Democratic Sentinel, Volume 21, Number 38, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 17 September 1897 — STRIKERS ARE SHOT [ARTICLE]

STRIKERS ARE SHOT

Marching Miners Brutally Slain by Deputies. OVER A SCORE KILLED Dead and Dying Coal Delvers Fall Like Ten Pins. Outskirts of the Little Town of Lett* ■er, in the Orest Pennsylvania Coal District, the Scene of a Bloody Slaughter—Shoctinir Held to Have Been Without Provocatioa and Bevengeful Cries Arise—Troops Are Called Out to Preserve Order. Twenty-two strikers were killed, thirteen fatally injured and between sixty and seventy more or less injured near Hazleton, Pa., Friday, by deputy sheriffs under command of Sheriff Martin, and, the dispatches say, without sufficient provocation to w arrant even a clubbing. The entire region is wildly excited over the affair, and citizens of all classes are talking of what they consider a terrible outrage. An indignation meeting was held at night, and Governor Hastings has been asked to order an investigation, and in the meantime to place the command of the deputies in other hands than those of Sheriff Martin. The citizens also ask that the deputy sheriffs concerned in the affair be discharged from all authority and disarmed. They say the local police force is quite competent to take care of the strikers if any disturbance occurs. Governor Hastings called out the Third Brigade of the State militia in order to prevent further bloodshed.

Following their general custom, the strikers assembled Friday morning and marched to the Hazle mines. The men were at work there, but were forced to quit. From there the march was taken up to Latimer. The men walked without any special organization, much as any body of men would ti a verse a road. They were elated by their success in driving out the men at the Hazle mines and their feeling of jubilation, combined with their antipathy for the operators, had somewhat aroused them. The road the men traversed was the public highway. As they reached the outskirts of the mining village of Latimer the marchers were met by a crowd of deputies, under Sheriff Martin. They were the usual kind of deputies, men and boys out of work. The strikers were ordered to halt. Being on a public highway the strikers refused. With little ceremony they kept walking, muttering imprecations on the men with rifles.

Firing Is Begun. Sudenly one of the special officers raised his rifle and fired point blank at the miners. It was the signal for a fusillade. The men and boys who were wearing the steel badges of deputies fired volley after volley into the marchers. Several fell dead at the first volley. The horrified cries of the miners could not drown the steady “crack,” “crack” of the rifles. The miners stood terrified for a moment, the leaden balls mowing down their comrades. A few shots were fired back. Then, yelling and crying, they broke and ran for the woods. The scatter of the marchers did not stop the firing. As they fled in terror the deputies spread out, each one seemingly picking his man, and shot the fleeing men. The strikers staggered and fell in every direction. Bodies of the killed lay here and there on the road and in the ditches. Piteous cries in foreign tongues came from the injured, some of whom were vainly trying to crawl to shelter. Pleadings to the deputies to cease firing mingled with the cursings of the less injured. The injured in the woods crawled away to safety. When the deputies has exhausted the magazines of their rifles they ceased firing and some turned their attention to the wounded and carried many of them to places where they could be more comfortably treated. The deputies seemed to be terror-stricken at the deadly execution of their guns. The people of Latimer rushed pell-mell to the scene, but the shrieks of the wounded drowned the cries of the sym-: pathizing and half-crazed inhabitants. As soon as the news of the shooting reached Hazleton there was consternation. Within ten minutes the streets were blocked with excited people. Trolley cars on the Latimer line were sent to the scene of the killing, and doctors and clergymen responded promptly. Along the bank of the trolley road men lay in every position; some dead, others dying. Three bodies, face downward, lay along the incline, and three others were but a short distance away. On the other side of the road as many more bodies lay. The schoolhouse was transformed into a temporary hospital, and some of the wounded were taken there. The colliery ambulance was summoned to the place as soon as possible, and upon its arrival wounded men were loaded into the wagon. All along the hillside wounded were found on the roadside and in the fields. Many others who had been carried to a distance could not be found. One of the strikers, in his dying statement said that there were no weapons of any kind among the marchers, for before leaving Harwood on the tramp across the mountain a meeting was held and resolutions passed forbidding any person to carry weapons. This fact was verified by not finding any weapons on those who were killed or wounded. The dead were searched and no weapons were found on them. Sheriff Martin in a detailed statement of the affair admits that he gave the command to fire.