Albuquerque morning journal. [volume] (Albuquerque, N.M.) 1903-1926, 1920-04-07
HOTEL KEEPERS
THREATENED BY
COPPER MINERS
IN B|SBEE ZONE
Witnesses Tell How Strikers
Tried to Intimidate Them
Prior to DepOrtationS in
the Summer of 1917,
WERE ASKED TO EJECT
MEN WHO WERE LOYAL
Demands Were Also Made
That SCabS Be Elected
From Boarding Houses
Flag InSuIted by Striker,

Tombstone, Arl2., April b.-flNe
sticks of dynamite with fuses, |
We're found in a room Of Bisbee
hotel two months before the mine
Strike called June 90, 1917, Mrs.
Anna C. Richards, at that tima
pi oprietress of the hostelry, test
fled today at the trial of Harry f.
Wiootton, charged with kidnapping
for his alleged participation in the
Bisbee deportations of July u,
1917.
Mrs. Richards said she report Il
ker find to the chief of police. TFe
men in whose rooms the explosives
were found left shortly afterwar l.
without having registered or wit l.
cut paying their bill.
During the strike a committee OF
men called upon her 20 use he
influence to cause her husband 20
stop working in defiance of the
strike, and threatened to declare
her house unfair to organized
labor if Richards continued to
work, Mrs. Richards testified.
As a result of these incidents,
Mrs. Richards sold her hotel and
left town a few davs before the de-
portations, according to her testi-
mony.
Other threats to rOOming-
keepers were mentioned by wit
nesses testifying for the defense
today. Mrs. John Gonderson, n
Bisbee, declared that she was
asked to eject men who We're work
ing during the strike, under pain
of being run out of business
and of being "hog-tied'' and with
intimations that there had been
such things as buildings being
blown up" s. X. Williams, an at
torney of Bisbee, who conducted a
rooming house at that time, tesu-
fled that a committee requested
him not TO rent any rooms o. his
to ''scabs," and threatened to boy
colt his house if he did so. As the
committee was leaving Mrs. Will
Jams said, one of the callers turned
to him and asked; How would
you like to see it in ashes?"
Two Men Were Killed.
Two men were killed during tho
deportations, the witness testified
testified, explaining that one of
them was striker and the other
a deporter.
Earlier in the day, Mrs. Bertha
Butler, another rooming house
keeper in Rishee at the time of de-
portations, testified that Finnish
woman had threatened that the
nlace would be burned down Il
Mrs. Butler served meals to men
who disregarded the strike. AS 4
result of this threat the witness
said, she did not open the dining
room, which she had considered
Going before the threat was made.
After the women in the court
room had been requested to retire
by Judge Samuel l.. Pattee, Will
lam Jewell Bisbee miner, repeated
some obscene language regarding
the American flag, used, he said,
by a man who had advised him to
join the Industrial Workers of the
World. and whom he believed to be
a German. The conversation oc-
Cured a few days before the strike.
Frank salmon of Bisbee testlfledi
that he saw Fred w. Brown, who
Is the prosecuting witness in The
present trial, standing on the picket
lines during the strike, writing and
asking questions of two men VINO
wore |. w. w. buttons. on previ-
Gus occasions, the defense has
sought to show that Brown, who
the state alleges was deported by
Wootton, was connected with the
|. w. w. organization. County At
torney Robert n. French has re-
peatedly declared that he would
prosecute no one for deporting an
/. w. W., and that he would put
no one on the stand who belonged
to that organization.
Moved From Bisbee.
Albert Stanfield of Btsbee tes-
titled that some men threatened
to run him out of town for con-
tinuing to work during the strike,
calling him "gray-haired -
- of q scab.
Because he had heard threats
that his house would be burned
down if he kept on working, Benito
Galyez of Lowell, said he moved
from Bisbee to Lowell. He went
to work daily two hours ahead of
time in order to escape molestation
on the part of pickets' Galvez tes-
titled.
That if he kept at work he would
have mo home or family left was
the threat Edward Clague, a miner
of the Warren district. testified was
made to him by an organizer for
the w. W., during the strike.
Clague said he went back home
and told his wife to shoot on
sight" any person trying to enter
their home.
Jesus Rocha, Bisbee storekeep-
er and worker in an assay office at
the time of the strike, said that
some of his customers threatened
TO burn his store If he did not stop
working. The witness sail he heard
| a speaker declare that the strikers
had an abundance of dynamite
with which to blow up the mines
and, the homes Of those who did not
| svmna hize with them.