New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1912-11-19
CHEER MOTHER Jones
Cooper Unicn Audience Hears
About Striking Miners.
TREATED AS DOGS, SHE SAYS
We'll Win This Fight if We
Have to Do It with Can.
Mons" She Declares


| crowded Cooper Union audience
listened for over an hour last night "a
/ the stirring remarks of a motherly. white
/ haired little woman who told them stories
! of suffering and misery in the coaltields
/ of West Virginia. Each time that she
| stopped to gain her breath the audience
! OF nearly three thousand cheered until
| they we're hoarse. She was Mother Jones.
VINO has for years fought the fights of the
| miners and nursed their women and chill.
dren during times of trouble and sick.
! ness
John w. Brown. representing District II
OF the United Mine Workers of America
who came from the coalfields Of Virginia
with Mother Jones, first briefly explained
! the trouble in the Kanawha Valley. He
said that the Kanawha River divided
the two great coalields of the valley,
] within radius OF forty miles of Charles
! ton. on the east side OF the river. where
runs the Kanawha & Michigan Railroad
| the miners were working under union
conditions. while on the west side. where
| operates the Chesapeake 4 Ohio road. the
coal owners refused to treat with the
union men and had brought "scab labor"
! from New York
Mother Jones said she went down Ito
see my boys because knew that they
wanted me. The soldiers and detectives
| tried to prevent my meeting them, but
by the External God ! made them stand
aside, and / saw my boys and organized
them" Continuing. she said:
Rome In her most degraded days was
| never charged with such brutality as can
be charged to those American pirates
the operators and capitalists. America,
TO permit such conditions, has arrived
at such state as took Rome and Baby
Ion thousands of years. You people have
/ a bunch Of bloodsuckers and robbers
down there in Wall Street who run this
country. | have no respect for them; no.
wouldn't care If they burned In hell
But you get down on your knees and
worship them.
i am here As a fighter from the battle.
felds-not az a gifted orator. The condl-
tons in West Virginia are unknown else
| where. Twelve years ago l. an old wom-
an, went there and spent nights tramping
through the rough mountains, encourage
Ing the men i'm the work and urging
| them not 10 strike, but to wait / organ
! lzed them on both sides of the river, and
all was peace and plenty. But now, see
what the conditions are. They are being
| starved and whipped about as are some
dogs. ! held meetings there. No organ
izer for eight years past, had ever dared
10 enter those fields. But ! have no mas
ter and want none | knew most OF
those men since they were little boys-a
great many have nursed upon my knee
and, by the God above me, | swear that
they shall suffer no more. Wen win this
fight. II We have to do II with cannon
When speaking OF "A committee Governor
Glasscock had sent to investigate condi-
tons she said He chose soldier, a
bishop. lawyer and-oh. others who
have never done any work How could
those men ever realize tho suffering Of
my boys when they stagger home across
the mountains to the kennels granted
them by their masters"
She also assailed sIffrage for women.
Bah with them and their homes for
cats and canaries and foreign missions
and all that folderol," she declared.
The meeting was held under the auspices
Of the United Mine Workers Of America.