The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1929-07-26
By BILL DUNE

Gastonia at present can be described
as follows:
LIN the last two weeks there
has been tremendous swing of
popular sentiment to the side of
Fred Beal, Louis Mclaughlin, Vera
Bush, Joe Harrison, Sophie Melvin,
George Carter, Russell Knight, and
their eight fellow workers held on
the three charges of murder, assault
with intent to kill and conspiracy,
and the other defendants charged
with the two counts of Secret" as
sault and conspiracy as the result
of the battle with the police who
attacked the headquarters Of the
National Textile Workers Union on
the night of June Z.
2.-The speed with which the In
ternational Labor Defense, the Ma
tional Textile Workers Union and
the Workers international Relief
rallied their respective forces, brot
order into the ranks Of the textile
workers temporarily demoralized
and scattered for a time by the fero-
city Of the attack of the mill barons,
their local government tools and the
press, has astounded the Manville-
Jenckes Company and its chamber
of commerce crowd of yapping re-
! tainers.
3.--The raid on the union head
quarters which followed the attack
in which the chief of police was
killed, two policemen, one volunteer
thug and one union organizer were
wounded, the raids on and searches
of workers homes which continued
for days, enabled the authorities and
the mill to confiscate the entire list
of union members.
Promised Immunity.
Systematic persecution and at
tempts to terrorize the union mem
bers and sympathetic workers fol-
lowed. Workers were brought before
Major Bulwinkle, Manville- Jenckes
attorney, threatened and then pro-
missed immunity if they would de-
nounce the union. Other workers
were brought before Major Dolley,
who is also cotton mill attorney,
and who was second in command
of the troops brought to Gastonia
early in the strike.
In spite of all this at the mass
meeting held today in Bessemer City
at the union headquarters, calls for
organizers and speakers were re-
ported from four different mill
towns.
Two organizers are on the road
and union connections have been re-
established.
4.-The International Labor De-
Tense has its legal staff fully organ
lied. Lawyers who are not only able
but who express freely their con-
viction as to the historic and funda-
mental nature Of the case have been
engaged. They have had number
of conferences with the representa-
tives of the LID. and the line of
the defense and the detail work ne
cessary to carry it through have
been agreed upon unanimously.
Judge Carter of Asheville, J..
Frank Flowers of Charlotte, the
firm of Unison and Alternately
the pioneer attorneys in defense of
the N.T.W. organizers and members
John Randolph Neal of Knoxville,
Tenn, and R. L. Sigmon of Gastonia
the only lawyer of the Gastonia
bar not offered a retainer as special
prosecutor by Manville-Jenckes-
constitute legal staff as good as
the best the South affords,
"Chagrined Ferocity."
The legal battalion of the Man
ville-Jenckes Company-some 16 in
all, according to the latest recruit
ing figures--seems to have lost
some of its morale in the last few
days. The prosecution attitude to-
day probably can be described with
maximum of accuracy as one Of
chagrined ferocity.
The prisoners are being furnished
every comfort possible in a jail.
They are in the best of spirits. Fred
Beal told US yesterday that in the
many times he has been in Jail on
minor charges as the result of strike
activity, he has never been associ-
ated with workers whose morale
was as high as that of his fellow
prisoners. Even among militant
workers where courage is a COM
monplace, these southern members
of the N.T.W. whom the textile
barons are trying to send to the
electric chair are remarkable for
their cheerfulness.