United labor bulletin., 1914-04-11
SMUCCLES LETTER
OUT OF BASTILE
Mother Jones Thanks God
for Her Faithful Friends
Wants the Nation to Know of Her
Confinement In Dark Base
ment of WaIsenbure Jail

From her prison cell in the basement
of the Jail at Walsenburg Mother"
Jones was able TO smuggle a letter past
the military guards and it was brought
to the headquarters of the United Mine
Workers in Denver. Horace Hawkins,
attorney for the miners, has filed an
other petition for a writ OF habeaus
corpus with the State Supreme Court
to secure the release OF the s2-year-old
battler for human rights.
The letter. written in a laboriously
scrawled haud at moments when the
soldier guards were not watching, is A.
follows.
Military Bastile.
Walsenburg, Colo.
To Ny Friends and the Public Gener-
ally:
am being held a prisoner ineommu-
nicado in a damp. underground cell IN
the basement OF a military bullpen at
Walsenburg. Colo. Have been here since
$3.50 a. m OF the 23rd OF March, when
was taken from the train by armed
soldiers as / was passing through Wal
senburg. l have discovered what ap-
pears to be an opportunity to smuggie
letter out of prison and shall attempt
TO get this communication by the armed
guards which day and night surround me
OF agci.
| want to saw to the public that
am an American citizen. 1 have never
broken a law in my life and | claim
the right of an American citizen to go
where | please so long as | do not vio-
late the Law. The courts of Las Animas
and Huerfano are open and unobstrucf-
ed in the transaction of business. vet
Governor Ammons and his Peabody APP
pointec. General Chase. refuse to carry
me before any court and refuse to make
any charge against me ] ask the press
to ie; the nation know OF nv treatment
and TO say TO my friends whom, thank
God. number hy the thousands
throughout the United States and Mex.
co, that not even my Incarceration in O.
damp, underground dungeon will make
me give up the fight in which ! am en-
gagged for liberty and for the rights Of
the working people. OF course long
to be out OF prison. To be shut from
the sunlight is not pleasant. but John
Bunyan, John Brown and others were
kept in jail quite n while, and | shall
stand firm. To be in prison is no dis
grace In all my strike experiences I
have seen no horrors equal to those per
petrated by General Chase and his corps
Of Baldwin Feltz detectives that are
now enlisted in the militia. Nv God ?
when Is II TO Stop l have only to close
my eyes to sec the hot tears OF the or
phans and widows of working men and
hear the mourning OF the broken hearts,
and the wailing of the funeral dirce
while the cringing politicians. whose
sworn duty it is TO protect the lives and
liberty of the people, crawl subservient-
ly before the national burglars of Wall
Street, who are today plundering and
devastating the state of Colorado eco
nomieally. financially, politically and
morally.
Let the nation know. and especially
let my friend. General Francisco Villa
know, that the great United States OF
America, which is demanding of him
that he release the traitors he has
placed under arrest. is now holding
Mother" Jones ineommunicado in an
underground cell surrounded with sewer
rats, Tin horn soldiers and other vermin
MOTHER" JONES.