, 1884-05-31
THE POWER OF A MOB.
Some of the Great Dangers to Which
Cities Arc Exposed
What n Regular Army Omcer says
Precautions which Are Urged
Dynamite and other Devil
try--The BarrIcade.


NeH
Every city with more than co. 900 popula.
ton has a mob element in it large enough tc
do as much mischief as a confagration or cy.
clone could do. 1t is a serious question with
the 1O2 cities Of that size in the United States
TO be studying the subject and take measures
to control, il not prevent, the volcanic
eruption of riot and mobbery.
A few months since General Molineux. of
the regular army, delivered n lecture on
sRiots in Cities" before the Military institute
at Governors island. 1t was, under the cir.
cumstances, a very striking coincidence that
he should so thoroughly have gone over the
ground. In his opinion one of the great
military questions will not relate to war as Is
usually understood-war with a foreign ma.
ton or a civil war-but to controlling the
uneasy and riotous portions OF the popula.
lation living in large cities.
The authorities, he declared, are not keep
ing pace with the "untiring energy of Social
ists, Communists and Nihilists that hav,
taken root here" and Eve are In grave peri
of being lulled into fancied security by our
civil and military authorities
The power of a mob consists in its posses
sion OF arms and ammunition; in its ability
to cut Off gas and water; to employ dyna
mite; to resort to barricades and interrupt
telepraphic communication Hence every
city should be prepared to defend at once
and at all times its gunshops, its armories
its telegraphs, its gas works and its water
works. The floods of Cincinnati taught the
people of that city to provide themselves
with lamps, candles and other substitutes,
and to anticipate the disablement of
their water supply; but other cities
have not even this advantage. The cutting
or of the water supply would put 8
city, at the absolute mercy of incendiaries
So. too, would the capture of the fro engin,
houses. Authorities should, therefore, see to
to it that the armories, the gunshops, the
water works, the gas works, the fire engine
houses, the telegraph offices, should be in {
condition to be put immediately in a state OF
siege. Commanding officers should be per-
fectly familiar with armories, the surrounding
houses and streets, the weak points, how .
thanking fire could be had, where loop-hole.
could be cut. Sacks full of earth, if on hand,
would be invaluable for barricading windows
In case of the telegraphs being cut Off there
should be a system of ug-signaling and Of
the use OF the Photograph, or flashes from a
suu-glass reflection.
The worst and most terrible weapon vel
devised for ASA ulting a city is dynamite
This the restless and riotous classes elsewhere
-Nihilists and Communists-hav not shown
themselves slow to use. In the hands Of O
mob a handful of gronades would wreck, il
not annihilate, a city more completely than
all the armies Of the Huns, Goths and Van.
dals combined-more than petroleum and
rifles and Gatlingguns.
The only weapon which can meet dynamite
i~s-dynamite. A mob which understood that
it would be devastated by dynamite, would
itself hesitate about using such a weapon,
because in trained hands the OK plosive would
be so much more effective than in their own.
The barricade, which has SO long been
used by mobs in cities, can be used with even
more effect against them. The militia in
Cincinnati made one of pork barrels, aud in
nearly all cities there is material at hand fol
the purpose. But the mob should not be
allowed to get hold of them first. Telegraph
poles with their network OF wires felled
across tho streets near the buildings it was
necessary to protect, would make very
effective barricades, n regular chevaux-de.
frise one would say.
1t is u question in which every citizen is
deeply interested; for a triumphant mob
means in~discriminate death, destruction. pill
lage, insults to women, and the complete ter
rorizatiou of every person in the precincts
of the doomed town.