Butler citizen. [volume] (Butler, Pa.) 1877-1922, 1894-06-08

dlils HdAAA lltiiui iNhns
'Yes." replied Calicot, calmly. ''He
is brave fellow and a warm friend" F"
Let us hope that there is no blood
she'd" said Hendricks, land that we
shall enjoy his society,"
CHAPTER XIV.
It was this year that the new phase
of imported socialism came into view
with the Industrial Junta," as it was
called. The branches had been or
ganized secretly and it was known
that the mischievous order had its
lodges in all the states. Public atten-
tion was not however awakened to the
power of the "Junta," until the St
Mary's riots occurred. st. Mary's, at
one time mere suburb five miles from
Paducah at the confluence of the Ten
nessee and the Ohio, had five years be-
fore become an important manufactur-
ing place owing to its purchase by an
Er i5h syndicate and the erection
there of enormous workshops. The
principal industry was the manufac-
tI.re of cutlery and all kinds of copper
tools, hardened by new process,
equal To the finest steel. The same
syndicate had purchased an enormous
track of copper-mining land ON Lake
Superior and communication was di-
recT and inexpensive by means of the
Mississippi. This English company had
obtained the secret process of harden
ing copper, so it was said, from poor
American mechanic. At the time Of
the trouble with the men, there were
over ten thousand operatives employed
at st. Mary's. The place may have con-
tanned five thousand other inhabitants
but all the stock holders lived abroad.
II was "A town of factories and chin
neys and, save at the outlying end of
its main thoroughfarc where one of
the directors and several of the super
intendents had erected handsome
houses, its residences were cottages of
unrretentious form. IL had bank
also owned by the company; free Ii
brary, several churches and IA public
hall called "The Forum" The trouble
between the company and the work.
men was at the start a trifling one and
would have been adjusted by the work
men themselves II IT had not been for
outside interference. "The Junta"
had had its eyes on this point for
year and resolved to make it the start
ing point of its socialistic uphcaval. II
succeeded in getting its own men into
the works and disaffccting large
number Of operatives. A strike Of one
branch occurred early in the year and
the company sent men from England
TO take their places IL was not proven
that they came under contract, but no
one doubted IL. In six months they
had taken on three hundred men
guardedly and singly, and, having dem
onstratcd to their own satisfaction the
feasibility Of importing their labor in
Il surreptitious manner, undertook IL
colnizing scheme. They put up five
hundred cottages on "A large tract and
let the property and invited immiRra-
tion, disclaiming any desire to get
worlemcn. II was not till "a reduction
of wages took place and another strike
occurred that the colonists proved to
be able TO take the place Of the dis
charged men who we're, Ia the main,
unslsilled worlsincu At this point the
actual trouble began. Tho skilled
American wor.tmen sympathized with
the men who had gone out and -four OF
She factories shut down.
'.bc director appcar5 to have been
pragnatic Eng!iahuan, without the
tact Of prudence. There was, at the
time, q million dollars in specie on
temporary deposit in the St Mary's
bank, being the two payments made
by the government for large contract
for copper gun-barrels. This money
should never have reached st. Mary's
In coin. But there had been loud
outcry from different parts Of the coun-
try that all the profits Of the company
went to England, and the disaifectcd
men of "Thc Junta' had rcechoed IL
bitterly This director, therefore,
whose name was Matloclt, had advised
tho company 20 use the money at st.