The St. Louis Republic. [volume] (St. Louis, Mo.) 1888-1919, 1902-11-30

Far as the blazing freighthouse lit the
yards we could see the rioters swarming in
from the bottoms.
The railroad officials gathered upstairs In
the passenger depot waited helpless for the
moment when the fury Of the mob should
turn on the unprotected building.
The entire records Of the division. the dis.
patchers' offices, the headquarters of the
whole West End were under that roof, with
nothing to stand between It and the torches.
Two intensely active leaders rose out of
the crowds.
Following the shouts of the pair. which
We could Just hear, a great body Of the
strikers dashed up the yard.
by the gods!'' cried Andy Cameron Mt
my elbow. they're going for the oilhousel'
Before the words were out We could hear
the dull stroke of the picks sinking into
the cheated doors.
house tanks.
Jacketed ans OF turpsntins and varnish
were hustled down the line to men drunk
with not. In a moment twenty cars were
ablaze.
To top the frenzy they fired the oilhouse
itself. Destruction crazed the entire popu-
lation Of the bottoms.
The burning cars threw the front Of the
big brick depot up into the sky.
As the reflection struck back from the
plate-glass windows the mob split into two
great waves and one headed for the pas
senger depot.
They crossed the coal spurs brandishing
torches and sledges and bars.
We could see them plain as block signals.
Every implement that ever figured in a
yard showed in their line. but their leader,
a youngish fellow. swung a long, taperilg
stake.
AS the foremost Polack climbed I'D on
the last string Of fats that separated them
from the depot, the storage tanks in the
oilhouse took fire.
The roof jumped from the wall plates like
one vast trap door, and the liquid yellow
spurted flaming a hundred feet up into the
black.
A splitting yell greeted the burst, and the
Polacks, with added fury, raced toward the
long depot.
1 made out then the man with the club.
1t was Rucker.
The staff of the superintendent and the
force of dispatchers. a handful of men. all
told. gathered at the upper windows and
opened fire with revolvers.
1t was just enough to infuriate the rioters.
And it appeared certain that the house
would be burned under the defenders feet,
for the broad platform was bare from end
to end.
Not a ghost Of a barricade. not a truck.
not a shutter, stood between the depot and
the torch. and nobody thought Of a man
unit, Cameron. with the quicker eyes, cried:
For Gods sake! There's McTerzar"
Sure as pay day, there he was. walking
down the platform toward the depot, and
humping alongside-Sinkers.
I guess everybody in both camps swore.
Like a man in his sleep, he was walking
right in the teeth Of the Polacks.
But that was just McTerza-to be where
he shouldn't when he shouldn't.
Even had there not been more pressing
matters. nobody could ave figured out
where the fellow had come from with his
convoy or where he was going.
He was there-that was all; he was there.
The dispatchers yelled at him from above.
The cry echoed back short from a hundred
Polack Threats.
It was plain they were mad for blood.
Even that cry didn't greatly feaze the
fellow, but in the clatter of 1t all he caught
another cry-a cry sent straight to Nc
Terza's ear, and he turned at the voice n
the word like a mar stung.
Rucker, leaping ahead and brandishing
the truck stave at the hated sufferer,
yelled:
The scab!"
The Reading engineer halted like a baited
bear.
Fuckers cry was enough-in that time and
at that place 1t was enough.
McTerza froze to the platform.
There was more-and we knew 1t, all of
m between those W. men than scab
and brotherhood, strike and riot. flood or
fire. There was a woman.
We knew it SO we'll there was hardly a
flutter anywhere. I take 1t. when men saw
McTerza, STOPPING. grasp sinkers. shove
him toward the depot, slip like a snake out
of his pea Jacket and turn to front the
whole blooming mob.
There wasn't any fiuttering, I take ft-and
not very much breathing; only the scab.
never a tremendous big man, swelled big
ger in the eyes than straining his way than
any man in McCloud has ever swelled be-
fore or since.
Mobs are queer.