugees in prison in Arizona, Kansas, and other Western States.
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