Homestead

The import of the verdict was unmistakable. It meant that, for the second time, the people of Allegheny County, speaking through their representatives in the jury box, refused to be governed by the letter of the law in the matter of punishing the men of Homestead as rioters and murderers, and that the continuance of the prosecutions would be a waste of time, energy and money. Such was the construction generally put upon it, and most probably the Carnegie Company and its counsel formed the same judgment. Nevertheless, the district attorney announced that every one of the Homestead cases would be brought to trial and as an earnest of sincerity, Hugh O'Donnell was brought forward to face a jury of his peers on February 13, the fifth day after Clifford's safe deliverance.

The young leader looked pale and thin as a result of his imprisonment, but his eye was as clear and his voice as firm as on the day when he marshaled the fighting men at the barricades, and there was no sign of flinching in his demeanor as he stood up to enter his plea of "not guilty."

The attorneys engaged in the case were the same that served in the preceding trials, excepting that Major E. A. Montooth and Mr. John F. Cox relieved the counsel who had previously taken the most active part for the defense. The following jurors were selected: Fred Vogel, William Richardson, Charles Beuchler, John Sproul, M. J. Byrne, Henry Brooker, A. C. Flood, Henry Eisenhauer, John McGann, John Geisler, Peter Stragen and William Dramble.

The case for the prosecution differed little from that advanced against Clifford and Critchlow. Pinkerton detectives, sheriff's deputies, mill clerks and reporters repeated the old, old story of the events of July 6, while Mr. D. F. Patterson, who conducted the direct examination as a substitute for the district attorney, elicited from each statements showing O'Donnell's ostensible participation in the battle.

The line of cross-examination pursued by the defense showed that the intention was to prove that O'Donnell was present at the battle as a newspaper correspondent, and that, when he interfered actively, it was in the capacity of a peacemaker. Several newspaper men testified that the defendant was known as a correspondent of the Tri-State News Bureau and of various daily papers, and that, in a spirit of professional fraternity, he had taken care of the reporters during the fight and secured for them a convenient headquarters of observation in the cupola of the mill. Only one out of a dozen reporters examined specifically incriminated O'Donnell, and the evidence of that one was vitiated by the knowledge that he had sold out to the Carnegie Company at the beginning of the Homestead trouble and had acted throughout as a spy.

The prosecution could not have made a weaker showing, all things considered, and the work of the other side was, therefore, comparatively easy.

Captain O. C. Coon, who accompanied O'Donnell to the river bank on the morning of July 6, was the star witness for the defense. O'Donnell, he said, went to the scene of the trouble for the express purpose of preventing bloodshed, and used every effort to check the combatants even to the extent of pushing angry men back from the water's edge after the firing had started. The witness had also seen O'Donnell, on the day after the surrender, rescue from the hands of a mob of strikers a poor wretch who was supposed to be a straggler from the Pinkerton forces.

Dr. John Purman testified in the same strain. He swore that O'Donnell came to his office with three wounded men on the morning of July 6. A crowd gathered on the street without, and O'Donnell exhorted them to go peaceably to their homes and avoid going to the mill-yard. Later in the day, witness met O'Donnell on the street. A crowd surrounded the young leader, cursing him, and some one said, "You are a —— of a leader, staying away from the mill." O'Donnell answered, "There are no leaders; everyone acts for himself. If you want to do me a favor you will stop this and go to your homes."

Numerous other witnesses gave testimony corroborative of the assumption that the defendant had taken no part in the riot other than as a law-abiding citizen anxious to preserve the peace. O'Donnell's wife was placed on the stand, but her evidence was unimportant.

After the attorneys for the defense had practically won their case, it was decided to let O'Donnell testify in his own behalf. There was some doubt about the prudence of this move, and that it was not without foundation was shown by the difficulty which O'Donnell experienced in escaping damaging admissions.

In his direct examination by Mr. Brennen, O'Donnell told a straightforward and impressive story. He told of his residence of seven or eight years in Homestead, his newspaper correspondence and other personal matters, and then went on to describe, in graphic terms, his doings on the day of the riot. On that eventful morning, he said he had gone to the river bank, arriving just when the gang-plank was being run out from the barges. He begged the Pinkertons not to land and not to shoot, reminding them of the presence of women and children and the certainty of wholesale loss of life if violence should be resorted to. After the first skirmish, he had gone to the Postal Telegraph offices and notified the Mercy and South Side Hospitals to send ambulances. If he had had only a few minutes more time to gain the bow of the barges before the fighting began, not a shot would have been fired. In no manner had he aided or abetted the trouble which occurred that day, nor did he at any time encourage the use of violence in preventing the introduction of non-union men into the Homestead mill.

Mr. Patterson, in his cross-examination, tried to extract from O'Donnell the admission that the workmen maintained an armed military organization, but was unsuccessful. He managed, however to force the defendant to name some of the men who were among the combatants on the river bank.

Attorney Robb closed for the prosecution, in an address which was mainly devoted to picturing the trouble at Homestead as a revolution conducted by a band of assassins, thirsting for Pinkerton blood. He referred to Hugh O'Donnell as having been summoned by a whistle signal to "marshal his standing army and begin a battle to the death."

Major Montooth closed for the defense. He contended that the substitution of Mr. Patterson, the attorney hired by the Carnegie Company, in the place of the public prosecutor was sufficient reason why Hugh O'Donnell should be acquitted. Mr. Robb interrupted to ask the court if this was good law. Judge Stowe answered in the negative. Nevertheless, the shaft had been too well aimed to miss its mark because of this interference, and the point made by Major Montooth was undoubtedly appreciated by the jury.

Judge Stowe charged the jury briefly and to the same effect as in the Clifford case. The jurors stayed out from 7 o'clock in the evening until 9:30 o'clock on the next morning. When they filed into court there was nothing in their faces to indicate whether they brought good or bad news for the defendant. O'Donnell was quite cool and collected, nodding pleasantly to his wife and niece when he was brought in from the jail, and betraying no sign of emotion except a slight heaving of the chest at the moment when the foreman of the jury drew the sealed verdict from his pocket. "We find the prisoner not guilty," were the words that rang out upon the death-like stillness of the court-room—welcome words to almost everybody present. A murmur of approval was heard, but was hushed when the court officials rapped for order. The jury was dismissed without comment. Then O'Donnell, with tears of joy coursing down his cheeks, turned to his faithful wife and embraced her tenderly, while friends thronged around to proffer their congratulations. O'Donnell was recommitted to jail, pending a hearing on the remaining charges against him, but was shortly afterward released on bail. His was the last of the Homestead cases brought to trial. Realizing that it was impossible to obtain the conviction of any of the Homestead men, the attorneys for the Carnegie Company made overtures to their opponents which resulted in the dropping of all prosecutions on both sides. Ex-Burgess McLuckie protested vigorously against abandoning the case against H. C. Frick, in which he himself was the principal prosecutor, but his protest was overruled and, aside from the trials of Dempsey and Beatty, Homestead was heard of no more in the criminal court.

The anarchists, Carl Knold and Henry Bauer, whose arrest in connection with Berkman's attempt on the life of Mr. Frick was mentioned in an earlier chapter, were brought to trial a few days before Hugh O'Donnell on indictments charging them with conspiracy and with being accessories to Berkman's crime. It was shown that Berkman was harbored by Knold at the residence of Paul Eckert, in Allegheny City, a rendezvous for anarchists; that the anarchist circulars distributed at Homestead were printed at Eckert's and taken to Homestead by Bauer and Knold, and that the two defendants had counseled and guided Berkman in his assault on the Carnegie chairman. Berkman was brought in from the penitentiary to testify, but proved a recalcitrant witness. The solitary sensational feature of the trial was a speech delivered by Colonel W. D. Moore, counsel for the defense, in which he lauded the doctrine of anarchy and traced its origin back to the Redeemer of Mankind. Judge Slagle, in his charge to the jury, expressed profound regret at the enunciation of such objectionable views by a member of the legal profession. Bauer and Knold were found guilty on both indictments and sentenced five years to the penitentiary. At the same time the rioters arrested at Duquesne during the strike at that place were sentenced to the work-house for terms ranging from two to six months.

CONCLUSION.

Although ignobly routed in the courts, the Carnegie Company lost not a foot of the ground gained at Homestead. On the contrary, it has since doubly re-inforced itself, for not only is the spirit of unionism stamped out among the employees of the firm, but fully three-fourths of the former union men are now working, most of them at their old jobs, without exhibiting a trace of the independence which was once their pride, or making any pretensions to a voice in the determination of their wages.

The re-employment of so many of the old hands was one of the fruits of the substitution of Mr. Schwab for Mr. Potter as general superintendent. Mr. Potter, having received the non-union men who came in during the strike and guaranteed them permanent work, would have become a stumbling-block when the time arrived for treating with the defeated union men and was, therefore, removed just before the crisis came. Mr. Schwab was bound by no pledges of his own and refused to recognize those made by his predecessor. Hence but a short time elapsed after the collapse of the strike until most of the green hands were discharged and their places filled by ex-strikers, whose experience rendered their services almost indispensable.

The active leaders of the strike were, of course, excluded from the amnesty, and few of them have since been able to secure employment at their trade. They are the victims of a form of ostracism; blacklisted as dangerous agitators in every steel and iron mill in the country.

Hugh O'Donnell left Homestead to travel as manager of a concert company and subsequently became connected with a weekly journal published in Chicago.

Honest John McLuckie tried his hand in sundry small ventures, lectured a little, took the stump in the campaign of November, '93, and otherwise managed to keep his head above water, but always under the handicap of a lost cause and the diversion of energy from the familiar pursuits of a lifetime into new and untried fields.

William T. Roberts turned his attention exclusively to speechmaking and politics.

Thomas Crawford worked for a time for the Uniontown Steel Company, and on the suspension of that firm, went into business with Jack Clifford alternately as politician and book agent.

David Lynch obtained a position as agent for a liquor firm.

Hugh Ross visited his birth-place in Scotland and has been idle since his return.

William H. Gaches carried on a successful business enterprise in Chicago during the World's Fair, but has since been idle.

Eddie Burke, known as "Rioter Burke," was stricken with an affection of the eyes which prevented his working even if he could have found a place. The Amalgamated Association, at the '93 convention, voted an appropriation sufficient to pay for his treatment at an eastern hospital.

Of the Amalgamated lodges in Homestead nothing remains but the charters which have never been surrendered, and under which a reorganization may be effected if the men should hereafter find themselves in a condition to return to union principles and practice. There is, however, nothing to indicate a future revival of the old-time order of things. If there are grievances to be suffered the men must simply be contented to suffer them in silence rather than invite a repetition of the calamitous consequences of their first and only encounter with Chairman Frick.

Of the rates of wages now paid, no more is known by outsiders than that they are even lower than was contemplated by the firm when the lock-out was ordered and that they promise to fall lower still. The firm refuses to publish its scale rates on the pretext that, by so doing, it would be playing into the hands of competitors. Rival manufacturers have endeavored to secure the Homestead schedules and so, too, has the Amalgamated Association, but without success. The Amalgamated officials made their last fruitless effort in this direction during the scale-making period in June, 1893.

As an additional protection against surprises of any description, the fortifications of the Homestead mills have been strengthened and no one can enter otherwise than through the offices, from which a bridge leads to the workshops. Mr. Frick is evidently determined to be always ready, hereafter, for battles, sieges or stolen marches.

There is one means of defense, however, which, having weighed it in the balance and found it wanting, the Carnegie chairman is not likely to try a second time. He will never again undertake to capture his own territory with a posse of Pinkerton Guards.