The San Francisco call., 1908-03-22
GREAT DAMAGE WROUGHT
BY BIG RAILWAY STRIKES
Have ParaIyzed Empires and
Many Lives, and Much
Treasure Lost

+ Fifteen. thousand people killed and
wounded, property to the value of f20.,
900, 900 burned or otherwise destroyed,
and an empire shaken to its founda-
tions.
Such, briefly stated, was the outcome
of the great series of strikes among
the Russian railwaymen, which broke
out at st. Petersburg on October 81,
1905, and was forcibly quelled at Mos
cow. amid unexamRled scenes of car
mage and red ruin, on the 24th of De-
cember. following.
That. any future railway war in Eng
land will be fraught with horrors such
as. these is,elof course, impossible, our
social and economic conditions being SO
entirely. different. Nevertheless, it is
certain that here, as in Russia, trade
would be paralyzed, cities and towns
isolated from one another, and the
prices of foodstuffs and other perish
able commodities enormously. enhanced.
- There might even be serious srioting,
as happened at Motherwell during the
strikezs~ona the Caledonian and North
British railways In 1890 81, when police
and military were In .confifctcfer hours
together, day after day, with thousands
of infuriated men and women, driven
TO desperation by starvation and the
threatened loss of their homes. from
which they were being ousted by the
agents of the companies.
In 1877, when the American railway
men went on strike, no one anticipated
any very serious trouble Nor was there
just at first. Then the strikers realized
that they were being beaten and at
once pandemoniHm .reigned
Bridges were dynamited, trains were
derailed and set on fire. railway sta
tions by the score went up in flames.
At Columbus, Cleveland. Buffalo and
elsewhere the lighting was of the most
desperate character. But the worst
scenes of all were enacted at Pittsburg.
Here the station, which was crowded
with fugitive nonunionists, was shelled
by the strikers and afterward deliber-
ately set on fire. with the result that
nearly all within perished. Afterward
the mob planted eanhlo gs-looted from
the city armoryat2 the approaches to
the yards and sldings and dared the
troops to come on The challenge was
promptly accepted blythe Veteran Cen
eral Sherman. who. commanded, and
hundreds of theennaddened strikers fell
to the bayonets and bullets of the reg
ulars. So was order restored. But the
damage to propertys in that one city
alone was estinstea. atsbetween e2,-
100000 and $4,000. 600. = - -
Most other nations, too have Suffered
in like fashion at one time orsanother
in connection with similar disputes.
Germany has twice seen her entire sys-
tenn at staHslstAl. In Italy during one
black week .ins May 1898. scarcely a
train was running. and bread became so
scarce in consequence that the frenzied
populace rose in revolt.
Railway strikes IN this scountry have,
by comparisoH with these. been small
affairs. The Caledoniap and North Brit
ish strike alluded to above was ner-
haps the biggest AFFAIR of the kind we
have so far had to deal with. And 1t
involved only about 5000 men, as
against the 100000 of the American
(S94) strike and the 1,000.o00 Jinciud-
ing telegraph operators and others who
struck in. sympathy of the great Rus
sian railway war-London Tit Bits.