Annals of the great strikes in the United States

The Fourth Pennsylvania Militia at Reading—General Frank Reeder Undertakes to Restore Order—Bold Rioters Tantalize the Citizen Soldiery—Without Orders They Fire into a Crowd of Peaceable Citizens—Thirteen Killed and Twenty-seven Wounded—Not a Rioter Hurt—A Boy Horribly Mangled—Five Police Officers Victims of the Bullets—A Lady Shot While Engaged at Her Sewing Machine—Terrible Anger of the Citizens and Rioters—Threats of the Mob—General Reeder’s Sworn Statement.

Baltimore and Pittsburgh had not been forgotten. The great strikes continued. There was still in the minds of men disquieting thoughts. When would the troubles end? How would the difficulty conclude? What was to be the result of all the turmoil, the bitterness, the hate aroused? These were questions present in the minds of men, and for them there were no answers. Nearly a hundred lives had already been extinguished, five times a hundred human beings had been maimed and mangled since the strikes began. Property worth millions of dollars had vanished amid smoke and flames. The country was in a feverish state of excitement from Boston to San Francisco; from the Lakes to the Gulf. Men lived, thought, and acted more in a day, than they ordinarily do in a week. Since the first European landed on the shores of America, no such scenes as those transpiring had ever before arrested the attention of the whole people of the country. It was a time of fear and anxiety. Who would be the next victim, what city next be given over to devouring flames, and the rapacity of a lawless mob? Who could tell?

It was on the 23d day of July, 1877—just seven days after the commencement of the first strike on the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad, at South Baltimore and Martinsburg. Already momentous events had happened. Baltimore, Pittsburgh, and Cumberland had successively attracted the attention of those who cared to observe the course of the remarkable movement among the working classes. Hornellsville, Harrisburgh, Phillipsburg, and Buffalo had been the scene of actions, startling in their nature. Where would the next center of interest be located? It was not necessary to wait long for an answer to this question. For some days there had been trouble on the Philadelphia and Reading Railroad, and among the miners in that vicinity. Reading was favorably situated to become the central point of the movement in that region.

At this time Pennsylvania was in arms, from the Delaware to the Monongehela. There were many militia officers who were anxious to immortalize themselves by the performance of some heroic action. The Knight of La Mancha has imitators in this age, and in this land. Up to the 22nd, no trouble had occurred at Reading. There were some men on a strike, and trains had been stopped, but the crowds that gathered about the stations, were citizens drawn to those places to satisfy an idle curiosity.

But the scene was destined to change. There was in that division of Pennsylvania a notable military commander, Major-General William J. Bolton, who commanded the Second Division of the National Guards of Pennsylvania. To this puissant warrior the railroad authorities appealed, and he sent one of his trusted Lieutenants, Brigadier-General Frank Reeder, to Reading, with the Fourth and Sixteenth Regiments. These warriors, even, according to the sworn statement of their commander, succeeded in making for themselves an odious record ere they left Reading—at least, may this be said of the Fourth Regiment, and particularly of the “Easton Greys.” Reading mourns the folly of the militia yet.

On account of the unmilitary conduct of some companies of General Reeder’s regiment, we are compelled to add another story of slaughter to the bloody records of Baltimore and Pittsburgh. Without one word of warning, these militia fired upon an assembled crowd of citizens, in the very heart of the city of Reading, and killed thirteen people, shot five policemen, and altogether severely wounded twenty-seven persons.

Night had just settled upon the city, and North Seventh street, for two squares, was lined with people, sitting in the enjoyment of the cool air of evening, in front of their homes. The main line of the Philadelphia and Reading Railroad Company’s road passes through the city on Seventh street. Penn street is the main thoroughfare, running in an opposite direction from the course of the railroad, and crosses Seventh street at right angles. From Penn street northward for two squares, two lines of track are laid, leading to the new depot. These are laid through a deep cut, with a heavy stone wall, twenty feet high on either side. On this section of track the bloody work was done. At ten minutes after eight o’clock the military marched in toward Penn street, through the cut, from the depot. They were about three hundred and fifty strong, and they marched, to the tap of a few drums that could not be heard a square away. Few people were aware of their arrival in the city, and fewer still knew they were advancing upon the crowd.

Steadily they approached, when suddenly three hundred rifles were discharged in volleys, and five men dropped to the pavements. The report that the troops had shot blank cartridges, of course, was incorrect. When the troops fired their first volleys, they were given broadsides of rocks and stones from the tops of the walls. Quite a number of revolver shots were returned by parties in the crowd. The troops continued their firing, and men, women and children fled in fear. They had assembled on Seventh street to look at the train that had been stopped, and they were recklessly and indiscriminately shot by the militia. The citizens were almost universal in their condemnation of these proceedings. In five minutes the streets were cleared, stores were closed, and hotels and restaurants were locked up. Business had been proceeding as usual, and just before the firing, not a single merchant, or business man was aware of the coming of the military. The streets resembled a small battle field, and the pavements were stained with many pools of blood. It was absolutely dangerous for men to come from the alleyways and from behind the brick walls, to go to the assistance of the dying. The heroic militia stood to their guns, and were valiantly disposed to shoot down any citizen who might cross the line of their vision. Finally the sufferers, groaning and shrieking for water, were carried to the drug stores to have their wounds dressed.

Among the policemen who were on duty at Seventh and Penn streets, keeping the pavements and sidewalks clear, five were shot down, as follows: Officer Abner Jones, shot through the back, the ball penetrating through his body; officer Ludwig Rupp, shot twice through the right leg; officer Orden Weller, shot in the leg; officer Hart, shot through the thigh; officer Haggerty, shot through the ankle.

These policemen were shot with rifle balls. They received no word, of whatever kind, warning them of what was to happen. Officer Rupp, one of the best men in the force, was dangerously hurt and died of his wounds two days afterwards. The officers had their wounds dressed at the drug stores and were taken home.

Chief of Police, Peter Cullen, who was on duty near Seventh and Penn streets, had a rifle ball penetrate his coat, and officer Werdner also had his coat ripped with a ball.

Officer Culp narrowly escaped death, a minnie ball whistling past his head, just grazing his ear.

But two of the military were badly hurt, so far as was reported.

Private Stienberger, of the Allen Rifles, of Allentown, was shot in the left side of the neck.

Private Slatington, of Company F, was struck in the abdomen by a brick or rock. Both of these men were conveyed to one of the rear apartments of the Mansion House, where their wounds were attended to.

Several more of the military were struck with stones, but not seriously hurt. After the firing was over the soldiers formed along Penn street, with their left resting on Seventh, and subsequently they marched to Penn Square, and from there proceeded to the depot of the Philadelphia and Reading Railroad Company, which was strongly garrisoned. That evening a large number of special police was sworn in and ordered on duty, armed with seven-shooters, and the depot was transformed into a military post. Pickets were out and sentinels were guarding all the train galleries and entrances. On their march through the streets the militia were followed but by few persons, who jeered and shouted in an unpleasant manner.

That night the railroadmen, who were at war with the Philadelphia and Reading Railroad Company, were engaged in taking counsel as to future movements. Meanwhile all the tramps from a wide range of country had come into the city on the first intimation of trouble. On the night of the 24th, it is supposed they burned down the Lebanon Valley Bridge, which spanned the Schuylkill at Reading, and which was built at a cost of one hundred and fifty thousand dollars. Reading’s direct railway communication with Harrisburg and the West was thus cut off, freight cars were burned and tracks interfered with. The 24th of July was one of the most trying periods known in the annals of railroading in Pennsylvania. All day long Reading was in a state of wild riot and disorder.

There were three alarms the night after the fight, and each time the Fourth Regiment formed under arms. The rioters contented themselves with tearing up part of the track below Penn street, cutting down a long line of railroad telegraph poles, and robbing freight cars. Six men, identified as rioters, got into the depot. They were put under arrest; three of them were storekeepers in Reading. All were heavily armed and very audacious.

Before daylight on the morning of the 23d, a locomotive glided into the depot at Reading. She brought from Auburn six thousand rounds of ball cartridges. At six o’clock in the morning, five companies of the Sixteenth Regiment arrived at the break in the track below the city and were marched up to the depot. They were under Colonel Scholl. These militia-men declared they would not fire on the rioters, and the crowd cheered them. Some of these men said, “We will not shoot workingmen, whatever the Easton Greys may do. They are our brothers, and the only one we’d like to pour our bullets into is that damned Frank B. Gowen.” Mr. Gowen is Superintendent of the Philadelphia and Reading Railroad. The officers denied that their men used this language, but hundreds of persons in the crowds heard the expressions. At eight o’clock a number of police who had been wounded were started on a slow local train to get to Allentown and Easton. Some were very seriously hurt, one mortally.

At half-past eight, the two regiments, marching by the flank, with General Reeder at their head, started out of the depot and towards the cut where the conflict of the preceding night took place. The Sixteenth Regiment had the right, and as it was recognized, the crowd cheered it, when the Easton Greys and other companies of the Fourth Regiment came along the air was rent with yells of “Give ’em hell,” “Go for ’em,” etc. Instead of repeating the last night’s error in going down the cut they marched in the streets, above and along side it, a movement which disconcerted the riotous crowd, nevertheless a brisk flight of stones was kept up by the mob upon the Fourth Regiment. The Easton Greys suffered most, having Sergeant Hanmann, Corporal Perdoe, Privates Mack and Vail severely wounded. Young Surtz, of Easton, was sun-struck and came near dying. No member of the Sixteenth Regiment was hurt. It was expected the soldiers would cover the restoration of the track by a working party, but after they had reached the ground the workers did not appear. After waiting half an hour, they marched through Penn and Fifth streets back to the depot. Men could not be found to do the dangerous work proposed. From the mob following the soldiers came a deafening storm of curses, threats, and insults hurled at the Easton Greys. Many men carried great stones and bricks wishing to throw them, yet fearing to get close enough. They regretted loudly that the soldiers had not come down the track again in the cut, so they might have been stoned from the ramparts twenty feet above. In the cut one could see the ground covered with stones, fragments of iron, and bricks, hurled down the previous evening. As the troops marched along a volley of stones from the windows on the route fell upon them. From time to time, sudden fear of retaliation seized the mob, and wheeling they dashed into open doors. Finding the soldiers did not fire, their assailants grew bolder, and there was good reason to believe that if the return march had not been made when it was, another combat must have taken place.

The rioters openly threatened to burn the railroad property, notwithstanding the presence in the city of nearly one thousand soldiers. They also threatened to massacre the Easton Greys. The animosity against that company was greatest because the volley of the Greys did more deadly execution the previous evening, than all the regular firing of the other companies.

The terrible effects of the fusilades was now made apparent, thirteen killed and thirty-seven wounded was the result. The corpse of a boy was found during the morning, with the abdomen shot wide open. A woman was shot at her sewing machine, but not seriously hurt. A German came about the depot crying for vengeance, because, he said, his wife had been killed by the soldiers.

The town was full of excitement. The rioters congregated in masses on the street corners, but the excessive heat of the day seemed to prevent overt acts.

The five companies of the Sixteenth Regiment at Reading were almost all Irishmen. They slipped away from the depot into the town singly and by twos and threes, and gave their ammunition to the rioters, by whom they were everywhere hailed as brethren, and with whom they engaged in drinking. They were repeatedly heard to swear that not only would they not fire upon the mob in any event, but that if the Easton Greys did so they would fire upon them, and help the rioters to clean them out and burn the railroad property. The rioters were greatly encouraged. The Fourth Regiment, feeling itself in momentary danger of betrayal, and of being put between two fires, wanted to go home.

General Frank Reeder telegraphed all the time, and shrouded himself in mystery. He did not care to show himself to the people of Reading.

Meanwhile the most unsoldierly lack of discipline prevailed among the military. There were sentries at each entrance to the depot, yet the platforms were crowded with persons who openly avowed their fixed purpose to rout the militia and burn the property of the Railroad Company. They expressed a determination to kill some of the companies of the Fourth Regiment.

The presence of the military did not curb the spirit of the rioters. On the contrary they grew bolder and more threatening. For some days after the fight open attacks on the trains were made.

The strikers mounted a passing loaded coal train, put on the brakes, stopped the train and pushed back the caboose and several loaded cars, thus virtually blockading the down track. One of the eight-ton cars was dumped on the rails. At ten minutes after four o’clock, July 25th, the down express train came along slowly on the other track. The strikers were led by a large man wearing a dark shirt and dark pants. His hair looked as if it had been recently shaved from his head.

Fully two hundred strikers would rush right up squarely to the front of the approaching locomotive, wave their hands, shake their clenched fists, and by many devices intimidate and threaten the engine driver and train employes. An up freight train was compelled to go back, and the crew made to desert the cars. At one time it was feared they would run the engine into the river below the city. The up passenger and express train came through the city at a fearful speed, with the engine whistling lustily. As she sped through the crowd, Engineer Saracool bent low in his cab and gave the engine full stroke, in order to successfully pass the enraged men.

The freight up from Philadelphia and the market train were compelled to halt and go no further. At this point the passenger train down, was stopped in the cut, where the fighting took place. The crew were compelled to desert and the passengers were obliged to leave. These high handed proceedings continued until about seven o’clock, when nearly all the strikers left the ground for parts unknown. Not one of the rioters was either killed or wounded.

The majority, in fact all the unfortunates, were law-abiding, peaceable citizens, who had assembled at Seventh and Penn streets simply to gratify their curiosity.

A large body of Coal and Iron Police, from the coal regions, were quartered at the Company’s mammoth car shops, which works the strikers threatened to burn. A large crowd of the friends of the railroad men procured about fifty muskets for the strikers, and there was imminent danger of a desperate conflict.

The military companies engaged in the fight were the Hamburg Rifles, Slatington Rifles, Allentown Continentals, Company I, infantry, of Catasqua, Easton Greys, and a company from Portland, Northampton county. They arrived at eight o’clock in the evening. A number of the military, after their bloody work was done, threw down their arms, and asked for citizens’ clothes.

At a quarter after eleven o’clock, the night of the 25th, the strikers had torn down the watch boxes at the street corners, and proceeded down the road to tear up the tracks. They signalized their departure by a perfect hurricane of yells and cheering, as they proceeded in their onward march of ruin and destruction. The city had become turbulent again, and the outlook indicated desperate work. The cry among the men was, “Wages and revenge.”

The Sheriff issued his proclamation, and Mayor Evans returned home from Ocean Grove, on a special train, in answer to an urgent telegram. Town meetings were held to take steps to prevent any repetition of the dark deeds which had cast a gloom over the whole community at Reading.

Before the militia were withdrawn from Reading, there was a narrow escape from a bloody scene. It was the night after the horrible fusilades. Large crowds had gathered at the scene of that conflict, and about the same time several companies of the Fourth Regiment marched down Seventh to Penn street. Here they met a company of the Sixteenth Regiment, and a fight between the military seemed imminent. The crowd treated the Easton Greys to a shower of stones. This company immediately levelled their pieces, when they were notified by Colonel Scholl of the Sixteenth Regiment that no indiscriminate slaughter would be permitted. All the troops then passed down Penn and out Fifth street, followed by the mob, who fairly threw insults in the teeth of the soldiery.

The Morristown company of the Sixteenth Regiment subsequently stacked their arms, and refused absolutely to operate against the rioters. Some of them threw their guns away, and distributed the cartridges among the crowd. The company left for home shortly afterwards, as did all the militia engaged in the firing on the citizens. Mayor Evans issued a proclamation, calling for one thousand volunteers to do patrol duty in the city, until quiet and order was restored. A special force of policemen were sworn in, and other measures taken to preserve order in the city.

On the day after the fight, Coroner Goodhart, of Reading, summoned a jury of inquest, and proceeded to investigate the circumstances attending the shooting of peaceable, unarmed citizens. A summons was issued for General Frank Reeder, who had disappeared from Reading, in obedience to orders, and had established his headquarters at Allentown, to which place the Coroner sent a notification to him. On the 30th, seven days after the fusilades, General Reeder submitted the following sworn statement, in relation to the affair:

Dear Sir: Your notification, dated July 27, covering certain inquiries to which you desire replies, was duly received by me. While I do not for one moment concede your right to demand such replies from me at this time, while I know perfectly well that my official report of the occurrences at Reading, on the 23d inst., to my superior officers, is the only account which I can at this time be required to make. I am, nevertheless, quite willing to furnish you with whatever information is in my possession; calculated to throw light upon the subject matter now under official investigation by you. To that end I reply categorically to your questions, as follows:

Q. Who ordered your command to this place? A. I was ordered to Reading with the Fourth Regiment of my brigade, by Major-General William J. Bolton, commanding Second Division, National Guards of Pennsylvania.

Q. Who gave you orders to march through the cut to Seventh and Penn streets? A. I received no orders to march through the cut, but I was requested to march into the cut to liberate a train in the possession of the rioters, by an official of the Reading Railroad Company.

Q. Who ordered you to fire upon the crowd? A. No person ordered me to fire, neither did I fire, nor direct any other person to fire upon the crowd.

Q. Which of the companies discharged their guns, and how often? A. All the companies did firing, but no living creature can give the further information desired.

Q. Did you acquaint the High Sheriff of this county with your coming and presence in the city? If not, why not? A. I did not; it was not my duty to acquaint him with my coming, and it was while I was proceeding in the direction of the High Sheriff’s house that my command was attacked by the mob; upon receiving orders to repair to Reading, I took cars with my command at Allentown, and proceeded without incident to Temple, where the train was boarded by Messrs. Eltz and Paxon, Railroad officials; these gentlemen informed me that the Reading depot was in possession of a mob, numbering from two to three thousand; I desired them to stop the train just outside of sight of the depot, which being done, I disembarked the troops, and, having formed, we marched to the depot, finding it in the hands and under the protection of the Coal and Iron Police; I was then requested to release a train from the hands of the strikers, and was informed that this cut was the direct road to the Penn street crossing, which it was necessary to clear to permit the running of trains. I moved my command in the direction of the cut, but before reaching it we were met by a large body of men, whose violent gestures, coarse insults, unspoken threats, and general bearing, suggested the idea of halting the regiment, loading the pieces, and moving the musicians to the rear. Before entering the cut we were saluted by the crowd with a volley of stones and some pistol shots. We moved down the cut, stoned, at every step, by a yelling mob, without firing a shot, or speaking a word in reply to the shouts which almost deafened us, until we reached the second bridge. During this march I, seconded by all the other officers of the command, constantly cautioned the men not to fire, notwithstanding the fact that every step was being marked by the blood of the men, and that many of the troops had been knocked down by the flying stones. Near the second bridge a single shot, fired without orders, was the signal for a dropping fire, which, while doing little or no damage to the mob of rioters, served to check the fast-falling shower of stones. Pressing on, the command reached Penn street, and was confronted by a large crowd of persons, who met us by hurling stones and firing pistols at the regiment, which was only stopped by what I have since learned was a very effective volley, which entirely dispersed them. Not a single shot was fired by us on Penn street, either up or down, nor was there a single shot fired after the last halt was made by us on Seventh street. Of all the five cart-loads of stones, which I heard next day were collected in the cut, very few were thrown after the first shot was fired. Most of the stones were of such size and weight that it is almost certain strong arms were employed in the work; upon reaching Penn Square, I inquired for the Mayor, and was told he was at the seashore; I also inquired for the High Sheriff, but could learn no tidings of his whereabouts; I thereupon returned to the depot, which I had been asked to protect from the mob. Later in the night, the Mayor having returned to the city, I was requested by him to send a company of troops into the cut to drive off the mob, then alleged to be engaged in tearing up the railroad track. This I declined to do, principally because I was short of ammunition, having had but fifteen hundred rounds.

I am led to supplement this narrative with a word or two in defense of the military propriety of moving into the cut by the strictures which your District Attorney and one of your daily papers have been pleased to make upon me for having selected that route for my advance into the town. Raw recruits run greater risks from having their formation destroyed and the confusion incident upon broken alignments than from any other cause. Had the mob succeeded in breaking its formation, the Fourth Regiment might itself have degenerated into a mob, and would have been completely at the mercy of the rioters. This might have been accomplished had we been on a wide street where the mob could press upon our flanks, but in the cut it was impossible, as our flanks were clear, our formation was preserved and the men had room to use their rifles with reasonable effect, and we emerged from the cut without the loss of a single soldier. I think I can safely rely upon the result of the battle with the mob as the most unanswerable argument against the theory of a military blunder.

In accordance with your request I send this letter as a sworn statement.

The admission of General Frank Reeder in the remarkable statement given above, is sufficient evidence that the destruction of life at Reading was a reckless and wanton sacrifice. Even admitting that his men had been badly treated by a mob of roughs, that they had suffered from the vigorous attack of a mass of men armed with stones and pieces of iron, and other missiles, the fact that not a single rioter was either killed or wounded, goes far to reflect upon the indiscretion of the soldiers, in firing into a company of innocent people, for it shows, what was true, that the mob of rioters, who had stoned the marching militia in the railway cut, had already vanished. The feeling against the Fourth Regiment both among law-abiding citizens and the rioters, was intensely bitter. The result of the Coroner’s inquiry into the circumstances served to increase the animosity, and there is no doubt that at one time the members of the Easton Greys were in actual danger of being massacred in a mass by the enraged populace. Some of them obtained citizens clothes, disposed of their guns and accoutrements in some manner, and quietly stole away.

The Fourth Regiment received orders to depart from Reading with lively satisfaction. The Sixteenth Regiment was composed of workingmen, and sympathized with the strikers, and for that reason were withdrawn. A detachment of United States regulars subsequently came to Reading, but their services were not called into requisition. They did not fire on crowds of citizens because of “unspoken threats,” hence there was no further trouble. Then the Mayor and Sheriff undertook to restore and preserve order, and they accomplished it. In a few days Reading had become the same quiet, plodding town it had been before.