Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1910-02-23
AEREs STING AR1oTrEIr In TrEr I'LL D15rR1cr
manded by Maj. Thudbert BraZer, al
officer who is imposing in appearance.
First Meeting With a Moo.

manded by Mai Thudbert Brazer, an
officer who is imposing in appearance.
First Meeting With a Moo.
The Fencibles had never heard shot
haste, but they were willing to take a
| hand.
| With Maj. Brazer riding grandly at
their head, they turned up at the city
hall one hundred enlisted men and TWEEN
| ty-four officers. and Swore to serve the
f! city. Many of them had been UP all
| night getting their uniforms in trim and
| replacing brass buttons that the admiring
girls of Philadelphia had shipped from
| their coats.
After the swearing in, Maj Brazer
made an address. He said that they
| were about to embark on a serious under
| taking. 1t would he their duty to protect
or salvage the police They were not to
fire their muSkets under any circum-
stances unless the order came from him.
The Fencibes grounded arms. repressed
a cheer for the gallant major and were
marched to a Philadelphia rapid-translt
barn near Germantown and Iehigh
avenues.
The announced intention of the Phiia-
delphia rapid transit to run cars along
Germantown avenue and the news thdl
the Fencibles We're coming to safeguard
the cars attracted crowd of 10000.
1t was at the outset good-natured,
laughing crowd. holiday turnout
dressed in its best clothes. There were
young men with their steadies. women
leading children. workmen off for the
day, hundreds of strikers and thousands
of sympathizers. Apparently nobody
went there looking for trouble.
Dangerous Isolation.
Up came the Fencibles. muskets at
cborldar thar oficerS ra ttlipP ont orders
faster than very young volunteers could
comprehend easily.
After some confusion, caused by the i'm
mense crowd, the soldiers were stationed
for five blocks along Germantown avenue
They were posted on each side OF the
thoroughfares, about thirty PAGES apart
The isolation of each man from his neigh
Dor was grand invitation to the crowd
for somebody to start something
Between the ordered ranks and behind
them and for blocks each way the crowd
was packed solidly. You knew BEFORE
you had been there five minutes that I'M
| less the soldiers could keep their tenn
| pers and stand lot of rough Joshlng
! they were in for a bad session
/ 1t began rather amusingly. Parties or
young men and girls strolled by the stltf1y
erect young Fencibles and commented
audibly upon the fit of their uniforms,
the way they held their muskets, the set
of their broad-brimmed hats.
Bit by bit the crowd became bolder ana
more. ANNOYING. Harmless jests became
sneering insults The soldiers looked as
if they wished they were anywhere else
Attack on Soldiers.
Presently, as if the whole movement
had been carefully organized, squads OF
young men and boys stole up behind each
far separated soldier and stole cartridges
from his belt. snatched at his hat or tried
to jerk his musket out of his hands.
Here and there a militiaman lost his
temper and struck out with his fist or
the butt of his gun
In no time at all there was scuffilng all
along the line. The soldiers looked to
their captains for orders TO charge the
crowd with bayonets or TO shoot me
CAPTAINS looked to the major, but the
major was so busy at the moment that
he hardly knew what was going on.
Blocks away he was explaining to ID. /.
Pierce. executive assistant to President
Kruger of the p. r. T., how the Fenci-
bles could be depended upon to suppress;
trouble if cars were attacked.
Suddenly near Huntingdon street
woman screamed and attacked one of
the soldiers with her hands. scratching
at his face. Real trouble broke like
thunderclap.
BOYS and men sprang on the militia
men, fifteen or twenty to soldier, bore
them down, took their muskets away
from them. tore their coats on their
backs struck them in the face with
clenched fists and rolled them in the dirt.
The crowd, now converted into mob,
wedged itself between the separated
militiamen and the Fencibles were utter
ly HELPLESS.
If the order had come to them to shoot
they could not have obeyed. Many had
lost their guns. There was hardly a man
i'm ten who had a single cartridge in his
belt.
The intersection of Germantown and
I,ehigh avenues. which forms a spacious
square, was surgng. swaying mass of
men and women, in which you could see
every now and then a bayonet pointed
at all kinds of queer angles.
Service hats were whirling In the air
ae the crowd snatched them from the
heads of the youthful soldiers Women
emerged from the rim OIL the crowd hold
ing IN brass buttons that had been cut
from uniforms. Some of the Fencibles
were literally weeping in their humlia-
ton.
Cavalry Cops to the Rescue.
Then came the rapid clacking of
horses hoofs down I.ehigh avenue Act
ing Sergt Buehler. riding at the head of
ten mounted men. all ex-cavalrymen, hit
the mob at full gallop.
Buehler spread his squad in fan
shaped formation and drove right INTO
the heart of the press. There was no
(
The Joke had turned into bloody reality.
Every time mounted policeman swung
his club somebody, man or woman. and
the police weren't bit particular, went
down with a broken head or paralyZed
arm.
There were "A thousand men for every
city cayalryman. but the sergeant didn't
stop to reckon on odds. He was mad
clear through. His face burned like a
red headlight and his straw-colored Ger
man mustache bristled with rage.
As he swung past church near Lehigh
avenue Buehler's club struck woman
on the side of the head. She dropped
with a scream of pain that was heard
above the roar of fighting.
4 young man sprang upon the steps of
the church and fired revolver at Bueh-
lers head. The bullet missed and the
young man fired again and again until
his pistol was empty.
A foot policeman leaped up the steps
and beat the youth down with his club
The Fencibles meanwhile were with
drawing by main strength from the fight
They were worse than useless and no.
body knew ii better than themselves
BY ones and twos they wrenched and
dragged each other out of the battering.
squirming mass and assembled finally
near harm from which they had