UNITED STATES TROOPS FILL THE “BULL-PEN” WITH MINERS’ UNION
DYNAMITERS--MY EVIDENCE CONVICTS EIGHTEEN OF THE UNION LEADERS.
On reaching a place of safety on the heavily timbered mountain side
about three miles from Wallace, Stark and I lay down to sleep on the
ground, using the sky to cover us.
Towards noon the next day we found the cabin of a sourkrout dutchman
whom I knew as a friend to the mine owners. Though a member of the
union, he was opposed to the way the Miners’ unions were conducted;
therefore I concluded to risk entering his cabin in order to get
something to eat. We found the kind-hearted fellow at home alone, and
he was fearful lest the union find out that he had fed us. He knew me
as secretary of the Gem union, and had heard through his Irish partner
that I had turned out to be a “traitor.”
This Irishman partner was a rank union man and had gone to take part in
the riot at Gem, and now he was expected back any moment, so for that
reason, we were put in a stone cabin nearby and given a key so as to
lock ourselves in, while waiting for “Dutchy” to cook us something to
eat.
Soon after the steaming coffee and food were set before us in our
hiding place, the dynamiter partner returned with glowing accounts of
the murdering of “scabs,” etc. He was worn out from his long siege and
after filling up, was soon asleep. Then our German friend came to tell
us to keep quiet for awhile, as his partner was going back to Wallace
when he finished his nap. Stark and I then took a nap ourselves, as
we knew no one could get at us without waking us up. Still, mine were
cat-naps, as I feared that “Dutchy” and “Micky” might conspire to blow
us into kingdom-come with giant powder, or else warn the union of our
presence there.
Late in the evening “Micky” went back to Wallace to help uphold the
principles of his noble union, and then Stark and I with a supply of
grub and an old coffee pot, struck out again for “tall timber.”
This time we climbed the mountain side for a mile, east. Here in a
secluded spot in the heavy timber and underbrush, we built an Indian
“wickiup” to shelter us from the rain which was falling, and that night
we slept the sleep of the just.
Next morning we tramped north nearly to the edge of Wallace, secreting
ourselves on the top of a round mountain overlooking the town. Here we
had a free show which couldn’t be beat for money. It was grand, viewed
from a distance; especially one of the last acts wherein a tall lanky
pilgrim was the “fall guy,” though he didn’t take time to fall. He just
hit the high places, twenty feet to the jump.
It was the unions’ grand day of reckoning with all “scabs,” and
business men who had opposed union principles in the past. They were
gathered up in small droves and taken to the railroad yards and there
told to “hit the road” for Spokane, Wash., about seventy-five miles
distant; and to give them a good start, the union men would fire over
their heads. In running, some would fall and turn somersaults, but not
so with the lanky individual with the stove-pipe hat and valise. At
the first mile-post this tall man was leading the herd by at least 200
yards, and besides, he was handicapped with a big valise.
At the funny things which happened during the day, Stark and I split
our sides laughing.
Late in the afternoon the union men captured a railroad train, and in a
body, went to bury their dead.
Some union Knights of Pythias wanted to bury Ivory Bean, the man whom
I saw shot through the heart, under the rules of the order, but the
union wouldn’t allow it. He had to be buried as a “scab,” so far as the
unions were concerned. This we heard later.
That night Stark and I slept in our “wickiup” again.
Next morning we returned to our lookout mountain, and late in the
evening saw train loads of United States soldiers and State militia
arrive from the State of Washington. It was indeed a grand sight to me,
and for the first time in my life did I realize the value of our troops.
When the large American flag was planted near the Carter hotel my heart
broke loose from its mooring, where it had been hitched under the
Confederate flag of my babyhood. Stark and I gave three cheers for the
Star Spangled Banner of our united country, and deep down in my heart I
made a vow to die and bleed, if necessary, to uphold the honor of this
flag.
Throwing a kiss of farewell back at our “wickiup” and coffee pot, we
started on a run down the mountain side for the Carter hotel. Arriving
within a quarter of a mile of the hotel and soldiers’ camp, on the
outskirts of the heavy timber, I concluded to do a little detective
work at the home of French Pete, a rank union man who had built a fine
home on the hill, south of the Carter hotel. Pete had married an Irish
mother-in-law, and it was on this old Irish woman that I got in my fine
work.
I had cached Stark, with his rifle across a log, ready to shoot, while
I went to French Pete’s home to learn the news and to get all the
information possible about union matters. The Irish mother-in-law and
her young son-in-law greeted me in the yard. I gave an assumed name,
and wondered what we Miners’ union men would do now that the dirty
cut-throat soldiers had arrived. I won the old lady’s heart, and she
slobbered over me as a poor tired union miner who had fought a noble
cause.
I asked if there was any danger of President O’Brien and the officers
of the Central union being arrested by the soldiers. She replied no,
that they would never find them as they were hiding in her (Mrs.
Hollihan’s) cellar down town. Here the old lady went into the house
and got the late daily Spokane Review, and Spokesman, for me. I then
went out to my supposed union friend behind the log and she and her
son-in-law followed. There I read the big headlines aloud. They told
of the riot and the blowing up of the Frisco mill and the killing of
“scabs” and the capture of John Monihan and his 130 or more armed men,
and how the next day they were marched in a body to the Wallace bank
to draw their wages and savings, and then with all their cash, they
were taken on a train to the head of the Coeur D’Alene lake at which
point they had to board a steamer for the other side of the lake; and
that while waiting for the steamer at the Mission about dusk, they were
fired into by the union men and many shot and robbed of their money;
John Monihan being among the missing; also that a train load of United
States troops had been sent on the first day of the riot from Missoula,
Mont., but that the union men of Butte City and the Coeur D’Alene blew
up the bridges so they couldn’t get through; so that they had to go
around through Oregon and Washington.
Of course we all cheered at this good news against “scabs.” Then Stark
and I bade our friends goodby, and started ostensibly for Placer Creek
where the Dutchman and his Irish partner lived.
On getting out of sight in the heavy timber, we lay down and watched
Mrs. Hollihan who had just come up to visit her daughter, French
Pete’s wife. In a few moments she came out of the house and with an
old-country stride of four feet to the stretch, she hurried down to
her own home, and on arriving there, as I learned afterwards, she told
her guests, the union leaders, that she had just met two poor union
men who looked tired and worn out. She was asked to describe these two
men, which she did. On describing me as being pitted with smallpox,
President O’Brien spoke up and said: “Why, that’s that ---- detective
Allison that we have been scouring the hills to find,” or words to that
effect.
Then a runner was sent down town to gather a crowd of union men to go
on our trail and head us off and capture us. A large crowd was sent up
the creek on the run, to scour the woods back to the point where the
old lady had seen us. This crowd running up the creek armed, created
an excitement, and some one friendly to the mine owners, learned that
they were after me. Then General Carlin, commander of the United States
troops, was notified and he sent a detail of twenty-five soldiers on
the double-quick up the creek to rescue us. The soldiers were given a
good description of Yours Truly.
It was just dusk when Stark and I presented ourselves to General Carlin
in the Carter hotel. When he heard my name he said: “Why, you are the
man we sent out twenty-five soldiers half an hour ago to rescue.” Of
course this was news to me, though next day I learned the whole truth
of the affair, as outlined above. Then General Carlin sent runners out
to bring in the soldiers, as the lost had been found. It was late when
the last ones returned. They reported seeing many armed men whom they
couldn’t capture owing to the heavy brush.
I told of President O’Brien being hid at Mrs. Hollihan’s house, and a
squad of soldiers were sent to surround the place, with the result that
President O’Brien, Joe Poynton and others of the union leaders were
captured. But Dallas was not among the prisoners, who were fixing to
change their hiding place when the soldiers got there. He had no doubt
gone with the crowd to capture me, and thus saved his bacon, as he was
never caught.
Stark and I slept soundly that night in the Carter hotel, with the
glorious American flag waving over our heads, and a thousand bayonets
to insure our safety.
Next day Dr. Simms was made marshal of the whole Coeur D’Alene
district, under military rule, the district having been put under
marshal law; and I was made one of his chief deputies.
As I knew all the agitators and union leaders, I was kept busy for
the next week or so putting unruly cattle in the “bull-pen,” a large
stockade with a frame building in the center, for them to sleep and eat
in.
We scoured the country to the Montana line. General Carlin refused to
follow them over the line, out of Idaho. In less than a week we had
300 “bulls” in the corral. A word from me would liberate any of them
and many were let go, as I knew the bad ones. Instead of burning me at
a stake, they were now begging me for mercy, that is, a great many of
them.
My friend, Geo. A. Pettibone, was not captured for a few days. He was
hid up in the mountains wounded by being struck with a boomerang. He
had touched off the fuse that blew up the Frisco mill, causing the
death and maiming of many men.
After they had sent a car of giant powder down the mountain and it
blew up before reaching the mill, they tried a new scheme. High up on
the mountain side there was a large wooden flume and from this to the
water-wheel in the mill, there was a large iron pipe called a penstock,
to conduct water to run the mill machinery. As the mill was not then
running, there was no water in the penstock. In order to reach the
upper end of this penstock, the water was let out of the large wooden
flume, and along its bottom, Geo. A. Pettibone and his gang of three
or four men walked. Then bundles of giant powder were dropped into the
penstock and found lodgment at the bottom, inside the mill. When they
thought enough had been sent down, Pettibone touched a match to a fuse
attached to the last bundle. He made the fuse long enough so that it
wouldn’t go off till it reached the bottom among the other bundles.
Now, Judge Geo. A. Pettibone, the learned justice of the peace, of
Gem, had a fine head for dishing out union justice and for crawling up
a hollow tree of small caliber, but not for scenting a boomerang. He
remained in the flume with his ear at the mouth of the penstock so as
to hear the joyful sound of the explosion when it should take place.
Pettibone went up in the tree-tops and his companion picked him up
outside of the flume, where he came down with a shattered hand and
other injuries. He hadn’t studied concussion in his school books. If
he had, he would have known that the shock of the explosion would come
back up the penstock.
In this explosion at the Frisco mill, many lives were saved from the
fact that most of the seventy-five or more guards and non-union miners
were at the further side of the mill building, shooting at union men on
the opposite side of the mountain, from where Pettibone and his small
gang were doing their work.
In rounding up these unruly cattle with squads of soldiers, I had some
narrow escapes. Once in Burk it looked scary for me, as I only had a
few soldiers and the miners were very angry at me. All they lacked was
a leader to make a break for my scalp.
To show how I was hated by the miners in the bull-pen, I will quote the
headlines from the “Barbarian” newspaper:
“Allison went into the bull-pen and a rush was made for him. He had to
draw his pistol. His presence in their midst had the same effect as a
red flag on angry bulls.”
I made one trip with a train load of soldiers with General Carlin in
active command, to the line of Montana, where Jack Lucy, “Long Shorty”
and a large gang of dynamiters had a fort built on top of a mountain.
From the train to the foot of the mountain, Lieutenant Page had charge.
After marching about a mile it was found impossible to reach the
enemy’s fort in a body, owing to brush and fallen timber. Therefore,
we had to return empty-handed. But on the trip I learned a lesson in
military training. Funny things happened, which would have made a stone
idol grin, but not so with General Carlin. He would never crack a
smile. On making inquiry, I found that at the military schools he had
learned to set the brakes on his mouth, at will.
In Gem, Capt. J. W. Bubb had charge of a company of United States
troops, and I did much of my work through him. He would furnish me a
squad of soldiers whenever I asked for them.
In my dealings with soldiers I found out the difference between “raw
recruits” and “seasoned veterans.” In going through old tunnels and
caves, searching for dynamiters, the boys in the state militia would
squat and often jump at the least noise, while, if I said the word,
half a dozen United States soldiers would march right into a dark place
where dozens of the enemy were supposed to be hidden. I would be right
behind them and could note their maneuvers. A dozen bats or “bloody
howls” could fly past their heads and they would never change their
course or alter their steps.
On my first visit to Gem, after the soldiers came in, it was comical to
see the surprise of Mrs. Shipley’s little boy. He almost had a “duck
fit” on seeing me. He supposed I was still down in that hole under the
floor, and his mother said that he couldn’t eat a meal without saving
some for Mr. Allison. This he would drop down into the hole. Bless his
little baby heart, wherever he might be. I have lost track of him and
his mother, but I want them to know that my last crust of bread or
dollar is theirs for the asking, should they ever be in need.
Of course, after marshal law was declared, the mine owners and deported
business men came back.
Joe McDonald, a brave man and a fighter, took charge of the Frisco mine.
After the soldiers came, John Monihan also returned. He told of his
narrow escape at the Mission while waiting for the steamer to take them
to Coeur D’Alene City. He said they were all sitting around on the
grass, about 250 of them, under the guard of a few union men, when just
about dusk a squad of union dynamiters, under the leadership of Bill
Black, who was later shot and sent to the penitentiary, came swooping
down on the defenseless men shooting and robbing them right and left.
The murderers were on horseback. John Monihan and Percy Summers jumped
into the water and swam to an island, thus saving themselves.
At the point where the shooting took place, the river is very deep, and
after dark a wounded man, Abbott, who was hidden in the tall grass said
he saw the union men rob several dead bodies and then cut open their
stomachs, so they would sink, and dump them into the river.
After the count, fourteen “scabs” were missing and some of them have
never turned up to this day, and the supposition is that they were the
ones sunk in the river.
Most of the “scabs,” who gave up their money without protest, were
liberated. Some had a year’s savings in their pockets, as many had been
working for a long time under union rules, but had turned to be “scabs”
after the strike.
Many times I visited the States’ hospital in Wallace and talked with
the non-union men wounded in Gem, and in the Fourth-of-July canyon on
the lake. To see some of these poor fellows shot through the body, and
others with their heads split open, would melt the heart of a stone
man, and make him resolve to fight this kind of unionism to the last
ditch.
One poor fellow seventy-five years old, lay with his head cracked open
and his face and body pounded to a jelly, and this was done after he
had surrendered, when the Frisco mill was blown up. And other men
served in the same manner lay by his side, almost at the point of death.
This dastardly work was done under the leadership of Paddy Burke and
Dan Connor, two of my brothers of the Gem union. All honor to the
Irishman who had the manhood to stop these cut-throats and give orders
that no more prisoners be ill-used, at the risk of their own lives.
This Irishman was Peter Breen, a leader of the Butte City (Mont.)
union, who had come over to help in the riots. I afterwards saw him
sulking in the Wallace jail, and I felt like giving him my hand for his
noble act, even though he had himself trampled the Constitution of the
United States under his big brogans.
The old man referred to above, told me how he had come from California
to work in the Frisco mine to save his little home from being sold
under mortgage, over his old wife’s head, and tears streamed down
his bruised face as he told it. Furthermore, he was an American-bred
citizen, while the men who beat him up were every one foreigners of the
lowest order.
Finally, I had to go on a stage coach to Murray, the county seat of
Shoshone county, Idaho, this being the county in which the Coeur
D’Alene mining district is situated, to appear before the grand jury
against union rioters.
Murray is an old gold camp across a range of mountains, and is made up
of a good class of American citizens, many of them being old Grand Army
men. So, for that reason the grand jury brought in many indictments.
Charlie O’Neal was the prosecuting attorney for the county, and he
worked faithfully to get indictments, though he said he knew it would
be utterly impossible to convict a union man in the local courts, and
he was right, for the strongest case was tried first, as a test. It was
against Webb Leasier, the man who was seen to fire the bullet through
Ivory Bean’s heart. O’Neal had witnesses who saw Leasier fire the shot,
and still he failed to convict.
While in Murray, and before I had appeared before the grand jury, the
deputy sheriff in charge at that point under Dr. Simms, told me after
supper one night, that he and his guards could not be responsible for
my safety, as there was a well-laid plan to kidnap me by force. He
said he had just got a tip from a reliable party who had seen a large
crowd of union outlaws up the creek several miles, and from this gang
of union men, about 300, the informant found out their intention of
capturing the town of Murray in order to get me. This deputy appeared
to be very nervous over the matter, and he hired several extra men to
do guard duty, but said he had no hope of standing off a large gang of
desperate men. He advised me to look out for myself and not depend on
him.
There were no soldiers in Murray, and the town was filled with union
men to act as witnesses for their side; therefore I felt a little
shaky. Still, I figured that possibly it was a bluff to frighten me so
I wouldn’t remain to testify before the grand jury.
That night and every night following, until all my evidence was in the
hands of the grand jury, I stayed awake and sat up on the mountain
side overlooking the town, with my Winchester rifle ready for action.
I would pretend to retire to my room for the night, not telling a soul
of my intentions; then I would slip down the back stairs and up the
mountain side. Next morning I would return to the hotel at daylight and
slip into my room.
After I had testified before the grand jury, I was told that Dallas and
his gang were laying for me on the road to capture me when I returned
on the stage to Wallace. No doubt there was truth in this report, for
the stage drivers told of men stopping the stage as though to see who
were aboard. Each side of the road was covered with a dense growth
of timber and underbrush, so that it would have been an easy matter
to capture the stage at a given signal that I was a passenger. But I
fooled them by hiring a saddle horse to take a little exercise one
evening, and that night I “hit the road” for Wallace on horseback, a
distance of about twenty miles.
Finally I was called to Coeur D’Alene City, Idaho, to testify in Judge
Jas. H. Beatty’s United States court against leaders of the Miners’
union.
Before leaving Gem, I had the pleasure of seeing my little daughter,
Viola, though no one was to know that she was my child.
Mr. Will F. Read had sold his home in Anna, Ill., and come out to Gem
for his wife’s health, on the strength of my advice. He then bought out
Mrs. Shipley’s interest in our store and became my partner. I agreed to
give him half the profits from the rent of the twelve furnished rooms,
which were now all occupied with non-union men, and a barber shop
adjoining the store, for his trouble in running the place. Therefore,
on leaving, I turned over to Mr. and Mrs. Read all my rights in Gem,
including the good-will interest in Miss Gertrude Hull, a pretty young
lady whom I rounded up in Spokane to clerk in our store. I had gone to
Spokane City on this special round-up, and of course I roped in the
prettiest girl I could find.
For the next few months my name was in the papers a good deal, as I was
the star witness against the leaders of the miners’ union. Many people
came to Coeur d’Alene City especially to hear my evidence.
The United States’ prosecuting attorney was Freemont Wood, and a Mr. F.
B. Crossthwaite from the Department of Justice in Washington, D. C.,
assisted.
The Mine Owners’ Association employed Attorney Hagen and W. B. Heyburn,
now a United States senator from Idaho, to assist in the prosecutions.
We also tried a batch of the dynamite leaders in Boise City, the
capital of Idaho, in Judge Beatty’s court there.
During these trials I had to keep wide awake, as it was known that the
miners’ union had turned me over to the Irish “Clan-na-gaels” to be
killed, so that my evidence would not be used against President O’Brien
and the other leaders.
In Boise City I received a “tip” that Kelly and four “Clan-na-gael”
members of the Butte City, Montana union, who it was said had charge
of assassinating Editor Penrose for opposing their union, a short
time previous, would come to get me out of the way. The “tip” came
from a man on the inside. Kelly and his four companions came to Boise
by the time court opened, but they were pointed out to me, and their
usefulness to the dynamite society was spoiled.
The Butte City, Montana, and Coeur d’Alene unions had employed
one-armed Pat Reddy from California and Nevada, to protect their side.
He was a noted criminal lawyer, and he and I had some hot tilts while
I was on the witness stand, both at Coeur d’Alene City and at Boise,
The “Barbarian” newspaper and others, came out with big headlines of
how Siringo-Allison paralyzed Reddy and had him fighting mad. In Boise,
Reddy frothed at the mouth and shook his fist in my face, but I only
smiled. Judge Beatty upheld me. Attorney James Hawley, of Boise, a nice
fellow, was employed to assist Reddy. The unions also had two other
lawyers of smaller caliber.
We succeeded in convicting eighteen union leaders, among them being my
friend, Judge Geo. A. Pettibone, who had recovered from his fly up in
the tree-tops at the Frisco mill explosion. He received a sentence of
two years in the United States prison at Detroit, Mich.
I was really sorry for the “honorable president” of the Coeur d’Alene
Central Union, Mr. O’Brien. He was not a bad man at heart, but his head
had gone wrong through taking the advice of such men as Joe Poynton and
“Judge” Pettibone.
I shall never believe that nature intended Mr. O’Brien to wear prison
stripes, but every one of the other seventeen, with the exception of
Dan Harrington, deserved hanging, among them being an ex-prize fighter,
Tom Whalen, who did a noble deed when he shot Bill Black through the
body in a drunken brawl. Had he killed Black, who led the charge in
the Fourth-of-July canyon on Monihan and his helpless victims, several
lives would have been saved.
Thomas Eaton, old man Mike Divine, “Spud” Murphy, C. Sinclair, Joe
Poynton, Tom Whalen and John Nicholson, were among those convicted as
leaders of the miners’ union.
The peculiar twist in the names of all these convicted men would
indicate that they were not Swedes, Chinamen or Scandinavians.
It was late in the fall when in Wallace, Idaho, I closed the operation
and started back to Denver. I had been on the operation a year and two
months.
I hated to part with my companion, Frank Stark, as we had become warm
friends; but soon after my departure he lost one of his legs above the
knee from a rifle bullet. It was done in my building at Gem where he
was rooming, and the rifle was fired accidentally by Johnny Kneebone,
the “scab” blacksmith, afterwards murdered by the miners’ union,
several members of the union going to his blacksmith shop at the Gem
mine in broad daylight and shooting him full of holes.
After losing his leg, Stark went to his old home in Pennsylvania and
learned to be an engineer. Since then I have lost track of him, though
I hope he is alive and doing well; for he is a prince and there is not
a cowardly drop of blood in his veins.
I arrived in Denver and discontinued the Coeur d’Alene operation just
before Christmas. Superintendent McCartney was glad to see me back
alive, after the strenuous life I had been leading.
On several occasions in the Coeur d’Alene I had saved my life by being
handy with the pistol and getting the drop. I always avoided taking
life, though I had the law on my side. I had a chance once in Coeur
d’Alene City during the trial there, to kill a bad dynamiter right
before the eyes of Prosecuting Attorney Wood, and be upheld by the law.
Also another time on a crowded train between Gem and Wallace, when Mr.
“Mace” Campbell and other mine owners were present. Some of the tough
union men had raised a “racket” with me. I made them sit down and kept
them covered with my gun till we arrived in Wallace. Then I had Sheriff
Simms throw the leader, a big Irishman, in jail for threatening to kill
me.
On reaching Denver I started out to have a good time by spending my
money freely. I figured that I could afford it, as outside of my weekly
salary, I was drawing $135.00 per month from the rent of my Gem, Idaho,
building and furnished rooms, besides a good profit from my half of the
store.
But with me, good things don’t last long, for one morning early in
January, 1893, Miss Mollie Rucker, our cashier, handed me a telegram
from Mrs. Will F. Read in Gem, which stated that my building and store
had burnt to the ground and that her husband was in jail for shooting
the union dynamiter merchant, Samuels. Thus my $3,000.00 had taken
wings and flown up in smoke, and my extra income was cut off. I had had
$1,500.00 worth of insurance on the building, but a few weeks before
the fire, $1,000.00 of it was canceled owing to a fear that the union
would set the town afire. The $500.00 of insurance money was used to
pay some debts in Idaho and to assist the Reads who later joined me in
Denver.
While the fire was raging on our side of the street, Will Read had
carried his wife’s trunk containing her keepsakes across the street
and put it upon Samuels’ store porch where it would be safe from
the fire. Then Samuels gave the trunk a kick out into the street,
as Read was not liked by the union men on account of his friendship
for me. Read at once went back into the burning building and got his
double-barrel shotgun loaded with buckshot, and “winged” dynamiter
Samuels by shooting his right arm off at the shoulder; but before doing
so, Samuels fired a couple of shots at Read with a pistol, after Read
had knocked him through his own glass-front store, shattering the plate
glass.
Barrels of whisky had been rolled out of the burning saloons, which lay
between the Union Hall, where the fire started and my place, and the
union mob were all drunk on free liquor.
After the shooting Read was knocked down and the “scab” Deputy Sheriff
Frank Rose secured Read’s gun. The drunken dynamiters seeing their
brother with his arm shattered to threads and Rose with the smoking
gun in his hand, supposed he did the job. Poor Rose tried to explain
matters, but he was a “scab” and they wouldn’t listen to his pleadings.
While they were fixing to hang him, the truth was explained that
Allison’s partner shot poor Samuels. Then Rose was liberated and the
mob started after Read, who by that time, was half way to Wallace.
Arriving in Wallace about 5:30 A.M. Read surrendered to Sheriff Simms
who took him down to the jail as a matter of duty, but forgot and left
the jail door open; and he also forgot and left a Winchester rifle and
100 rounds of cartridges where Read could get them.
Soon the mob came in sight. Read lay on top of a stockade with his
rifle ready to do business. When within a few hundred yards of the
jail, Webb Leasier the man who is said to have killed Ivory Bean,
succeeded in stopping the mob. He had been pleading with them to let
the law takes its course, as Read was a brother Odd Fellow of his; but
they wouldn’t listen, until finally Webb Leasier got in front of the
leaders with cocked gun, and threatened to kill the first one who made
another step forward. They knew he meant business, and besides, they
loved him as a good “scab-killer,” so they turned back and spoiled
Read’s chance of making a glorious name as a slayer of dynamiters.
Webb Leasier’s action goes to prove that there is some good in all men,
even in murderers.
At the preliminary trial before my friend, Judge Angel, in Wallace,
Read was liberated.
This ends the second and last act of the bloody Coeur d’Alene strike of
1892, which taught me many new lessons in my study of human nature.
My only regret is that I couldn’t have bottled up that hole in the
floor before it went up in smoke, so as to keep it as a relic to be
handed down to my descendants, to remind them of the first time their
worthy grandsire had crawled into a hole in time of danger.
The Coeur d’Alene trouble had been caused through the miners’ union
wanting to dictate as to how the mines should be run. When they made
a demand for shorter hours, and that “muckers” and common roustabouts
receive $3.50 per day, the same wages as skilled miners, the mine
owners closed down the mines and sent out for non-union men.