PISTOLS AND CLUBS.
It Comes at Last—Riotous Roughs—Socialists Serving Satan—A Well
Organized Police Force—The Military all Ready—Hot Heads at Halstead
Street—Resisting Arrest—The Police Persist, are Resisted and resort
to Pistols and Clubs—Intense Excitement—A Scene of Bloodshed and
Death—At the Viaduct—Triumphant Law—Roughs Retire—Dead in the
Streets—Then Peace.
The violent demonstrations of the mob on Wednesday, leading to a
fusilade on Halstead street in the evening, it had been hoped, would
terminate the disturbances in Chicago. And this hope was based on the
reasonable ground that several railroad companies, employing a large
number of men, had at once acceded to the demands of their employes,
thereby removing all cause of complaint on the part of their employes,
and consequently withdrawing therefrom any active sympathy with the
riotous conduct of workingmen throughout the country. But well founded
as were such hopes, they were doomed to be disappointed. It was not the
railroadmen, not even the sober, industrious workingmen of other trades
in Chicago, who had seized upon and were directing the riotous movements
in that city. The same dreadful elements that had come to the front in
Baltimore, in Pittsburgh, New York, Newark, Buffalo and, indeed, in all
the cities where riotous demonstrations had been made, were present in
Chicago. Behind the discontent of the poor-paid workingmen, appeared the
horrid front of the Commune. It was “The Workingmen’s Party of the
United States,” known in Europe as the “Workingmen’s International
Association,” that had assumed the reins, and were endeavoring to drive
the car of civilization over the precipice of destruction. It mattered
not to such men as Van Patten, Schilling, Parsons, Clynch, and other
leaders of the malcontents, whether the railroadmen had succeeded in
carrying their point. It was sufficient for their purposes that the
public mind was excited, that the whole country was in an uproar, that a
vast number of men were idle, poverty stricken, hopeless, and these were
fit materials out of which to manufacture mobs. And they proceeded to
organize the idle, and the vicious into formidable, and dangerous bands
of rioters.
The measures adopted by the Mayor, and municipal authorities, were not
amiss, as events proved. Ample as were the preparations, thorough as
were the organization of the law-abiding citizens, the preparations were
not too extensive, nor the organizations uncalled for, in the emergency
which had arrived.
The morning of the 26th was damp, murky and hot. A rain had fallen the
night before, which had not served to cool the temperature, or cause a
breeze to break the sultriness of the steamy atmosphere. And the
passions of men had not cooled during the still hours of the last half
of the preceding night. The people of Chicago, not unused to exciting
events, rose that morning, hopeful, but ready for whatever emergency
they might be called upon to meet. Bands of armed men were stationed at
many convenient points in the city, the police were thoroughly organized
and carefully instructed in regard to the nature of the service they
were expected to perform. Several companies of United States regulars,
which had been placed at the disposal of the Governor, by the President,
and by him ordered to act under the orders of Mayor Heath, were
quartered in the Tabernacle, a building convenient to any point likely
to be threatened. By order of the Mayor, all saloons had been closed,
and peaceable citizens, women and children, had been warned to avoid
going into the streets. The committee of safety organized as a civil
_posse_, acting under the orders of the Mayor, and Sheriff of Cook
County, were divided into companies, and patrolled the streets in nearly
every section of the city. All business of every character had been
completely suspended. There were no busy hands nor toiling brains in the
great commercial marts of the metropolis of the lakes. There was a
mingled feeling of apprehension and hopefulness agitating every breast
throughout the mighty hive of humanity.
There are reasons for the belief that the lawless elements had not been
idle during the night. Quiet consultations had been held, and a sort of
understanding between various hands and cliques of the turbulent
elements, as to what their course should be, had been arrived at. Such
was the situation in Chicago, on the morning of the 26th of July, 1877.
The city was resting above a volcano, that gave token of a coming
eruption. That it was not involved in sudden and certain destruction, is
believed to be due to the careful and extensive preparations which had
been made. The action of Mayor Heath, throughout, showed him to be a man
of calm disposition, cool judgment, and possessed of great practical
wisdom. In every movement made during those anxious days, he displayed a
calmness that fitted him to judge correctly, a judgment that enabled him
to decide justly, on every issue presented. Knowing that numbers of
honest, but illiterate and unreflecting men, would naturally be drawn
into the maelstrom of passion engendered by the mob, he directed that
life should not be lightly regarded, and ordered his forces to be as
sparing as possible in the destruction of life. Sternly resolved upon
enforcing the law, he yet retained the feelings of a man, and to his
humanity and justice, in ordering the municipal forces to fire high, and
spare life whenever it was possible, many a poor, misguided man in
Chicago was spared to his family, to his friends, perhaps to a career of
honor and usefulness. In this respect, the conduct of Mayor Heath,
contrasted with that of some other official characters, is like a ray of
light in a cave of darkness. He might have decreed the death of
hundreds—many innocent ones among them—but he did not. Nevertheless, it
is contended by some, that like many others during those days, Mayor
Heath placed himself in a position amenable to censure, by violating the
supreme law of the land in a manner that requires the severest
reprobation. He assumed to interdict the meeting of societies in their
own halls, in palpable violation of the first article of the amendments
to the Constitution of the United States, which guarantees “the right of
the people peaceably to assemble and to petition the Government for a
redress of grievances.” What right had Mayor Heath, Chief of Police
Hickey, Governor Cullom, aye, or the President of the United States to
interdict the meeting of the coopers or the moulders, or any other
assemblage of citizens? What right had they to interfere with any one on
account of words spoken? The “freedom of speech shall not be abridged.”
But, his mistake may be excused.
These things are mentioned here, because it is important to remember
that lawlessness should meet with prompt and stern reprobation from
every patriotic citizen, whether it is developed among illiterate
laborers or among the cultivated leaders of social and political
opinions. There is some excuse for the ignorant, who, misguided by evil
counselors, may be betrayed into the commissions of unlawful acts. There
can be no extenuating plea in favor of the cultivated, and certainly no
possible plea, can be entered in behalf of those who are the
administrators of the law.
The citizens of Chicago were not long kept in doubt as to the purposes
of the mob on Thursday morning. At a very early hour men began to
assemble in various localities, little knots at first, they were the
nuclei of great multitudes. At seven o’clock in the morning, the city
was already in a feverish condition, and the streets were thronged by an
excited populace. The hopes which had been entertained by some, that
there would be no demonstration of the mob on Thursday, was dissipated.
As early as seven o’clock, intelligence reached police headquarters,
that lawless mobs were beginning to concentrate at the Halstead street
viaduct, where a fight had occurred the preceding night. Rioters came
from all parts of the city, and before nine o’clock not less than ten
thousand persons were present. It was evident that the mob was bent on
violence, and hesitated in their maddened frenzy at nothing. The north
approach to the viaduct, and the structure itself, was thronged by an
immense mass of rioters. When the crowd seemed in the highest state of
excitement, sixty men under officer Frainer arrived, and the moment the
rioters beheld the approach of the police officers, they broke into
small gangs and fled howling like fiends. The police followed on a run
in pursuit of them, firing as they ran. A counter charge was made by the
rioters in an attempt to pass the police on the viaduct, in order that
there might be a force of desperadoes on each side of the beleaguered
officers of the law. The scheme was frustrated by the free use of
billies, and display of pistols, from which blank cartridges were fired.
The mob then proceeded to Sixteenth street where a halt was made. A
large body turned into Sixteenth street and a similar crowd went east in
the direction of the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad freight
houses. There was a brief moment of inaction, during which the police
formed in line and prepared for a charge.
This was a signal for a perfect shower of stones, pistol shots, and
other missiles. For a little time the wildest disorder prevailed. It was
evident that the police could not resist the overwhelming forces arrayed
against them half an hour. A discharge of weapons was kept up at short
intervals in reply to the stones that were being continually hurled at
them from all sides. With every moment of delay, during which the
rioters were unharmed, the belief grew in their minds that the police
were not firing bullets, and they began surging nearer a central
rallying point. Several times did a few of the more daring attempt to
break in upon the sturdy band of police, and each time they were
successfully repulsed. At last the police received intimation that
reenforcements were coming up Halstead street. They justly concluded
that their situation became more precarious each moment.
The police, seeing the impossibility of resisting the mighty tide of
humanity which was surging down upon them, hastily formed in line, and,
raising a great shout, started to retreat across the viaduct. The roughs
rushed forward in pursuit, with shouts and yells that startled every
listener. It seemed as if all the infernal imps had come from their
gloomy retreat to curse the earth by their presence. Flight after flight
of stones, hurled by strong arms, assailed the police officers as they
moved away on Halstead street. The police attempted to guard their
retreat at first, but soon found it absolutely impossible, and turned
and fled. The race for life was then one of the wildest and most
exciting that could be imagined. The vast throng hung close upon the
heels of the police, and did not cease until the latter arrived at
Fifteenth street, where a relief force had just arrived. This consisted
of a squad of fifty mounted police—armed with repeating rifles. When the
rioters saw these they turned to retreat. Then began the battle, the
police keeping up constant firing, and using clubs to good advantage. In
this affair only two persons were killed, one of whom was a bright-eyed
boy, who received a death-blow from a stone.
The numbers comprising the mob began to increase, and the police felt
incompetent to master the situation. About eleven o’clock, the second
regiment appeared with two pieces of artillery, which produced something
like a panic in the ranks of the infuriated mob, the rioters scattered
in various directions, but continued to hurl stones and fire their
pistols. As they began to disperse a mounted troop of members of the
Grand Army of the Republic were fired into by occupants living in a
private house. The parties who did the shooting were arrested by the
police and locked up.
The second battle of the day occurred in the forenoon, on Twelfth
street, where a large crowd of rioters greeted the officers with yells
and threats. The usual weapons, stones and other missiles, filled the
air. A number of officers were seriously hurt. The crowd surged into
Turner Hall on Twelfth street, and picked up chairs and used them for
weapons. Revolvers were fired from all directions. Five of the rioters
were killed and over thirteen badly wounded. After twelve o’clock three
companies of regular troops arrived in the locality of the riot, and
their presence had the desired effect, and by three o’clock P. M. the
mob was pretty well dispersed. In that part of the city, during the
afternoon, every precaution was made to prevent a further spread of the
riot. At five o’clock four more companies of regulars arrived in the
city, and citizens organized in every form and manner for the protection
of life and property. Saloons were closed and business was suspended.
The Board of Trade had adjourned. Business men entered into various
organizations which were stationed at the threatened points throughout
the city.
During the hours between, say nine o’clock in the morning and two
o’clock in the evening, Chicago was suffering in the throes of an
excitement which is indescribable. The newspaper offices were besieged
by vast crowds, eager to get the least bit of intelligence from the
so-called battle that was in progress in the neighborhood of the
Halstead street viaduct, and on Sixteenth street. Mounted couriers rode
in wild haste from point to point, and reports of the most terrible
massacres and slaughters were repeated from lip to lip, and believed by
thousands. Men turned pale at the blood-curdling recital of horrors at
the viaduct, and women swooned when the horrifying reports fell upon
their ears. The most exaggerated stories prevailed concerning the
character of the collision at the Halstead street viaduct. Ten blocks
away from the spot where the mob and police were engaged in something of
a fight, such stories as were circulated were perfectly astounding. At
one time a report flew, and grew in magnitude and horror as it flew
through the city, to the effect that the mob had vanquished the police
force of nearly a hundred men, had captured more than thirty of them,
and had deliberately massacred the whole number, before the eyes of the
citizens, who were powerless to assist them. At another time it was
reported that the regular United States troops had gone out Halstead
street, with a four-gun battery charged with grape shot and canister,
and two Gatling guns, and had opened fire on the mob with the most
horribly destructive effects—that hundreds—nay thousands of the rioters
had been killed, and that Halstead and Sixteenth streets were literally
flowing with blood.
The effect of such reports, when there were no means of ascertaining the
truth, was to excite the people beyond all precedent. To ladies pent up
in their houses during these exciting scenes, hearing nothing but the
exaggerated reports that flew through the streets, with brothers,
husbands, fathers, and lovers, engaged in the strife, the day was one of
unmitigated misery. The anguish of doubt, the deceitfulness of
appearances, the alternations of fear and of hope, of courage and
despair, were some of the mental distresses that tormented them during
that memorable day.
During the afternoon, and the early part of the evening, there were few
exciting incidents, and the city was comparatively quiet. The hopes of
the people were once more raised, the belief had become general, that
the mob had dispersed, and would not gather again.
At half-past eleven at night a large mob gathered at the corner of
Sixteenth and Halstead streets, augmented by the presence of a great
number of Bridgeport roughs. Indications at first pointed to as serious
an affair as the fights occuring in the morning, at the same locality.
The mob were evidently just as wild with excitement as at any time
during the day, but upon the approach of the Second Regiment of militia,
all indications toward actual violence passed away, after stones had
been hurled in the air with the desired effect, and after three soldiers
and two policemen had been badly wounded. Some of the rioters were
dangerously wounded.
At a late hour in the evening of the 26th, the quiet suburban village of
Lawndale, was the scene of one of the most brutal murders which
disgraced the city during the continuance of the riots. The
circumstances under which it was committed, were these: Mr. James White,
a respected member of the Chicago Board of Trade, acting in the capacity
of a special police officer, was patrolling his beat in that village,
when he saw a person whose actions appeared to be suspicious. Mr. White
proceeded to arrest him, and was conducting him to the station, or
headquarters in the village. The person under arrest went quietly enough
for some distance, but finally concluded not to submit to the arrest,
and began to resist. While engaged in the struggle with his captor, the
prisoner, suddenly drew a revolver, presented it at the head of Mr.
White, and fired. The ball penetrated the brain and the unfortunate
gentleman fell and expired in a few minutes. The fellow who had
committed the horrible deed then fled, and was not arrested. The next
day the merchants of the Board of Trade raised the sum of three thousand
five hundred dollars, which was appropriated for the benefit of the
family of the deceased merchant.
The field of operation during the day was confined to the district of
the city between Canal and Green streets, and between Twelfth and
Twenty-second streets. It was within these limits that the rioting was
confined. In other parts of the city there were occasionally threatening
demonstrations, but nothing came of them, save alarm to a few timid
souls.
All the afternoon and during the early part of the evening the police
were busied in making arrests. Numerous persons were taken to the
lockups. Among them some who had been particularly conspicuous in
inciting the rioters. One of the notable facts connected with the events
of this somewhat eventful day, was the presence and active participation
of women in the riots. In the neighborhood of the viaduct on Halstead
street, they were very demonstrative. Taking up positions in their
houses, they encouraged the male members of the mob to attack the
police, and were excessively abusive to every one who wore a white
shirt, or a uniform. Nor did they stop with abusive words, and insulting
epithets. Many of them provided themselves with heaps of stones, pans of
mud, and other dangerous and unpleasant munitions of war, and vigorously
hurled them from the windows of houses upon the officers contending in
the streets below. Not a few of these viragoes had pistols which they
fired, sometimes with evil effect, at the policemen.
During the day the mob captured one of the Metropolitan Telegraph
Stations, and prevented any despatches from being sent during the time
they were in possession.
The Second Regiment of state troops were held as a reserve to the police
force, during the conflict between the mob and the officers of the law.
There was also a large force of special officers and independent
companies, acting under the orders of the Mayor, in readiness to
co-operate with the regular police force.
The newspapers of Chicago gave a somewhat exaggerated, but a very minute
and complete history of all the incidents in connection with the
conflicts between the police and the rioters. After the smoke had
cleared away, after the fight was over and the mob dispersed, the before
countless number of the slain of those fierce engagements was counted,
and the number of those who sought and found gory graves were just
seven. If Mr. White be regarded as one of the victims of the riot, then
eight human beings had met death by violence since the riots began. This
is the net result of various conflicts, which were heralded to the world
as sanguinary battles, and the eight persons who lost their lives were
all the dead of that “fearful carnage.”
If the day had been one of the most intense excitement, the evening was
one of deepest anxiety to the people of Chicago. But except the
gathering about Sixteenth and Halstead streets, which dispersed on the
approach of the police and the military about eleven o’clock in the
evening, the night wore away without further alarms.
There is one thing which particularly requires to be noticed at this
point. Among the killed and the wounded, among all the prisoners
captured, there was not a single railroadman. This is a significant
fact. Who were the strikers? The Pariahs of the streets, the Communists,
the idle and the vicious, who were not workingmen, who would not work
for any wages, at any time. The railroadmen struck for higher wages, or
to resist the reduction of the pitiful pittance they received for the
dangerous services they performed, but they were, as a class, neither
rioters, incendiaries, thieves nor murderers. The attempt to class the
railroadmen with the mobs that showed so ugly a front in some of the
large cities of the country, deserves the stern reprobation of every
man, actuated by a sense of justice and humanity. They do not deserve
it, and those who claim that workingmen constituted the mob, do so
without evidence, and are guilty of slandering a useful class of
citizens.
The day of excitement had passed away in Chicago, the events of the day
had become a part of the history of the times. Another day had dawned,
and the rumor-mongers were early busy with all sorts of startling
reports. There were numerous assertions made that the mob was preparing
for a more desperate re-encounter with the police; that they had secured
arms and were organized, and would attempt to capture the city. The
extravagance of the rumors circulated the day before, had a tendency to
discredit the sensational stories that were circulated during the
morning of the 27th. The adage, in time of peace prepare for war, had
been acted upon by the military authorities, acting under the direction
of the Mayor and Chief of Police. During that morning the forces were
distributed as follows: Stock Yards, sixty regulars; Chicago, Burlington
and Quincy Freight House, Sixteenth street, two hundred; Twelfth street
bridge, three hundred and fifty regulars of the Second Regiment; corner
Twelfth and Halstead streets, two hundred of the First Regiment; Canal
Park and South Morgan street, fifty of the First Regiment; south side of
the Gas-works, General Lieb’s Battery, numbering sixty-five men; north
side Water-works, sixty-five veterans; Union Street Police Station,
fifty of the Second Regiment; corner Chicago and Milwaukee avenues, a
possible rendezvous of Communists, sixty veterans; Halstead street,
north of Twelfth, forty of the Post Office Guard, while Dalye and Walrus
Mounted Guard were constantly patrolling that dangerous section.
Four hundred regulars were at the lake front awaiting orders. The
regular and special police were at the center of the trouble. Citizens
with police powers were in every section of the city.
There were some small crowds collected on Halstead street, and on Archer
avenue, but these evinced no disposition to resort to violence. The
sensation-mongers had no basis from which to send forth their exciting
rumors. There was no mob, and of course there could be no riot. The mob
had dissolved. The history of the whole day’s events would simply be a
record of the evolutions of the mounted militia, and the police. The
Mayor issued another proclamation, in which he declared that the city
authorities had dispersed all lawless bands in the city, and law and
order were restored. He urged and requested all business men and
employers generally, to resume work and give employment, as much as
possible, to their workmen. He considered this the first duty of the
business community. He said he was amply able to protect them and their
workmen.
Some unimportant strikes in stables, and among cigar makers took place,
but there was no unpleasant demonstrations in connection with them.
The railroads were resuming business, and the city, though not in its
normal condition of commercial activity, was rapidly recovering from the
depression caused by the excitement of the four or five days preceding.
Chicago had indeed passed through an ordeal and had come out of the
difficulties, which at one time were so threatening, with less loss of
life and destruction of property than was expected.
There are no reasons for doubting the statements made at the time that a
large number of people stopped in Chicago, who would not hesitate to
apply the torch to buildings, or the knife to throats, if only the
opportunity should present itself. Nor are there wanting proofs of the
fact that a formidable attempt was made to create such an opportunity.
It was fortunately frustrated. The only thing to be lamented was the
necessity to take life in the suppression of disorders. This, however,
could not be avoided. The misguided, hapless beings, who were hurried
from the busy scenes of life on that day of turmoil and excitement, were
men after all, men with dispositions not so greatly unlike those which
prompt other men, actuated by emotions of kindness and love, and wrath
and hate, just as other men whose position in life and surrounding
circumstances alone gives them a precedence and a preference in the
world’s regard. Were the seven men who met the messengers of death in
Chicago more wicked than the thousands who escaped? We say certainly
not.
Meanwhile so far as the great strike affected Chicago it was practically
at an end. There were a few days of uncertainty, perhaps anxiety in the
public mind, but no further actual trouble was experienced, and within
the week business resumed its wanted channels, and Chicago was at peace.