Hellraisers Journal – Sunday February 22, 1914 Houghton, Michigan – Seeberville Gunthugs Found Guilty of Manslaughter
From the Michigan Miners’ Bulletin of February 18, 1914 -Jury Finds Waddell Men Guilty of Seeberville Slaying:
A jury in the strike zone of Michigan has found three Waddell men and a deputy sheriff guilty of manslaughter in the death of Steve Putrich. This report is from the latest edition of the Miners’ Bulletin:
The Milwaukee Leader February 16, 1914
FOUND GUILTY
———-
Arthur Davis, William Groff and James Cooper, Waddell gunmen and Ed Polkinghorne, a deputy sheriff were found guilty of manslaughter after a trial lasting two weeks in the circuit court. The case was turned over to the jury Saturday at 4 o’clock and after twenty hours deliberation the above verdict was reached. In its verdict Polkinghorne was recommended to the mercy of the court, probably on account of his being a deputy sheriff. Harry James, another deputy sheriff, who stood trial along with the others was not considered in the verdict in compliance with the instructions of Judge Flannigan to the jury. James, it was brought out by the testimony, did not take any part in the shooting but was merely in company with the others, he not firing a shot.
When the verdict was read in court Monday morning, Attorney Galbraith for the defense addressed the court, stating that he had three motions to make as follows,-First, that the court set aside the verdict and dismiss the respondents at the bar; Second, that the court set aside the verdict and order a new trial; Third, that a stay of sentence be granted pending a bill of exceptions. In a lengthy statement and detailed explanation Judge Flannigan denied the motions. Attorney Nichols for the people then moved that sentence be passed on the prisoners and four defendants were requested to stand up.
Before passing sentence Judge Flannigan stated that passing sentence on prisoners was one of the most unpleasant and harder duties the court had to perform during his term on the bench. The court then sentence Cooper, Groff, Davis and Polkinghorne to hard labor at the branch prison at Marquette for not more than 15 years, and not less than 7 and 1/2 years. The prisoners appeared very much downcast when they heard their doom. It is believed they looked for an acquittal or a very light sentence, and were greatly disappointed.
The prisoners were then taken to jail to await transfer to the penitentiary. Thomas Raleigh one of the accused men who was out on bonds of $10,000 left the country about one month ago forfeiting his bonds. If caught he will probably be given the maximum sentence.
The crime for which these men were convicted was the murder of Steve Putrich, a striker, on August 14th last at Seeberville, a small mining camp near Houghton [where] an altercation occurred in which the deputies drew their guns shooting [a boarding] house full of holes, killing Steve Putrich and Louis Tijan, two absolutely innocent men and injuring several others who were in the house.
[Newsclip, paragraph breaks and emphasis added]
The Judge made this statement before imposing his sentence:
I have tried to find mitigation if it existed. I have made an effort to find something, somewhere, in mitigation for your act. I know too that the jury sat through this trial hoping that from the lips of some witness might fall something that would put at least a drop of humanity into that awful transaction.
It is not right for a circuit judge to scold convicted men when passing sentence and I do not want to be looked upon as doing so. I have tried to give you boys a fair trial. It was impossible for it to be fairer. If the jury had found your plea of self defense true in this case it would have been a travesty of justice.
[Emphasis added]
On Tuesday, the convicted murderers were taken to the train station and shipped off to serve their sentences. The Daily Mining Gazette reported on that event:
NOT A DRY EYE AS CONVICTED MEN LEAVE FOR PRISON.
The Gazette further reported that a huge crowd of well-wishers gathered at the station to witness these fine but “luckless young men” being deported from Michigan’s copper country.
Hellraisers Journal – Thursday February 5, 1914 News from Michigan Copper Strike: Striker Shot; May Prove Fatal
From The Calumet News of February 2, 1914:
[Note: Names above are incorrect, see below.]
Monday February 2, 1914, Hancock-Houghton, Michigan –Striker John Laitila Shot by Scabs, Not Expected to Live
John Laitila, striking copper miner, was shot by James Johnson, a scab, yesterday near the Superior mine as he confronted Johnson and three other scabs who were on their way to work. Laitila is not expected to live. Prosecuting Attorney Lucas is looking into the matter. An arrest is expected. We have learned that the Lucas doubts the story of self-defense told by Johnson, and further believes that the gun found on Laitila was planted on him by the killers.
The trial of the Waddell men in the killing of the strikers at the Seeberville boarding house begins today. Six gunthugs are on trial, and the sympathy of the kept press almost brings tears to the eyes. According to The Daily Mining Gazette, the gunthugs are “young men of good character and agreeable social manners,” while the men they murdered were “ugly” and “drunk.” Left unexplained by the Gazette is why men of such good character would come to seize men, without authority of law, and, when the men resisted being unlawfully seized, then shoot up a home, especially one containing a family with young children..
From The Indianapolis Star of February 3, 1914:
House Mine Committees To Inquire into Strikes
Washington, Feb. 1-Subcommittees of the House committee on mines will leave Washington next Wednesday night for the West to investigate the Colorado and Michigan mine strikes.
The Colorado investigators, Representatives Foster, Illinois, chairman; Byrnes, South Carolina; Evans, Montana (Democrats); Austin, Tennessee, and Sutherland, West Virginia (Republicans), will go first to Denver, then to Trinidad and Pueblo and later to Boulder.
Representatives Taylor of Colorado, chairman; Hamlin, Mississippi; Carey, Pennsylvania (Democrats); Howell, Utah, and Switzer, Ohio (Republicans), the subcommittee for the Michigan inquiry, will go direct to Calumet and take in Houghton and other places in the strike-affected area.
None of the committeemen would venture a prediction as to how long their tasks would occupy them.
Hellraisers Journal – Tuesday February 3, 1914 “Calumet” by Leslie H. Marcy, Part II-Profits, Wages and Working Conditions
From the International Socialist Review of February 1914:
[Part II of II]
We have seen how the copper country is governed by an “invisible government”; from the judge on the bench, to the grand jury in session; from the national guard of the state of Michigan, on “duty,” since July 24, 1913, to the sheriff with his hundreds of imported professional strike breakers whom he swore in as deputies. The Calumet and Hecla Mining Company, Calumet, is the invisible government of Michigan.
This poor-little-rich corporation was “created” in the early fifties. According to a statement given out by Attorney Peterman, and endorsed by General Manager W. F. Denton, and General Manager C. L. Lawton, we find this devout confession: ”The profits of the Calumet and Hecla have been large, but they were due solely to the fact that the Creator put such rich ore in the company’s ground.”
However, Congress in the year of our Lord, 1852, seems to have been in total ignorance of this little gift on the Creator’s part to the copper crowd, for we find that “it gave to the state of Michigan 750,000 acres of public land, to aid it in building a ship canal around the Falls of St. Mary. The state in turn bargained this land to the contractors who built the canal, at a dollar and a quarter an acre. The lands thus disposed of at so beggarly a price were supposed to be swamp, or overflowed lands, but somehow, and strange to say, a part of them are now the rocky matrices from which the Calumet and Hecla has long been extracting shot-copper,-that company having in some way got hold of them. Years later a man named Chandler, who claimed to have bought the same land over again from the State of Michigan, brought a suit to dispossess the copper company,-charging all sorts of fraud in the switching of swamps so as to be quarries of copper-bearing rock. But the Supreme Court ruled against him, on the ground that as he got his deed from the state, he was in no better plight than the state, and that the state could not go back on its first deed to the canal contractors: so the Calumet and Hecla people kept it.”
This “good thing” was capitalized for $2,500,000 in shares of $25 each, instead of $100-note that. Of this $25 a share, only $12 was paid in. A total cash investment of $1,200,000. According to the Mining and Engineering World of December 27th, Calumet and Hecla has declared dividends on issued capitalization to December 1, 1913, amounting to $121,650,000, or $1,216 a share or $101 profits for each dollar invested.
Dividends for 1900 amounted to 320 per cent; for 1906, 280 per cent; for 1907, 260 per cent. In the Boston market, the stock was quoted on the day before New Years, at 427, bid price. Bearing in mind that the par value of the shares is but $25, this figure means that the stock is now worth more than 1,700 per cent, and bearing in mind also that only $12 a share was actually paid in, it means more than 3,400 per cent, market value. The president of the company receives a salary greater than the president of the United States.
Not long ago, when dividends threatened to be unusually enormous, the company purchased an extensive island in Lake Superior, stocked it with the finest game, and it is now used by stockholders of the company as a hunting preserve.
And the capitalists, who have never seen the inside of a mine shaft, who have stolen and defrauded to gain possession of the Calumet mines, have refused to permit their wage slaves, who produce all the wealth brought out of the mines, to organize into a union. They have denied the right of these workers to organize to demand more wages and better working conditions. Their arrogance is summed up in the words “We have nothing to arbitrate.”
These capitalists want MORE labor from the laborers. They are not satisfied with having stolen hundreds of millions from the men who have dug the wealth from the dangerous recesses of the earth. They demand still MORE.
Up above the strikers stood Annie Clemenc, girl leader of the miners. She was not the usual militant Annie Clemenc. She was saying a prayer for the children. The Day Book, January 6, 1914
Annie Takes Up Her Flag
On July 23, 1913, 9,000 copper miners of the Keweenaw Peninsula, Upper Michigan, laid down their tools and walked off the job. They were led by the great Western Federation of Miners, and they had voted by a good majority for a strike: 9,000 out of 13,000. The main issues were hours (the miners wanted an eight hour day), wages, and safety. The miners hated the new one-man drill which they called the “widow-maker.” They claimed this drill made an already dangerous job more dangerous.
The mining companies had steadfastly refused to recognize the Western Federation of Miners in any way. They would continue to refuse all efforts at negotiation or arbitration, even those plans for arbitration which did not include the union, and this despite the best efforts of Governor Ferris, and the U. S. Department of Labor. James MacNaughton, general manger of Calumet and Hecla Mining Company, famously stated that grass would grow in the streets and that he would teach the miners to eat potato parings before he would negotiate with the striking miners.
The Keweenaw Peninsula was a cold, windy place, jutting out into Lake Superior from the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. This area was known as the Copper Country of Michigan and included Calumet Township of Houghton County, with the twin towns of Hancock and Houghton ten miles to the south. Calumet Township included the villages of Red Jacket and Laurium.
It was here in Red Jacket, on the third day of the strike that Annie Clemenc, miner’s daughter and miner’s wife took up a massive America flag and led an early morning parade of 400 striking miners and their families. Annie Clemenc was six feet tall, and some claimed she was taller than that by two inches. The flag she carried was so massive that it required a staff two inches thick and ten feet tall. The miners and their supporters marched out of the Italian Hall and through the streets of the Red Jacket to the Blue Jacket and Yellow Jacket mines. They marched silently, without a band, lined up three and four abreast. These early morning marches, with Annie and her flag in the lead, were to become a feature of the strike.
Hellraisers Journal – Saturday December 27, 1913 Hancock/Houghton, Michigan – Moyer and Tanner Kidnapped and Deported
Last night at about 8:30 p.m. Sheriff Cruse and a “committee” paid a visit to the Scott Hotel in Hancock. They went to the room of Charles Moyer, President of the Western Federation of Miners. The “committee” was determined that the leaders of the W. F. of M. should reconsider their refusal to accept any donations from the Citizens’ Alliance to the families of the victims of the Italian Hall Massacre. Mr. Moyer remained adamant that donations from the Citizens’ Alliance amounted to blood money and that the union would bury it’s own dead.
No sooner had this “committee” left the room than a mob burst into the room. They began to beat Moyer and also Charles Tanner who was there with him. A gun was used to beat Moyer over the head which discharged during the assault. Moyer was shot in the shoulder. Moyer and Tanner were dragged out of the Hotel and down the street to the train station in Houghton. At the Houghton-Hancock bridge they were threatened with hanging, and shown a noose brought for that purpose.
The kidnappers put Moyer and Tanner on the Chicago train. Deputy Sheriff Hensley and Deputy McKeever were assigned to accompany the deportees. The deputies wore their Citizens’ Alliance buttons right next to their deputy badges for all to see.
The train stopped briefly in Milwaukee, and reporters were able to get the story from Moyer and Tanner. The reporters also witnessed Moyer’s “pillow and bed linen were soiled with blood from wounds in his scalp and back.”
———-
From the Chicago Day Book of December 27, 1913, Noon Edition
Hellraisers Journal – Sunday December 14, 1913 Michigan Copper Country – MacNaughton’s Eye, Threats and Mob Rule
News From Michigan Copper Country
From the Michigan Miners Bulletin of December 2, 1913:
“Seen by the Search-Light” is a regular feature of the Miners’ Bulletin and refers to “MacNaughton’s Eye,” the giant searchlight that James MacNaughton, manager of the Calumet and Hecla Mining Company, has had erected on top of the main tower situated in the middle of the town of Calumet, Michigan. The searchlight roams about the streets of Calumet, keeping a watchful eye on strikers and scabs alike. It shines into windows of the homes of the residents, interfering with a peaceful night’s rest. Of course most of those streets, the houses, and the property upon which the town itself sits, is owned by C & H. Therefore, we suppose, MacNaughton has a perfect right to make of the town something resembling a prison.
Seen by the Search-Light
Senator James, in his office staring at the labor situation of the day, and concluding to remain silent; to draw the votes from both sides at election time.
James Torreana, the Laurium scab supporter, at mid-night when the Hyena walks around the graveyard walls, going to meet the modern Judas A. C. Marinelli, to furnish him with news of strike-breaking nature.
Mike Bargo, the Italian scab herder at the telephone, communicating some scabious news to the “Gazette.”
A small man with spectacles riding a bicycle, from West Portland St. to the office of “The Italian Miner” of Laurium, with a parcel of written matter for publication.
Paul Tinetti looking at Pietro Micca’s picture.
5th St.-The green grass growing in front of Keckonen store, but no other place for lack of pollen matter in the seeds.
[Emphasis added.]
Regarding the “green grass growing,” we will remind our readers that MacNaughton has vowed that “grass would grow in the streets” of Calumet before he would treat with the Western Federation of Miners.This kind man has also vowed to teach the strikers and their families how to eat potato pairings.
Poetry from Miners Bulletin of December 2, 1913:
THE WORKER By Berton Braley
I have broken my hands on your granite, I have broken my strength on your steel, I have sweated through years for your pleasure, I have worked like a slave for your weal. And what is the wage you have paid me. You masters and drivers of men? -Enough so I come in my hunger To beg for more labor again!
I have given my manhood to serve you, I have given my gladness of youth; You have used me, and spent me, and crushed me, And thrown me aside without ruth; You have shut my eyes off from the sunlight, My lungs from the untainted air; You have housed me in horrible places. Surrounded by squalor and care.
I have built you the world in its beauty, I have brought you the glory of spoil; You have blighted my sons and my daughters, You have scourged me again to my toil. Yet I suffer it all in my patience, For somehow I dimly have known That some day the worker will conquer In a world that was meant for his own!
Hellraisers Journal – Saturday December 13, 1913 The Keweenaw, Michigan – Government by Gunthug Starts Bloody War
From the Chicago Day Book of December 11, 1913:
Calumet, Mich., Dec. 11.-(Special.)-Bloody war has broken out in the copper country, and the battle has been waging since early this morning. It was precipitated by the Citizens’ Alliance, which has been making open threat for days that the union leaders would be forcibly driven from Houghton county.
Yesterday President Moyer of the Western Federation of Miners made application to Circuit Judge O’Brien for an injunction restraining members of the Alliance from interfering with officers and members of the Federation. The injunction was granted.
This morning about 2 o’clock gunmen deputies and members of the Citizens’ Alliance attempted to arrest striking miners who had barricaded themselves in their hall at South Range, about eight miles from Calumet. This started the fight.
Thirty-five armed strikers were arrested, and two special trains were sent out from Houghton loaded with reinforcements from the Alliance, one at 5 and the other at 9 o’clock.
In the battle Deputy Tom Driscoll of Houghton was shot and fatally wounded. Many others were wounded, although no list of them has been secured.
The fighting kept up all morning and before noon a total of 500 strikers had been arrested, including Victor Valimakki, Finnish organizer for the Federation, who is alleged to have confessed to the shooting of Driscoll, who was shot through the abdomen and the right arm.
Just before noon a third special train carrying gunmen, deputies and vigilantes was sent to the South Range district, a distance of 27 miles from Houghton.
The fire bells were rung in Calumet and Houghton this morning summoning all members of the Citizens’ Alliance.
Thousands are being held in reserve ready to be sent to any part of the county. The fighting today followed a night of terror throughout the strike district. Two of the gunmen deputies who were shot down yesterday are not expected to live.
Labor leaders predict that wholesale arrests will be made of members of the Alliance for violating Judge O’Brien’s injunction, issued yesterday.
Federation Hall, at South Range, where for more than eight hours today half a hundred striking copper miners battled desperately against a mob of vigilantes and deputy sheriffs, was surrendered by the miners into the hands of the Citizens’ Alliance at noon today. All the defenders of the hall were arrested. Thirty rifles and great quantities of ammunition were confiscated and will be thrown into Portage Lake.
As far as could be learned early this afternoon Deputy Sheriff Driscoll at Houghton was the only person to be fatally injured in the fighting. He was shot through the abdomen and cannot recover, it was stated this afternoon. Henry Koski has confessed to shooting the deputy, the authorities asserted. Koski’s wife is also held for complicity.
[Deputized Company Gunthugs]
The fighting deputy sheriffs are gunmen imported from New York by the Waddell-Mahon strikebreaking agency of 200 Fifth avenue, New York city. They were sworn in by Sheriff Cruse and armed with guns and deputy’s badges.
Waddell said himself that many of them were ex-members of the New York police department. Others were imported from Chicago and other cities, but most of them from the East.
The entire county has been under control of the mining companies, through the sheriff’s office and the Waddell thugs, ever since the strike began last July.
Hellraisers Journal – Tuesday November 18, 1913 Calumet, Michigan – Eighteen Women and Girls Arrested
From the Duluth Labor World of November 15, 1913
WOMEN AND GIRLS ARRESTED AT MINE ———-
Eighteen Charged With Violation of Injunction at the Mohawk Property. ———-
CALUMET, Mich., Nov. 13.-—Eighteen women and girls, strike sympathizers, were arrested at the Mohawk mine today, charged with violation of the injunction prohibiting abuse or intimidation of workers. They were cited to appear before Circuit Judge O’Brien on Nov. 24.
William Teddy, prominent strike leader, was arrested on suspicion of being connected with the dynamiting of a house in which mine guards boarded at Centennial Heights, Tuesday morning. The investigation of attacks on mail trains carrying imported workmen, is progressing quietly. Eleven arrests of strikers have already been made. The gunmen are losing no opportunity to harass the strikers.
—————
—————
—————
Last night at about 8:30 p.m. Sheriff Cruse and a “committee” paid a visit to the Scott Hotel in Hancock. They went to the room of Charles Moyer, President of the Western Federation of Miners. The “committee” was determined that the leaders of the W. F. of M. should reconsider their refusal to accept any donations from the Citizens’ Alliance to the families of the victims of the Italian Hall Massacre. Mr. Moyer remained adamant that donations from the Citizens’ Alliance amounted to blood money and that the union would bury it’s own dead.
—————