You ought to be out raising hell. This is the fighting age. Put on your fighting clothes.
-Mother Jones
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Friday April 22, 1904
Mother Jones Rescued in Utah; Big Bill Haywood Rescued in Denver
Mother Jones, who was quarentined in Helper, Utah, has been rescued by armed miners. From today's edition of The Arizona Republican:
"MOTHER" JONES RESCUED.
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An Appeal for an Extension of Military Rule.
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Salt Lake, Utah. April 21.-The sheriff of Carbon county has appealed to Governor Wells to send the militia to restore order in the stronghold of the coal strikers at Helper. A few days ago "Mother" Jones arrived at the camp and paid a visit to Organizer Wm. Price of the United Mine Workers under quarantine. Yesterday, according to the sheriff, an Italian mob consisting of 100 men armed with rifles rescued the woman form quarantine defying the officers present.
In Denver, Colorado, Big Bill Haywood arrived at the train station yesterday with his stenographers to greet Charles Moyer, President of the Western Federation of Miners. Moyer was being provided a military escort for his appearance before the Colorado Supreme Court on a writ of habeas corpus. The Bisbee Daily Review carried the story at the top of page one with blaring headlines:
SECRETARY OF WESTERN FEDERATION OF MINERS CLUBBED BY TROOPERS
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Denver Was The Scene Of Strife And Turmoil Yesterday, And Came Very Nearly Ending In Bloodshed. President Moyer, Of The Western Federation of Miners Is Still In Hands Of The Military, And Secretary Haywood Is Also In The Hands Of The Sheriff.
Secretary Haywood Had A Narrow Escape For His Life. A Trooper Fired Point Blank At Him, But A Comrade Knocks Up The Muzzle Of The Gun In Time To Save His Life.
President Moyer Was Escorted To And From the Capital Building by A Cordon of Soldiers.
We were able to get the story directly from Big Bill Haywood himself:
We [Haywood and his stenographers] went to the station and when the train pulled in a detachment of twelve soldiers got off first, then Moyer alone, then twelve more soldiers with officers following.
I stepped in and shook hands with Moyer and was walking along with him, hands clasped, when I felt a pressure on my shoulder, trying to force us apart. I looked around. There was Captain Bulkeley Wells, the same Wells who, a few months before, had entered into a agreement with us that would have brought about the peaceful settlement of the strike at Telluride. This thought flashed through my mind, and I wheeled and struck him full in the face.
It was a wild thing to do. In a flash the soldiers came to his rescue, and with the butts of their guns they struck me over the head and knocked me back between two cars. One pulled his gun down on me. I could see the hole in the barrel. I said, "Pull it, you son of a bitch, pull it."
One of the officers knocked up the barrel and said sharply:
"Stand back, stand back!" Then addressing me, "Haywood, go along with Moyer!"
I went along with Moyer and we marched to the Oxford Hotel....
When we reached the Oxford Hotel we marched in and Moyer sat down. I was standing with my elbow on the counter, when Walter Kinley, the Telluride gunman, came up to me and said:
"Sit down!"
"I don't want to sit down."
He pulled out his six-shooter and made a swing at me, shouting:
"Sit down, God damn ye!"
I hit him first and his gun did not strike me. Five or six soldiers rushed up and struck me several times, knocking me back against the wall. Kinley ran around to where he could get an opening, reached over and hit me on the head with the handle of his gun. About the same time a soldier made a jab at me, striking me on the cartilage just below the ribs. An officer came up swinging his six-shooter, shouting:
"Get back, you fellers, get back! How many does it take to handle this man?"
I could feel myself getting weak and I staggered to a chair where I sat awaiting further orders. I was bleeding like a stuck hog from blows on the head.
Soon I was taken upstairs and two gunmen were left in the room with me. One of them was Kinley, who was complaining about having broken the pearl handle of his gun on my head. It was only a few moments until the reporters appeared. I gave my keys and papers to John Tierney of the Denver Times. In a short time clean clothes came from home and I changed to the skin, all the time keeping a six-shooter which I had never attempted to use, and which had been somehow overlooked in the perfunctory search.
An army surgeon came and dressed the cuts in my head, sewing back my right ear, which required seven stitches. Then Ham Armstrong, the sheriff of the city and county of Denver, arrived and said, "I want you, Bill." I got up and remarked:
"That's good new!" and we started for the sheriff's office...
Big Bill Haywood is being held in the county jail at this time. A room has been provided him with a desk and a telephone, and his stenographers are being allowed to assist him there. And thus, his work for the Western Federation of Miners continues unabated.
SOURCES
The Arizona Republican
(Phoenix, Arizona)
-of Apr 22, 1904
Bisbee Daily Review
(Bisbee, Arizona)
-of Apr 22, 1904
The Autobiography of Big Bill Haywood
(1st pub 1929)
International Pub, 1983
Photos:
1). Mother Jones
Library of Congress
2). Big Bill Haywood
http://www.rebelgraphics.org/...
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