The Sentinel=record., 1913-03-07
suFFRAGETTEs TESTIFY TO IN. DlcNlTlEs DURING THE RE-
 CENT BIG PARADE.
FEARED TIE POLICE MOST
Women of National Note Condemn Action, or lnaction, of the Police During the Recent Big Suff-
 ragette Pageant

Washington, March 6.--Tales of in- dignities and affronts from the crowds and indifference and laughing comments from the police were re- counted today before the senate com mittee that has begun an inyestiga- ton into the alleged lack of protec- tion given the great suffrage parade of last Monday.
 Women prominent in national af fairs and in suffrage councils, told of their harrassed progress through snrging crowds of men and boys, whom the police, they said made little effort to hold back. Their stor- les differed in detail because of the various viewpoints from which the Pennsylvania avenue march had been observed but their statements as the general attitude of the police were in- dorsed by Rear Admiral Van Reypen, retired and George F. Bowerman. librarian of the Carnegie library of Washington. who appeared as Wit nesses against the police department
 Miss Julia Lathrop, chief of the chlldren's bureau of the department of commerce and labor. one of the marchers in the suffrage parade said the few police she saw seemed to be merely standing in the front row of the spectators" Mrs. Harriet Fay Tor Upton of Warren. Ohio division Of the parade. declared that crowds of "youngish mem surged in so close that the marchers could hardly walk two abreast; that good natnred drunken inefi' pushed against the marehers' lines without restraint by the police. and that the few officers in sight did nothing to protect the procession
 Congress had passed special act directing the Washington police de partment to prevent any interfer- ence with the suffrage procession in the questions put to the women today, Senators Jones. Dillingham; and Pom creme tried to secuse definite inform alton as to why the protection had been so inadequate: and as to the. ] number of police on hand and th manner in which they acted toward ano women marchers.
 Well dressed women, many lead CTS in national suffrage affairs, pack tu t0t tQiHlittttc iOoih Nnt4VI tht hearings were held and from their ranks came the witnesses who were called to the stand under the direc- tion of Miss Alice Paul. in state ment furnished to the committee at it's opening, Mai Richard Sysvester superintendent of police declared his department had given the parade all the protection 1t could with the linn fled number of police available; and rhat the disorder on the streets was due to the breaking of cables along the route and the unruy character of the crowd.
 Bursts of laughter came frequently az women told Of their experiences Mrs Upton said there were some elderly women in the Ohio division ana she vas afraid good natured drunken man" would fall against thenl-
 50 we all hurried and got past and he fell back on Wisconsin or Wyoming or some where back there, she said.
 She declared the police laughed at fhe scenes and made no effort to belp. The most inefficient, she said were the plain clothes men sworn m for the occasion who carried their authority in the badges on their coats
 Mrs. Agnes M. Jenks of Concord N H., who had her daughter and other young girls with her in the Now Hampshire division told one oi tho most striking stories. She de clared uniformed policemen had en- couraped the crowd. in it's disorder, and that she had been so alarmed at tue action of the officers toward the younp girls that the children were nlaced in the center of the procession where they were protected by older women.
 .The crowd booted and jeered. she said. men tried to get the How ers from our coats: and one man stuck his foot out in front ot my daughter and tried to trip her. Al another point two policemen in uni- form were standing together talking and were encouraging the crowd 10 s,eer us. One policeman looked as though he was going to take hold ot Stha young girls who were marchnR with us. We were more frightened nv the police than by the crowds.
 None of the women could give the nrmber of the policemen who mad exhibited indifference or antagomsnn, although several thought they couiu <. sdenfify some of them. The wines seq were almost unanimous in deciaf'