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Wednesday October 15, 2014
Part II of a Summary of the Colorado Coalfield Strike of 1903-04 by Emma F. Langdon
Many books have been written about the Colorado Coalfield Strike of 1913-14, but there is little written about the strike of 1903-04, and what is written is scattered around in various books. Therefore, as the strike comes to it's sad ending in October of 1904, this seems like a good time to present the summary of the strike that was written by Emma F. Langdon for inclusion in her book on the Cripple Creek Strike. We began yesterday with part 1 of Mrs. Langdon's account of the strike and conclude today with part 2:
As previously stated, the Southern operators refused in any manner to recognize the [organization of the] miners and all efforts to adjust matters proved futile.
When the men responded to the [strike] call [of November 8, 1903] they practically suspended every mine in the Southern fields. The operators were dumbfounded at the success of the union in closing the mines.
After they recovered from the shock they sent out agents all over the country, enlisting new men, deputy sheriffs were employed by hundreds. Notwithstanding all this, the strike progressed without any lawlessness, which proved a surprise to many who had predicted all kinds of trouble in the '' South.'' The companies became desperate at their failure to secure men to work their mines. Deputies and thugs were employed to beat and intimidate the striking miners. Men were offered as high as $100 of a bonus to go to work, but refused; the union miners were offered big wages to break the ranks of the union, but stood as one man for the terms asked when the strike was called.
Then it was that the imported tools of the corporations resorted to the beating system, law was not taken into consideration and force was established by the companies. Men appealed to the courts in order to retain their homes and in many cases where the courts ruled in favor of the party taking such action, regardless of the decision of the court, the coal companies would throw the men with families out of their homes. Union men were forbidden to drive over public roads.
Carlo (Charles) Demolli
November 19 [1903], C. Demolli and William Price, organizers, were going to Scofield, Utah; when a short distance from the town a mob, composed of members of the Citizens' Alliance boarded the train armed, and forced the train crew to take them back. December 6, 1903, Luciano De Santos and Joseph Vilano were killed by deputy sheriffs at Segundo. William Maher and Henry Mitchell were badly beaten at Engleville, Colo., January 24, 1904, by the deputies, for having gone to the town on union business.
December 17, the houses of five union miners were blown up at New Castle, Colo. One of the homes dynamited was that of W. G. Isaac. The night his home was blown up he was in Glenwood Springs, about twelve miles from New Castle and did not return to his home until summoned on account of the explosion. Had Mr. Isaac been at home, the two children would have been killed. The children slept in the front room, but on account of the absence of their father, they slept with their mother and, before the family retired, the mother moved the bed from the wall and called the old watch dog in. Some time in the night the explosion occurred, the dynamite set the house on fire and Mrs. Isaac saved the children and herself from being burned to death by crawling through the broken window and taking with her the two children. Next morning the watch dog was found, his nose between his front paws, dead, as if he had never moved, beside the couch on which the children slept when Mr. Isaac was at home.
Miner's Home Dynamited in New Castle, Colorado
December 17, 1903
And yet, reader, can you believe me, when I state that the coal companies had the callousness to declare that Mr. Isaac and others whose homes were dynamited were the guilty parties?
How easy for a corporation to point a finger of suspicion at a Working man and accuse him of attempting to murder his beloved wife and little ones.
How easy for the masses to accept their decree. It appears that the great coal barons can not understand that W. G. Isaac could have the same feeling of affection for his frail little wife, that proved herself an heroine, and climbed out a broken window and walked with bleeding feet and carried the little ones in her arms to a neighbor's, for assistance, that the owner of the coal mine felt for the, perhaps, helpless wife of his own, that no doubt in the face of a-similar case would succumb to circumstances; that the little ones were just as dear; that the humble home was as much home to them as Osgood's mansion to him.
If the truth were to be told, the answer from the employer would be like the verse in the song:
"You are not supposed to have a heart."
I believe the hirelings of the corporations dynamited the homes of the five union coal miners.
In February, Organizer Wardjon was attacked by three deputies. A striker of Sophris was beat up by Deputy McPherson. February 14, 1904, William Farley and James Mooney, national organizers, were caught by seven of the [Detective] Reno gang, one mile east of Trinidad, and badly beaten. A union miner was killed by a deputy at Dawson, New Mexico.
March 14, an Italian striker was shot at Pryor, Colo. He was driven from his home and when attempting to run away was shot in the back. Shortly after, John Faletti was beat up at Glenwood Springs by a gang of Reno's men. R. L. Martell, chief secret service man for Reno, figured in the deal. Faletti was district organizer.
There were many cases like the foregoing, men taken from trains and severely beaten; shot in the back; homes dynamited; thrown in jail and all kinds of outrages that could be conceived in the fertile brain of a demon. All unchronicled by the Associated Press.
March 23, the militia was sent to Trinidad and martial law proclaimed and the work of confiscating firearms commenced. Midnight searches for weapons was common; men, women and children were dragged from their beds at all hours of the night and taken to the barren prairie to be threatened and in some cases tortured, to try and force them to disclose where guns were hidden.
A. Bartoli, an Italian typesetter of District 15, was arrested March 25, 1904. The following day the Italian paper was suppressed. The same day "Mother" Jones, national organizer, William Wardjon, Joe Poggiani and A. Bartoli were deported from the county and with much abuse they were told never to return.
"Mother" Jones was given five minutes to dress and get her clothing packed and taken to the depot by a rough squad, who forgot they owed their existence to a mother.
[Here Langdon jumps suddenly to the ongoing strike in Utah, also a strike made up of mostly Italian miners. The photograph below shows strikers who have been rounded up and confined to the bullpen in Price, Utah, during that strike. Demolli is seated in the foreground.]
"Mother" Jones was quarantined in Utah, April 16. The following day she made her escape, going away with the strikers.
April 19, eleven strikers were arrested at Brodhead [Colorado]. They were deported to New Mexico. April 11, John Simpson, secretary District 15, visited Segunda, and was taken up by the militia and sent out of town on the first train. While there M. Simpson saw ten strikers doing scavenger work under guard.
April 27, fifteen strikers were arrested and deported to New Mexico. All of the deported were presidents, secretaries or commissary committees.
John R Lawson
J. D. Ritchie was arrested the same day for returning to the county without a permit from the military. Don't overlook the fact that Mr. Ritchie's home, wife and children were in this county. John Lawson was shot by a mine owner, P. Coryell, at New Castle. [The home of John Lawson was one of those dynamited on December 17, 1903. Coryell shot Lawson after Lawson's investigation of the bombings produced evidence that the homes of union leaders were bombed on orders from Coryell.]
Were I to undertake to enumerate the many tragic events in the coal strike it would make a volume larger than this entire work. Miners were driven from homes they had built on company ground and non-union men and negroes were allowed to confiscate these homes under protection of the military while the builders were living in tents [employers often used scabs of different races and ethnic groups against strikers, purposely to sow further division amongst the workers of any given area, but there is no excuse for Langdon to feed into those divisions here]; some were deported and in these cases the militia herded them in droves like cattle and they were driven over the prairie, and if thirsty forced to drink from troughs provided for horses by the roadside, similar to Siberian chain gangs exiled by order of the Czar of all the Russians. I have been told of cases where the miner on foot, growing tired, lagged behind and was pricked by the military bayonet and thus forced to keep pace with the guard on horseback.
Ten years later, an African-America striker and his family
take part in the struggle at Ludlow.
Remember, reader, Governor Peabody said that he was not opposed to unions, "all men had a right to belong to unions if they wished, the same as a church; it was no one's business"; also, that he was not fighting unions, "only the Western Federation of Miners and Socialists.''
Why, do you suppose, did he allow the United Mine Workers of Colorado, who were neither W. F. M. men nor Socialists [unlike the WFM of the period, the UMWA, as an organization, did not declare itself for Socialism, yet many individual coal miners, and even some officers were Socialists], to be subjected to such as I have described? I do not need to answer; you know; yes, and he knows—they were union men; they would not go to work without their demands being granted and the corporations wanted to dispose of them, and they knew the banker from Canon City—James Peabody—would do their bidding.
As time went on, many conventions were held at which the advisability of continuing the strike was discussed. In every case, when the vote was taken it was in favor of continuing the strike. When the strike became, apparently, hopelessly lost, the national organization withdrew financial support. This action was severely criticised by many. The author not being posted in all the details of the financial matters will not attempt to discuss the merits or demerits of the action of the National in withdrawing financial support.
District 15 held a convention in Pueblo, September, 1904, and the writer had the pleasure of attending the convention. Before the convention adjourned I was honored by being made an honorary member of District 15, U. M. W. of A.
No badge of honor on the shoulder of a brave knight ever conferred greater pleasure than this recognition of services rendered the cause of unionism by men who had themselves battled bravely in defense of their homes and constitutional rights.
June 6, 1904, martial law was revoked in Las Animas county. The strike was not officially declared off until early in this year, 1905. [The strike was not officially called off in October, but the strikers were cleared to return to work by the District 15 officials, without being considered scabs, on or about October 18th and this order was made retroactive to Oct 12th-as we shall see in the next few days.]
It is to be regretted that the strike of the coal miners was not successful, in obtaining for the strikers the improved conditions they had struggled for. Surely the fight and sacrifices they made, and the suffering they underwent without a murmur was worthy of victory. The writer knows personally of families who subsisted cheerfully on macaroni and water rather than to surrender.
Too much praise cannot be given the Italian miners for their loyalty in the cause of unionism. I am convinced that the rank and file of the strikers would have held out indefinitely on a fare of bread and water, but, when even that meager fare was withheld for want of funds and by military confiscation, there was no alternative but to surrender.
During the strike the Ways and Means Committee [of the Colorado Federation of Labor] contributed considerable financial support. In some instances supplied the families of the strikers with shoes and clothing. No discrimination was made by the committee in issuing relief as between the striking metalliferous and coal miners, the committee endeavoring to distribute the money at its command to those who were most in need of immediate assistance.
After the strike of the coal miners was declared off, there was much suffering among the miners and their families, especially among those who had been most active during the strike, for the reason that they were blacklisted by the coal operators. To some extent to relieve this situation, the national organization arranged to transport as many of the blacklisted miners for whom work could be procured, to other states.
Although temporarily defeated, the sentiment, at this writing is that the coal miners of District 15 will yet be victorious in procuring the conditions for which they went on strike, for it was clearly demonstrated that there existed great dissatisfaction among the miners with present conditions; from the fact that fully seventy-five per cent of the miners responded to the call when the strike was declared, although less than fifty per cent of them were organized. Steps have been taken to fortify the ranks of the miners for a renewal of this contest in the future.
The result of this strike should demonstrate how impotent are the efforts of organized labor in gaining better conditions when relying solely upon the strike in a contest with organized capital in control of the state government. It should teach the wage earners the necessity of not alone depending upon organization upon the industrial field but of active participation in the political field, so as to, themselves, control the state government or at least, through legislation, make it impossible for the corporations to use the power of the government to further their private interests.
"Truth forever on the scaffold,
Wrong forever on the throne,
But that scaffold sways the future
And behind the dim unknown
Standeth God within the shadow,
Keeping watch above his own."—Lowell.
Men who have brains to think for themselves and eyes to see into the future feel that there is an invisible power which stands on the side of right and finally carries it forward to success. The enemies of human liberty may seem to succeed for a time, but when they meet this power they are swept aside as autumn leaves before the storm.
The ranks of organized labor contains no more ardent, faithful, self-sacrificing and unselfish worker than "Mother" Jones. No more appropriate name could have been given her than that of "Mother." She considers all working people her children and would gladly, at any sacrifice to herself, take them all under her sheltering wing.
In her denunciation of the oppressors of labor she is merciless. The enemies of organized labor fear her. The union men and women love her. Would there were many more like Mother Jones.
Julien Hawthorne paid the following tribute to Mother Jones, which appeared in the Philadelphia North American:
I met today Mother Jones. She is a woman of the people, fearlessly fighting the battle of the class she believes to be wronged. She is the strong pedestal of industrial politics. While she lives America can count among her fair daughters one who will ever defend liberty, right and justice. She will be found on the side of the weak and crushed.
With her usual goodness of heart, Mother Jones has kindly contributed the following on the Colorado coal strike:
EXPRESSION FROM MOTHER JONES.
The coal strike of 1904, in Southern Colorado, with all the brutal methods used by public officials, professional and business men to subjugate these poor slaves of the caves has passed into industrial history. The generations yet unborn will read with horror of the crimes committed by the mine owners of Colorado, with their hired blood hounds aching to spill the blood of their slaves. In the home of religion and civilization they held up the God-cursed dollar and saw on its face the words: "In God we trust."
The big henchman of capitalism said so when he sent out the guns to kill these wretches. Then he yelled "law and order" to the teamsters of Chicago. Yes, his law and order—the law and order of thieves. Roosevelt went out to hunt four-legged bears, but when the two-legged bears were driving men, women and children from their homes, he had nothing to say.
Defeated? No, you cannot defeat such brave men and women as entered into that frightful struggle. They have just retreated. They will unfurl their banner to the breezes of industrial liberty in the near future. The commercial pirates of the Colorado Fuel and Iron, the Victor Fuel Company, with all their degraded curs will go down before an outraged people in disgrace. They will yet call on the mountains to cover them from the indignation of the people.
You will ask why the miners did not win. First the generals in charge of the field of battle were not accustomed to deal with great industrial conflicts. Their mental ability was not trained in that line. Some of them could tell you about benevolent feudalism, all about Herbert Spencer, but they had no grasp of the weak points of the enemy. In fact, they remained in their rooms and were not out in the field watching the pirates.
The men, themselves, were unorganized. It was a new move on their side. They had not learned to do their own thinking. The railroads were in close quarters for coal; in fact, they were stealing cars of coal from each other wherever they could grab one. The coal famine was taking place in the state; industries had to be closed; the people were squealing for coal, when a shrewd, cold-blooded corporation lawyer made a move to settle the strike in the Northern field. That was the first blow the strikers received. I felt then, and have not yet changed my mind, those who were instrumental in settling the strike in the Northern fields were responsible for the defeat of the miners in the Southern fields.
Working men, regardless of who their generals are, must learn solidarity. They must learn to move as a body. Not one portion to furnish the robber with the leash to whip him and his craft. True, they could get coal from Kansas; but, bear in mind, by the time it reached Colorado it would have cost the consumer a nice price. For the information of future generations, I wish to state that as a body there could not be found move loyal men and women than the Mexicans and Italians were; they deserve the support of every man and woman in labor's ranks. The world will never know the wrongs those brave men and women bore for a cause they loved. Every depraved cur that the sheriff could muster into service had no more regard for the life of one of these poor wretches than he had for a dog. In fact, he was a sanctified cannibal.
"MOTHER" JONES
Before I close I wish to refer to two of the district officers.
During the five months that I spent in the state, I was in close touch with both those men. I observed their actions, while I realized the conflict was more than they were able to intelligently deal with, yet I know that both John Simpson, as secretary-treasurer, and William Howells, president, are conscientious, honest men. These men will live in history when the savage beast—Peabody and his dog of war [General] Bell will be no more. The sanctified pirate knows no remorse. Brown said, "Man's inhumanity to man makes countless thousands mourn."
O, God, that flesh and blood should be so cheap!
[emphasis, paragraph breaks, and photographs-except that of Mother Jones-added]
The Great Western Publishing Co.
Denver,Colorado, 1905.
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