Opening of the Argument—Mr. Walker’s Speech—The Law of the
Case—Was there a Conspiracy?—The Caliber of the Bullets—Tightening
the Chain—A Propaganda on the Witness-stand—The Eight-hour
Movement—“One Single Bomb”—The Cry of the Revolutionist—Avoiding
the Mouse-trap—Parsons and the Murder—Studying “Revolutionary
War”—Lingg and his Bomb Factory—The Alibi Idea.
THE evidence being now all in, Francis W. Walker, Assistant State’s
Attorney, on the morning of August 11th, began his address to the
jury. Although his argument was an exceedingly lengthy one, he held
his audience and the jury to the closest attention from the first word
to the last. Mr. Walker began by an examination of the law, defining
what is meant by the term “reasonable doubt,” which he believed would
be one of the arguments used by the defense. Following this he read
the statutes showing what murder is, and what an accessory, under the
laws of Illinois. Under the statute, as he proved, an accessory is
to be held as a principal. Following this he reviewed at some length
Mr. Salomon’s statement, in that gentleman’s opening speech, that the
prisoners had been guilty, if they were guilty at all, of no crime more
serious than conspiracy. Mr. Walker held that the fact that murder had
followed the conspiracy proved the conspirators murderers. His logic
was clear, cogent and unanswerable. Its effect could be seen in the
gloomy attention which the doomed Anarchists paid to his fatal chain of
reasoning.
Leaving the authorities to one side, Mr. Walker addressed himself to
the facts made manifest by the evidence. He said:
“We start out first upon the analysis of the facts of this case
in this way: Was there an unlawful combination, a conspiracy, to
overthrow the systems of this Government upon the 1st day of May,
1886? Was the bomb thrown on the 4th of May in pursuance of the common
design? Are these defendants members of that conspiracy? When those
questions are answered in the affirmative the guilt of each and every
one of these defendants of murder is proven beyond a reasonable doubt.
But, if we go further than that, the argument would embrace the topic:
Was there a murder committed at the Haymarket? Did the defendants
aid, abet and assist the commission of that act? Or, if they were not
present aiding, abetting and assisting, had they advised, encouraged,
aided and abetted the perpetration of the crime? Under either aspect
of this case, the defendants are guilty of murder with malice
aforethought.
“Was there a conspiracy? Was there a conspiracy to culminate on
or about the 1st day of May? Were the defendants members of that
conspiracy? Was the conspiracy unlawful? Was the bomb thrown in
pursuance of the common design? Let us investigate the facts and
answer each proposition.”
Mr. Walker went into the peculiar fact that the bullets found in the
bodies of the officers were 22 and 44-caliber; the officers carried
38-caliber. The witnesses who had appeared for the defense in this case
were armed with pistols of the first-named sizes.
He read to the jury many remarkable extracts from Most’s writings,
pointing out the peculiar and criminal teachings of that Anarchist
leader, and showing how Spies and the others had in every detail of
their connection with the police, after the Haymarket murders, followed
the printed advice given.
[Illustration: FRANCIS W. WALKER.
From a Photograph.]
Following is one of the extracts from Most’s book:
“Shield your person as long as there is a possibility to preserve it
for future deeds, but when you see that you are irredeemably lost,
then use the short respite to make the most of it for the propaganda
of your principles. We have regarded it our duty to give you these
instructions, the more so as we see from day to day even people who
are expert in revolutionary matters violating even the plainest rules.
May their lives be the last which are necessary in this regard.
“I read you, gentlemen, this, so that we may start out from the proper
standpoint and position, before we argue as to the merits of the
testimony of the defendants’ witnesses in this case. Who are they? Who
is their advisor? Why, they have started out in social life agreeing
to swear to perjury. They belong to the Social Revolution. There is
not one of them, gentlemen, that bears upon his face the stamp of
sensibility or of heart, and there can be no argument made when they
talk about the motive to justify murder and the advice of murder, only
from the malignant heart. Here they picture murder and gloat over it.
They feast over the description of how to poison easiest, as the hyena
does over the corpse of the dead.
“Most laughs in his own book. He tells to the ‘mere compositor’: ‘Use
a dagger with grooves in it; the poison will stay on it the more
readily.’ And a file is adopted for the purpose.
“Gentlemen, we have found without any further analysis the reason why
the defendant Parsons converted the witness-stand into a propaganda.
It took him an hour by the clock here to repeat the substance of the
speech that he delivered in less than three-quarters of an hour upon
the Market Square. He endeavored to deny the conspiracy by an alibi;
and I mean by that the conspiracy upon the night of May 4th. He only
said he was in Cincinnati on Sunday, and did not get back until Tuesday
morning. They never asked him if he knew what ‘Ruhe’ meant. They did
not ask Schwab if he knew what ‘Ruhe’ meant. The only defendant that
they have asked as to his personal knowledge of ‘Ruhe’ is the defendant
Fielden—the only one, the only one from the beginning to the close of
this case.
“Was there a conspiracy? There has been a conspiracy existing in this
community to overthrow the law of the State of Illinois by force, for
years and years. In 1885, upon the anniversary of the birth of George
Washington, in the city of Grand Rapids, the arch-conspirator in this
case—because he is the one that is the most contemptible—said in the
city of Grand Rapids—I refer you now to the testimony of Mr. Moulton
and George Schook: ‘There are three thousand men, armed, in the city
of Chicago, secretly drilled. They are known by numbers and not by
names. Whoever wishes to join may join, but before you have joined you
cannot know their secrets, Mr. Moulton. There will be a revolution when
the eight-hour movement takes place. We will favor the eight-hour not
because we believe in it, but because it will assist us in the social
revolution, and the eight-hour movement will occur on or about the 1st
of May, 1886. If I fail, I shall be hanged.’ And then the man that
puts the word ‘Ruhe’ for the purpose of this case on the shoulder of
Fischer, compares himself to George Washington, and in his grotesque
and horrible vanity says: ‘I am a rebel, and if I don’t succeed I shall
be hanged.’
“On October, 17, 1885, in the city of Chicago, at the West Twelfth
Street Turner Hall, August Spies again, in a public meeting, admitted
the great conspiracy and again foreshadowed the coming revolution on
the first of May; and this was published by his coördinate editor in
the _Alarm_, at the same office, 107 Fifth Avenue, Mr. Parsons.
“The defendant Spies has been upon the stand. He only denied as to a
conspiracy, and never whispered a word of denial except when he got to
the word ‘Ruhe.’ Without explanation he could never escape the effect
of that word, and his explanation is the evidence of his guilt; he
tried to put that on Fischer.
“August Spies was introduced at this point and offered the following
resolutions: Whereas, a general move has been started among the
organized wage-workers of this country for the establishment of an
eight-hour work-day, to begin on May 1, 1886; whereas, it is to
be expected that the class of professional idlers, the governing
class who prey upon the bone and marrow of the useful members of
society, will resist this attempt by calling to their assistance the
Pinkertons, the police and State militia: Therefore, be it
“_Resolved_, That we urge upon all wage-workers the necessity of
procuring arms before the inauguration of the proposed eight-hour
strike, in order to be in a position of meeting our foe with their own
argument, force.
“Here is shown the sincerity of these men in their endeavor to
ameliorate the laborer—as they call it, the wage-worker.
“Resolved, That while we are skeptical in regard to the benefits
that will accrue to the wage-worker from the introduction of the
eight-hour work-day, we nevertheless pledge ourselves to aid and
assist our brethren of this class with all that lies in our power as
long as they show an open and defiant front to our common enemy, the
labor-devouring class of aristocratic vagabonds, the brutal murderers
of our comrades in St. Louis, Chicago and Philadelphia and other
places. Our war-cry is, ‘Death to the enemy of the human race, our
despoilers.’
“What does that mean? It was published in the _Alarm_. Was there a
conspiracy, gentlemen, against the police on the first day of May,
1886? After the reading, these resolutions were received with round
after round of applause, and the chair was about to put a vote, when
Mr. J. K. Magie arose and said that he understood a discussion of
them to be in order. He denounced the revolutionary character of the
resolutions. He believed that six hours of labor was enough! This man
was a labor agitator and believes in the amelioration of labor. ‘This
is the best form of government that ever existed,’ he said of this
Republic. He is an American citizen and believes in the institutions
of his country. ‘If there are abuses, there is a proper way to correct
them. Eighty per cent. of the voting population are working people;
they should strike with the ballot and not with the bullet.’ Then this
ameliorator of labor, August Spies, supposed that Mr. Magie did not
like the terms in which the members of the Government were referred
to. The reason of this was that Mr. Magie was one of those political
vagabonds himself. There were nine millions of the best people engaged
in the industrial trades of this country. There were but one million of
them as yet organized—one million, and by the way, that is significant
in the fact that these men fought to achieve this result all over the
country. Schnaubelt had said at 54 West Lake Street the night before,
the 3d of May, ‘We must telegraph our success to all the other cities
throughout the country.’
“To make the movement in which they were engaged—the eight-hour
movement for the 1st of May—a successful one, it must be a
revolutionary one. ‘Don’t let us,’ he exclaimed, ‘forget the most
forcible argument, the gun and dynamite.’
“Was there a conspiracy? Turn to the cross-examination of Wilkinson
by Capt. Black, and find that part where Wilkinson said he had heard
Joe Gruenhut say that the revolution that Spies spoke of was to occur,
the conflict was actually to occur on the 1st or after the 1st of May,
1886. This was brought out by Capt. Black himself on cross-examination
of this witness. In the first place you must remember that Lingg was
in this country before the Christmas of 1885, between the 1st day of
January and the 14th day of January. The Czar bomb, but six or eight
weeks after Lingg came here, was handed to Wilkinson by Spies—the
twin, the same bomb in general construction and general make-up as that
used at the Haymarket on that night, made by Lingg on the afternoon of
that day, or filled with dynamite on the afternoon of that day.”
Following this Mr. Walker reviewed Parsons’ utterances in the _Alarm_,
quoting many of them. He argued that it was this sort of language and
the dynamite bomb at the Haymarket which accounted for the failure of
the eight-hour movement in the United States.
Coming to August Spies, he read from the _Arbeiter-Zeitung_ the
following characteristic _morceau_:
“‘Six months ago, May 4th, when the eight-hour movement began’—this
is in Spies’ own handwriting—‘there were speakers and journals of
the I. A. A.’—that is the International Arbeiter Association—‘who
proclaimed and wrote: “Workingmen, if you want to see the eight-hour
system introduced, arm yourselves. If you don’t do this you will be
sent home with bloody heads, and the birds will sing May songs upon
your graves.” “That is nonsense,” was the reply. “If the workingmen
are organized they will gain the eight-hour in their Sunday clothes.”
Well, what do you say now? Were we right or wrong? Would the
occurrence of yesterday have been possible if our advice had been
followed? Wage-workers, yesterday the police of this city murdered
at McCormick’s factory four of your brothers, and wounded more or
less,’ etc. ‘If the brothers who defended themselves with stones (a
few of them had little snappers in the shape of revolvers) had been
provided with good weapons and one single dynamite bomb, not one of
the murderers would have escaped their well-merited fate.’
“The police went up there; they were nearly being murdered with
stones; the mob were throwing at them before they ever fired a shot;
and this man the next day writes: ‘Had they’—the mob—‘been provided
with good weapons and one single dynamite bomb, not one of the
murderers would have escaped his well-deserved fate.’ Then see: ‘As it
was, only four of them were disfigured. That is too bad.”
“Here, here is a man that has no design upon the police, don’t believe
in force. ‘That is too bad. The massacre of yesterday took place in
order to fill the forty thousand workingmen of this city with fear and
terror; took place in order to force back,’ etc. ‘ Will they succeed
in this? Will they not find at last that they have miscalculated? The
near future will answer this question. We will not anticipate the
course of events with surmises.’
“That is what he himself said. If one single bomb had been used it
would have been different. He sees these eight thousand men at his
back, returns immediately to the office of the _Arbeiter-Zeitung_
and writes out this, (indicating the Revenge circular). What did he
mean? What did he mean? ‘Revenge.’ He says he did not write the word
‘Revenge’ in English. _Rache, Rache_, Revenge, Revenge—he never
denied that he wrote it in the German language, nor any witness for
him; but it makes no difference whether he wrote it, or whether he did
not write it. He wrote ‘To arms;’ he says, ‘To arms, workingmen, to
arms.’ What does that mean? Did anybody say at the Haymarket, ‘Here
come the bloodhounds; you do your duty and I will do mine’? Let us
see. ‘The bloodhounds’ was the common expression from the lips of
these defendants as the designation for the police. Spies says in
English—did he mean this or didn’t he?”
Mr. Walker here read the text of the “Revenge” circular, both the
English and German versions, as given in a previous chapter, and
continued:
“Is that meaningless? ‘To arms, we call you to arms.’ Why, it is the
cry of the revolutionist; it is the cry of the Communist; it is the
cry of the Anarchist; it is the cry of Spies and Parsons—‘To arms,
to arms!’ And yet the English was tame in comparison to the German
version.
“Did they have no design upon individuals in this conspiracy? Why,
they had the most awful, damning malice against the police. It was
the motive-hunting of a motiveless malignity. Without reason and
without cause they had individualized the police; but Bonfield for the
second time stood in the way of the Social Revolution. Just see how it
forces up the blood of this social revolutionist: ‘The bloodhounds,
the police are at you, in order to cure you, with bullets, of your
dissatisfaction. Slaves, we ask, we conjure you by all that is sacred
and dear to you, avenge’—what does that mean? What difference does it
make whether he wrote revenge at the head of this circular or not? He
wrote it in it. What did it mean? What did those conspirators mean?
“Avenge the atrocious murder which has been committed upon your
brothers to-day, and which will be likely to be committed upon you
to-morrow. Avenge, laboring men. Hercules, you have arrived at the
cross-way. Which way will you decide, for slavery and hunger, or for
freedom and bread? If you decide for the latter, then don’t delay
a moment. Then, people, to arms! Annihilation, annihilation to the
beasts in human form who call themselves your rulers. Uncompromising
annihilation to them. This must be your motto. Think of the heroes
whose blood has fertilized the road to progress, liberty and humanity,
and strive to become worthy of them. Your brothers.
“Thousands of these were circulated throughout the city. Does that mean
that there was a conspiracy and no malice against individuals?
“And then on Monday night a meeting at 54 West Lake Street took place,
which has not been denied, and there were Lingg and Engel and Fischer.
Engel’s plan was again reiterated; Lingg was to make the bombs, and
Lingg was there to say he could make the bombs. He may have been to the
Carpenters’ meeting before that. When he left the 54 West Lake Street
meeting, he met Lehman upon the way home—Gustav Lehman, who testified
he got the bombs from Lingg—and he said to Lehman, ‘If you want to
know anything, you come to 58 Clybourn Avenue to-morrow night.’ In
response to the question, ‘What has been going on in the meeting at 54
West Lake Street, in the basement?’
“At that meeting at 54 West Lake Street were represented all the
different Socialistic and Anarchistic organizations. ‘Y, Come Monday
night,’ had brought delegates, according to Waller’s testimony, from
every group in the city. The West Side, the South Side, Southwest Side,
the North Side, every group was represented, and the Lehr und Wehr
Verein also had its delegates. The plan was arranged that on to-morrow,
if the revolution took place in the daytime, and the conflict had
occurred, the word ‘Ruhe’ should be published, all the men should be
at their outlying groups ready to annihilate the police, the fire
department, to cut the telegraph wires, and to prevent communication
with the central meeting at the Haymarket. Waller had suggested that
this meeting be at Market Square; Fischer says: ‘No; that is a mouse
trap; we will make it the Haymarket.’ And then Spies takes it up north
of the alley, north of the intersection of the street—and, by the way,
that block has more alleys than perhaps any other block in the city of
Chicago, and more means of escape—and locates that meeting just where
he had located the street battle in his description to Mr. Wilkinson,
and as Parsons had explained street warfare in the _Alarm_.
“Who called the meeting at the Haymarket to order on Desplaines Street
beyond the alley? Spies. He had written with his own hand the word
‘Ruhe.’ He was after the social revolution. Why did he move the meeting
to that place if he knew what ‘Ruhe’ meant? Why was he there at all if
he knew what ‘Ruhe’ meant? He has told. Why was he on the wagon if he
knew what ‘Ruhe’ meant? Why didn’t he notify the police, if he knew
what ‘Ruhe’ meant, not to come to that meeting? Why had he said upon
the wagon, ‘If you want to do anything, why don’t you do it and say
nothing?’ if he knew what ‘Ruhe’ meant? Why did he leave his revolver
before he ever got to that meeting unless he knew what ‘Ruhe’ meant?
He follows out his own instructions in the _Arbeiter-Zeitung_, on that
subject, when some one wrote:
“In the action itself one must be personally at the place to select
personally that point on the place of the action and that part of the
action which are the most important and are coupled with the greatest
danger, upon which depend chiefly the success or failure of the whole
affair.
“And he selected the place himself. Fischer says: ‘No, the Market
Square is a mouse trap,’ and they named they Haymarket, and Spies
designates the place of meeting and publishes the word ‘Ruhe;’ and
then it is expected from twenty-five to forty thousand people will
be at the meeting on Haymarket Square. Eight thousand had rebelled
at McCormick’s; the skirmish lines had met, and it was expected that
there would be twenty-five thousand at the Haymarket on that night; but
there were not, and for that reason this mob was not dispersed. The
police could not see at any time a meeting so large as to be beyond
their control, but when this meeting became boisterous it was after ten
o’clock, two hours later than the meeting was called for. If the police
had been but two hours earlier in dispelling the meeting the flames
would have been lighted out at Wicker Park; the instrument of fire
described in Herr Most’s book, and found at Wicker Park, was for that
purpose. The Northwestern group was to meet at Wicker Park, and come
down past North Avenue Station. The North Side group was to annihilate
the North Side Station, and Lingg was at his post of duty for that
purpose.
“Was there a conspiracy? They take the word and Spies publishes it.
He says in explanation: ‘Among the announcements it came to me by no
person of whom I am aware, no one about whom I know anything.’ No
questions were asked. In this way the mere editor, Spies, publishes in
the Briefkasten the word ‘Ruhe’ prominently. The Briefkasten is used
to answer private correspondence, personal letters and editorials, or
it is used to place the advertisements of secret meetings in, and for
no other purpose. ‘Y—Come Monday night,’ is found in the Letter-box
of the _Arbeiter-Zeitung_. That is a secret thing, and means that the
armed groups shall meet at 54 West Lake Street. ‘Ruhe’ was an answer to
no correspondent; the word ‘Ruhe’ could enlighten no ignorant man on
the subject alone; and the editor-in-chief of the _Arbeiter-Zeitung_
picked up a piece of paper and wrote ‘Ruhe’ on it without ever knowing
what it meant or where it came from, and says it was handed him among
the labor announcements: ‘Mr. Editor, please publish the word “Ruhe”
in the Letter box prominently.’ What tells you that it was a labor
announcement? Who ever said it was a labor announcement? ‘Ruhe,’
peace, rest, quiet—‘Ruhe’ a labor announcement! Why, who said so? It
would be lost if put in the announcements of labor organizations. ‘Mr.
Editor, publish the word “Ruhe” in the column where you put “Y—Come
Monday night,” the secret sign of the armed sections, and publish it
prominently.’ Without a word he did so, and he asks you to believe it.
Did he know what ‘Ruhe’ meant? Why, he sent for Fischer, and Fischer
told him it was harmless. ‘Why,’ he said, ‘that is foolish, Fischer;
don’t do that, don’t do that.’ Rau had only told him that it meant:
‘Workmen, be at your groups, keep yourselves armed and in preparation,
so that if you are attacked you can defend yourselves; workingmen, arm
yourselves and be at your groups.’ That is what Rau said ‘Ruhe’ meant,
and, when asked, Fischer says: ‘Why, that means, “Keep your powder
dry,” that is all.’ ‘Well,’ he says, ‘Fischer, that is foolish; that
is crazy; why, I cannot have that.’ What did he think was foolish and
crazy? To keep their powder dry, when this man had said the day before,
‘Workingmen, arm yourselves, arm yourselves!’ This is the explanation
of the word ‘Ruhe.’
“Did Parsons know of the conspiracy ‘Ruhe’? He was a party to the great
conspiracy, for he had cried about April 24th for the revolution upon
the 1st of May. That he has not denied; and to my mind he cuts one of
the worst figures in this case. He was born at least upon American
soil, and he stands here alone, alone amongst these vast hordes of
witnesses who are not citizens of our republic, and whose purpose is
her destruction. Albert R. Parsons is the only American, and he has no
right, no right to belong to that nationality. He never said he did not
know of the conspiracy, and he spoke of the 4th of May; it was said
that night he staid away—by the way, he left this out—‘I should be
accused of cowardice;’ but he did say, ‘I would come if I were to die
before morning.’ Did he know of the conspiracy? Why, he had been in it
for years. He published the order of street fighting in his _Alarm_,
foreshadowing the battle in his description; and not only did he do
that, but he made the alibi by calling at the American group on that
night, a group organized and holding a meeting for the sewing girls
when not a sewing girl was present, with no one there but a Nihilist,
a Communist, a Socialist and an Anarchist. Mrs. Parsons was there and
Mrs. Holmes. Where was any sewing girl?
“And here I want to ask you if, after hearing all the proof in this
case; if, after reading Most’s ‘Revolutionary War,’ the instructions to
the Nihilists and Anarchists; if after reading the _Alarm_ here; if,
after hearing the testimony of the witnesses, you will here and to-day
say that the men lied who on that night stood when Captain Bonfield
said ‘Fall in’—stood there when the concussion had riven to the earth
sixty of Chicago’s noblest men because they had courage. When, out of
the hundred and eighty, sixty lay wounded on the ground, the other one
hundred and twenty killed the revolution with one blow. The men whose
lives were spared fell in, and not a man has lived to say there was a
coward in the whole one hundred and eighty.”
In the same manner he went through the evidence proving the guilt of
Schwab, Fielden and Neebe.
“Was Engel in the conspiracy? He proposed the plan at both meetings.
He said to Captain Schaack, at the Chicago Avenue Station, that ‘what
was in him had to come out,’ and he called it the dangerous power
of internal eloquence. He planned the conspiracy of the Emma Street
meeting, and has been an Anarchist for years, and instructor in the
use of weapons, and adviser in the making of bombs. He not only was
that, but he absolutely and unqualifiedly advised the Socialists to
buy weapons for the express purpose of killing the police, maiming
them, and then with all the cunning of a conspirator who has placed
his neck within the noose, on the morning of the 4th of May he finds
this infernal machine and takes it to the Chief of Police, and then
comes the exhibition between Captain Bonfield and the leading counsel
for the defense on that proposition. The counsel says: ‘He brought it
to you freely,’ and he emphasized it, and then the tinner came, and
the counsel says: ‘What is there about this piece of iron that makes
you identify it? You only made that sheet; is that all? You just cut
a piece of iron off for Mr. Engel.’ The witness says: ‘Please look at
the mark on the inside; that is my mark.’ Was Engel in the conspiracy?
“Was Fischer, the lieutenant of Spies, in the conspiracy? Was Fischer,
the messenger of Spies to the meeting at 54 West Lake Street, in the
conspiracy? He was at the office on Monday afternoon between five
and six o’clock, when the ‘Revenge’ circular was printed, and from
there he went to 54 West Lake Street. Was he in the conspiracy—the
man with the revolver nearly two feet long, and with the file dagger
with grooves? What does that mean? Why, prussic acid evaporates;
it dries off the instrument. ‘Use something with grooves.’ And
the revolutionists must use files that are ground down, in order
to have an instrument that is capable of holding poison. If you
remember, there was another file dagger found in the office of
the _Arbeiter-Zeitung_ besides this one. Verdigris, which anyone
can easily produce by dipping copper or brass into vinegar, and
exposing it to the atmosphere, may also be mixed with gum arabic
and applied to weapons, but the weapons ought to be grooved, so that
the poison will remain on easier and in larger quantities. That is
the explanation of the file dagger and the revolver. Was Fischer in
the conspiracy, with the Lehr und Wehr Verein belt strapped upon his
person, and traveling in the streets of the city of Chicago with an
armament worse than any Western outlaw—because no outlaw ever carried
on his person a dagger grooved, the slightest scratch of which meant
death. It was conceived by nobody except the mind of the revolutionist
and lieutenant of Spies.
“Was Lingg in the conspiracy? He made the very bomb that was used on
that night, and it was used on that night in furtherance of the common
design. Do you remember the analysis of that bomb? Do you remember
the nuts used to fasten the half-globes together, identical with the
one found in the wounded man upon the night of May 4? Do you remember
Neff’s testimony and Seliger’s testimony—that after the bomb had
been thrown, and Lingg was at 58 Clybourn Avenue, some one accused
him and said: ‘You are responsible for all this—see what you have
done’? Hubner said: ‘You are responsible for all this.’ This does not
come from the lips of any indicted man, but from the lips of Mr. Neff,
the proprietor at the place 58 Clybourn Avenue. Then Louis Lingg goes
home and complains because he has been upbraided for his good work in
this case, and then he flees, changes his appearance—and he is the
only living man that changes his appearance in this case except the
bomb-thrower. They are the two who shaved and cut their hair—Louis
Lingg and Rudolph Schnaubelt. Was Lingg in the conspiracy? He was not
only in the conspiracy, but he did everything in the world to carry
out his part of it that night. ‘Lehman, you come to 58 Clybourn Avenue
to-night, and you will find out what the meeting in the basement at 54
meant.’ And Lehman came, and on the next day he was at Lingg’s house,
and bomb after bomb was distributed from that place before night.
Where was Lingg in the morning, between eight and one? Looking after
the revolution in the central part of the city. Men coming and going
all day after bombs and with bombs—as Mrs. Seliger says—all day
long, taking them away from that place.
“‘Seliger, make haste!’ ‘Hubner, make haste!’ ‘Muntzenberg, make
haste!’ ‘Put the cloth over your heads so that you can’t get headache.
Make haste. These bombs must be done so as to be used to-night!’
What a nice thing it would be, as he and Seliger stood at the
corner of North Avenue and Larrabee Street, to throw a bomb in that
station, Lingg says. Then it is 10:30, and the telephone has called
for assistance from the North Avenue Station, and the patrol wagon
goes out, and there stand Lingg and Seliger with bombs, and Lingg
says, ‘Seliger, give me a light; they are going to the assistance
of the others. It has happened; the revolution has come. Give me
a light’—and here I am reminded that when a man throws a bomb in
furtherance of the social revolution they do it by twos; one furnishes
the light and the other throws the bomb. And this shows that it was
not a solitary and single instance that occurred in the alley south
of Crane’s when a match was lighted and Schnaubelt threw the bomb.
The same thing was duplicated by Lingg and Seliger when Seliger was
to furnish the light and Lingg throw the bomb. It was only because
Seliger hesitated that those men were not killed by Lingg at North
Avenue. Was Lingg in this conspiracy then? Why, he fled the next day,
and he is the man who had the courage to give up all hope. You see,
Lingg is a practical annihilator. He don’t believe in preaching; he
believes in acting, and not only believes in it, but he will do it at
any time. He saw Schuettler come into the room and jumped upon him
the moment he passed the door, with one of those large revolvers. And
then you will remember the fight and struggle there. Most’s book says
when there is a possibility to annihilate an opposing party, or where
it becomes a question of life and death, that death or resistance, or
both, are advisable.
“That is the advice that Lingg acted on and that Spies acted on, but:
‘If you are sure that the arrest is made only on vague suspicion,
then submit to the inevitable. It is easier in such case to extract
yourself again. Prove an alibi.’ Was Lingg in this conspiracy? Was
it a Lingg bomb? Hubner, Neff and Seliger swear that Hubner said to
Lingg, ‘You are responsible for this, Louis Lingg,’ and they had a
dispute and a violent discussion when it was discovered there. After
he tries to throw the bomb at the station he goes home and he sees
‘Ruhe,’ and he is almost crazy, and he wants to go to the Haymarket,
and he goes back to 58 Clybourn Avenue and finds that it is over
and that the revolution is not accomplished; and then he gets angry
because he is upraided as the one to blame for the whole thing. ‘You
have done this,’ Hubner tells him. Hubner was there all day and helped
to make bombs, and Muntzenberg and the Lehmans were in and out all
day. Was it Louis Lingg’s bomb?”
Mr. Walker then made a close examination of the evidence in rebuttal,
and closed his magnificent address with a high tribute to the valor of
the police and their services to law and order.