People's Pilot, Volume 2, Number 44, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 21 April 1893 — BLOODSHED IN BELGIUM. [ARTICLE]

BLOODSHED IN BELGIUM.

The Universal Suffrage Riots Daily Growing Worse—A Pitched Battle at Mons In Which Four Strikers Are KilledTroops Called Out. Brussels, April 18.— The industrial revolution against the chamber of deputies is in full progress. The government has issued a decree calling out all the militia for the defense of the state. This means the mobilization of some 45,000 troops against the workingmen. The feeling of unrest continues to spread. There is no denying the fact that the crisis is acute. Excited meetings in favor of universal suffrage are being held throughout the country. Everywhere impassioned appeals are made to those who live by toil to join the great demonstration now in progress. The strikers at Mons have resorted to the use of dynamite to enforce their demands. A bomb exploded close to the Petit Wasines church with great violence, shattering the stained glass window of the church and doing other damage. There is no clew to the perpetrators, but the act is generally ascribed to the socialists. The strikers indulged in all manner of threats against the government, and as the day wore on they became emboldened and determined to take posession of the town for a labor procession. When the mob attempted to march through the streets it was met by a strong detachment of the civio guard. No attention was paid to the order to disperse. Hooting and yelling they attempted to march on, and defied the guards to fire upon them. The guard fired upon the crowd, but this did not effect their dispersal. On the contrary it only infuriated them, and a charge en masse was made upon the gpard. A desperate hand-to-hand conflict ensued. The main body of the strikers was broken up, but groups of struggling men could be seen in tlie side streets leading from the main thoroughfare. The battle was long and bitterly contested, but finally the guards were victorious. It is known that four of the miners were killed. Many of the rioters were wounded and a number were taken to the hospital. The killing of the four strikers has added greatly to the excitement in the town and there is danger of a more serious outbreak. Men and women from the adjaoent mining villages are flocking into Mons and the authorities are anxiously awaiting the events of the night. Mons is the center of the great Borinage coal mining district. Three-fourths of all the miners in Belgium are employed in this district.

In the fight between the workingmen and civic guard in the streets of Mons fourteen soldiers were wounded. Three will not recover. They were removed to the hospital, where their anti-mor-tem statements were taken for the public prosecutor. Many of the men employed at Antwerp in loading and discharging vessels and other work about the wharves did not quit work in obedience to the oider of the men engineering the strike. This inflamed the strikers, who made an attack on the workers. The gendarmes took a hand in the affray. The strikers were armed with revolvers and used them. The gendarmes were quick to respond, and it is thought that several of the strikers were wounded. A number of the ringleaders among the strikers were wounded. Some of the more enthusiastic and hot-blooded strikers at Grammont held an impromptu meeting at whioh fiery speeches were made. The gendarmes attempted to break up the meeting, but met with stout resistance. The fight was transferred to the street, and though the gendarmes had the advantage of arms and discipline the strikers struggled desperately and were only dispersed after a long contest and after two of the gendarmes and a large number of the rioters were serisusly wounded. In the Charleroi district, where 30,000 miners are employed, work in the “ mines may be said to be at a standstill, for 20,000 of the miners have quit work and are riotous. Most of these miners are miserably poor and they and their families are bound to suffer.