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Hellraisers Journal – Monday November 10, 1913
Mother Jones Speaks at Meeting of Washington, D. C., Central Labor Union
From The Washington Herald of November 6, 1913:
Tag: Trinidad CO
Hellraisers Journal: “Miners Go Out…Mother Jones Lecturing Miners for More Complete Organization”-Speaks at Sopris
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Hellraisers Journal – Monday November 9, 1903
Mother Jones Speaks to Miners at Sopris and Starkville, Colorado
From The Rocky Mountain News of November 8, 1903:
[Mother Jones at Sopris and Starkville]…..The meeting held at Sopris last night [November 6th], where the speaker was Mother Jones, was crowded. To-night she speaks at Starkville. Both these towns are incorporated, and the coal companies do not own the town sites, so no interference with the meeting can be brought about, even if it was the desire of the operators…..It is stated that all the miners are out at Berwind, and that all at Sopris and Starkville will refuse to go to work Monday. In the two latter towns, Mother Jones has made hurricane appeals to the miners to strike. She is a speaker of the strongest type, and the fact that she is a white haired woman carried weight with her talks, all of which recited the condition in the Eastern fields, and none of which referred to the conditions prevailing in Colorado or how to improve them…..[Emphasis added.]
Hellraisers Journal: UMWA Declares Strike of District 15’s Coal Miners Will Begin November 9th. Order Signed by President Mitchell So Instructs President Howells.
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Hellraisers Journal – Sunday November 1, 1903
Indianapolis, Indiana – United Mine Workers Issues Strike Call for District 15
From The Rocky Mountain News of October 30, 1903:
Note error above: District 15 coal miners are members of the United Mine Workers of America, not the Western Federation of Miners (metal miners).
Hellraisers Journal: “Rich Suffragets Know Nothing of Miners’ Wives’ Suffering Says Mother Jones” by William G. Shepherd
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Hellraisers Journal – Tuesday October 28, 1913
Mother Jones Lectures Rich Suffragettes on Suffering of Miners’ Wives
From the Chicago Day Book of October 27, 1913:
RICH SUFFRAGETS KNOW NOTHING OF
MINERS’ WIVES’ SUFFERING
SAYS MOTHER JONESBY WM. G. SHEPHERD
Trinidad, Col., Oct. 27.-Mother Jones, 81, here fresh from the West Virginia prisons to help Colorado coal strikers, recently gave me her opinion on women’s suffrage.
From what I see of conditions in this corrupted state of Colorado, where they have had women’s suffrage for 14 years, it seems to me that the influence of women has been utterly useless. I wish Mrs. Pankhurst would frame me a statement as to why women’s suffrage has failed so utterly in Colorado. Conditions of women and children in mining districts are worse than in any other part of the United States.
This state is owned by corporations. Votes of the women of Colorado have never helped Colorado women and children, made their lives easier or lessened their toil or gained for them any additional human rights.
The rights of lower classes are less respected in this great woman suffrage state than in West Virginia, where women don’t vote. It is like prescribing cough medicine to cure consumption for Mrs. Pankhurst to suggest votes for women as a cure for economical slavery.
Mrs. Pankhurst doesn’t understand problems of the lower classes; she belongs to the upper classes. What does Mrs. Belmont or Mrs. Mackay or other rich women who surround Mrs. Pankhurst know about suffering of miners’ wives and infants? Mrs. Pankhurst travels with women who are opposed to what laboring classes of America stand for. They demand to know what right Mrs. Pankhurst has to associate with such women at the same time she talks about uplifting the world. The consumptive, economical America needs something more than Mrs. Pankhurst’s celebrated cough syrup. I wish Mrs. Pankhurst were coming to speak to the women in the tented camps of the coal strikers of Colorado. It would be more of a lesson for Mrs. Pankhurst than for the wives.
[Emphasis added.]
Hellraisers Journal: William Gunn Shepherd on the Coal Strike in Colorado: “The Wrath of 25 Years Breaking Loose”
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Hellraisers Journal – Saturday October 25, 1913
Trinidad, Colorado – William Gunn Shepherd Reports on Coalfield Strike
From The Day Book of October 23, 1913:
Hellraisers Journal: “Fire Adds to Horror of Dawson Explosion-284 Entombed by Blast, 22 Rescued Alive…256 Missing”
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Hellraisers Journal – Friday October 24, 1913
October 22, Dawson, New Mexico
–Near Three Hundred Miners Trapped in Flaming Mine
From the Trinidad Chronicle News of October 23, 1913:
From Albuquerque Evening Herald of October 23, 1913:
Thursday October 23, 1913 – Dawson, New Mexico
-Mine Disaster Leaves Nearly 300 Miners Entombed, Hope Fading
These are the latest bulletins from The Anaconda Standard:
Dawson, N. M., Oct.23-Fourteen bodies have been recovered and seven men have been found alive by rescuers early this morning working in shaft No. 2 of the Stag Canyon coal mine, where an explosion occurred yesterday afternoon, entombing the day shift, variously given as numbering 230 to 280 men.
Trinidad, Col., Oct. 22-A special rescue train carrying scores of experienced miners equipped with rescue apparatus left here at 6 o’clock tonight for Dawson, 125 miles from here.
Raton, N. M., Oct. 22-About 100 feet of progress has been made by the rescuers at mine No. 2 of the Stag Canyon Fuel company at Dawson, N. M., in their fight against the debris which has choked the mine entrance. A few mangled bodies have been recovered, and it is believed that the blockades exist for hundreds of feet further into the mine.
Little hope is entertained here for the rescue of the entombed men…
Appeals for aid started scores of experienced miners from Trinidad and the surrounding coal camps, shortly after 6 o’clock, and they were expected to reach Dawson before midnight.
Dawson, N. M., Oct 22-…The rescuers believe they will be able to reach the interior by tomorrow night at the latest. They think no exits exist at present from the mine. So far all rescuing parties have had to enter the mine equipped with oxygen tanks
Women Gather
In the relief camps situated near the entrance to mine No. 2, are gathering the women and children of the entombed miners. Women of the town are in the camp comforting and cheering the wives and children of the miners, whose fate still is a matter of conjecture.[Emphasis added.]
Among those on the train which left Trinidad last night to join the rescue effort in Dawson were Louie Tikas, leader of the Ludlow Tent Colony; Ed Doyle, Secretary of District 15, and Ed Wallace, editor of the United Mine Workers Journal. They arrived with a thousand dollars in relief for the women and children. The young photographer, Lou Dold, was also reported to have arrived on the train from Trinidad.
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Hellraisers Journal: Mother Jones to Governor Ammons, Democrat of Colorado: “These Women Ain’t Going to Bite You.”
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Hellraisers Journal – Thursday October 23, 1913
Trinidad, Colorado – Mother Jones Leads Mass Parade to Confront Governor Ammons
October 21, 1913
Governor Ammons, Democrat of Colorado, arrived Tuesday, October 21st, in Southern Colorado to make a personal tour of the strike zone. He came accompanied by several state officials. Near Walsenburg, on the public highway leading into the C. F. & I. Company’s Ravenwood Mine, an Oklahoma gunthug refused to give a pass to the chief executive of the state of Colorado so that he could continue on his chosen route. The private company gunthug said to the Governor:
You may be the governor and again maybe you ain’t. I dunno. But you ain’t got no pass to get in here and you ain’t going in, see?
Governor Ammons and his party of state official were forced to turn back.
In Trinidad, Governor Ammons sojourned at the Hotel Cardenas. Imagine his surprise when he looked out the window to find Mother Jones leading a parade of 1500 women and children who were followed by 2500 more in a grand show of support. The Colorado & Southern railroad refused Mother’s request to carry the strikers and their families from Ludlow into Trinidad, and yet many of them managed to make their way into Trinidad to march in the parade. They were joined by the women, children, and miners from many of the other tent colonies as well.
They all came marching and singing, (especially “The Colorado Strike Song”) led by a brass band, and carrying signs of protest:
Has the Governor Any Respect for the State?
A Bunch of Mother Jones’ Children
We Want Freedom, Not Corporation Rules
If Uncle Sam Can Run the Post-Office, Why Not the Mines?
We Are Not Afraid of Your Gatling Guns, We Have To Die Anyway
Give Us Another Patrick Henry for Governor
The Democratic Party is on Trial
Do You Hear the Children Groaning, O Colorado
Mother, believing that the residents of the tent colonies deserve an encouraging word from their Governor, brought the women and children into the hotel and straight up to the door of the Governor’s room. According to reports, every hallway was packed. Mother called to the Governor, but he would not come out. She beat on the door and yelled:
Unlock that door and come out here. These women ain’t going to bite you.
The Governor remained barricaded in his room.
Governor Ammons will leave the strike zone today or early tomorrow. Reports indicate that he is unwilling to call out the National Guard at this time. He told reporters:
The strike is no Sunday school picnic, but conditions aren’t as bad as I had been led to believe.
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Hellraisers Journal: Nine Hundred Striking Miners March Through Trinidad to Honor Martyred Coal Miner, Luca Vahernick
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Hellraisers Journal – Wednesday October 22, 1913
News from the Coal Miners’ Strike in Southern Colorado
From The Rocky Mountain News of October 21, 1913
-Trinidad, Colorado-October 20
Nine Hundred Striking Miners March to Honor Luca Vahernick
From the Trinidad Chronicle News of October 20, 1913:
Hellraisers Journal: Mother Jones Arrives in Trinidad Unannounced, Will Investigate Conditions and Visit Homes of Miners
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Hellraisers Journal – Wednesday October 21, 1903
Trinidad, Colorado – Mother Jones Arrives, Meets with District 15 Officials
From The Denver Post of October 20, 1903:
Hellraisers Journal: News from Colorado Coalfield Strike: Forbes Tent Colony Attacked by Operators’ “Death Special”
Let every miner wear his red bandanna
around his neck. It is our uniform.
-John Lawson
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Hellraisers Journal – Sunday October 19, 1913
News Round-Up from the Coal Miners’ Strike in Southern Colorado
Wednesday October 15, 1913 – Southern Coalfields, Colorado
-Coal Operators Provide Gunthugs with “Death Special.”
The coal operators have brought a new machine into the strike zone of Colorado. Called the “Death Special” by the miners, the machine is an automobile covered with armor and equipped with a search light and a machine gun. It is usually seen roaming about the various tent colonies filled with Baldwin-Felts gunthugs holding their rifles at the ready. Word has it that Mr. Felts, himself, had the large automobile delivered from Denver to Rockefeller’s Colorado Fuel and Iron plant in Pueblo. There the sides were torn down and replaced with three-eights-inch steel plates. The machine gun was shipped in from West Virginia where it had served previous duty against the miners of that state.
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Thursday October 17, 1913 – Trinidad, Colorado
-Death Special follows 48 Union Men from Starkville to Trinidad
Yesterday strikers engaged in peacefully picketing at the Starkville Mine. This mine is owned by James McLaughlin, brother-in-law of Governor Ammons, Democrat of Colorado. Forty-eight of these union men were rounded up, placed under arrest by company guards and county deputies and marched the three miles back to Trinidad. On either side of them were rows of armed gunthugs, and behind them came the Death Special with its spotlight and machine gun aimed at their backs.
The union men offered no resistance, but as they come down the hill into Trinidad, they began to shout. They are being held in the Las Animas County Jail.
G. C. Jones, organizer for the Western Federation of Miners, was beaten by Gunthug Belk and by A. C. Felts as he attempted to get a Kodak of the menacing machine. The young photographer, Lou Dold was more successful.
In the past few days other attacks upon the striking miners and their families have been perpetrated by the mine guards. The Sopris Tent Colony was shot up by company gunthugs as they sped by in an automobile. In Walsenburg, Gunthug Lou Miller and six of his companions, roamed the streets assaulting strikers and union sympathizers wherever they found them. The town of Segundo was sprayed with machine gun fire for a full ten minutes as punishment for the beating of guard who had insulted a woman there.
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Saturday October 18, 1913 – Forbes Tent Colony, Colorado
-Mine Guards Attack with Death Special, Striker Luca Vahernick Killed
Mine guards, yesterday, attacked the Forbes Tent Colony making use of the machine gun from the Death Special. Guards on horseback also used their rifles in the attack. A miner, Luca Vahernick, was killed, and a boy, Marco Zamboni, was shot nine times in the legs. A young girl who was on her way home from school was shot in the face. She lives on a near-by farm. The attack began at 2 p.m. and continued until dusk. The miners had only seven rifles or shotguns, six revolvers, and very little ammunition, but they were able to defend the Colony and prevented the guards from entering.
John Lawson arrived at Forbes this morning. As Lawson approached the camp, he found the Gunthugs Belk and Belcher lurking about, and confronted them. These are the same guards who were involved in the murders of Brothers Lippiatt and Powell, and now it appears, they have murdered another union brother. Louie Tikas stepped between Lawson and Belk, in that quiet, calm way of his and eased them apart. And, in this way, he may have saved Brother Lawson’s life.
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