CHAPTER V
THE STORY OF PITTSBURGH
Another Storm Center—Greatest Concentration of War Work in the United States—The Tower of Babel and How it was Held Safe—No I. W. W. Need Apply.
Pittsburgh also was expected to be an alien storm center when the United States declared war upon Germany. This uneasiness was natural and to be expected. Most of our great iron and steel plants were located there, and numerous other important industries as well. These plants were vital to our success in the war, as were the great coal mines in the adjacent districts. It was felt on every side that the enemy would strike here if he struck at all. But the main cause for apprehension lay in the fact that Pittsburgh had an enormous foreign population, especially from countries of the central allies, and the presence of this element in its industries was feared as a source of dynamite, sabotage and labor troubles. The fact that Pittsburgh and Western Pennsylvania throughout the war remained practically free from labor disturbances and war munition destruction, so troublesome in other sections, was due to the splendid intelligence service rendered by the American Protective League, in close coöperation with the United States Department of Justice and Naval and Military Intelligence Bureaus. The Smoky City sends in a very clean report.
Pittsburgh operated the highest percentage on war work of any district in the United States. It filled over sixty-five per cent of all the steel contracts placed by the Ordnance Department, in addition to the tremendous output of munitions and other war materials for the Entente Allies. It was estimated that the district was running from sixty to seventy per cent on war work at the time of the Armistice, that at least 5,000 plants, many of them mammoth in size, were filling Government orders, and over one million employees were engaged in large part in helping win the war. During the latter part of hostilities the daily labor shortage was over 16,000. It was vital to the United States and to the Entente Allies that the Pittsburgh District should be permitted to conduct unmolested its great industries of the war, and that this was possible was due in a large measure to the American Protective League.
A few days after the war was declared, John W. Weibley, a well known Pittsburgh business man, was asked to organize a Division of the American Protective League in the twenty-seven counties of Western Pennsylvania, comprising the United States Western Judicial District. Mr. Weibley conferred with Mr. Robert S. Judge, Special Agent in Charge of the Bureau of Investigation, Department of Justice, to learn if the Government was in need of such an organization. When assured that it was, Mr. Weibley began the formation of a branch for this district.
Representatives of the railroads and other important corporations were called into conference and were asked to coöperate, and within an amazingly short time the American Protective League had active agents in every county, township, city, town and village in the entire district. In the case of Pittsburgh, the operating headquarters, this plan of organization was worked out so minutely that an active agent representing the League, and in constant communication with it, was located in every voting precinct, and where there were concentrations of the foreign element, these agents were to be found in practically every city block.
Mr. Weibley personally perfected and maintained from Pittsburgh this network throughout the District. Mr. Ralph B. Montgomery directed the work in Pittsburgh, each ward being placed in charge of a captain who reported to him, and each captain having his separate lieutenants with agents in every election precinct. Mr. Raymond H. Allen, assisted by Mr. William S. Masten, directed the operation of the intelligence activities in the outlying counties.
Frequent meetings of ward captains and district lieutenants were held to hear suggestions from representatives of the Government. They were thus kept familiar with the latest happenings and knew what precautions to take to make their work effective.
The story of the Pittsburgh Division, as it is related in these pages by its Chief, is the story of a program of action, thoughtfully conceived, carefully and efficiently executed, and successful beyond all expectations. Mr. Weibley says in his report:
A splendid esprit de corps was maintained, as the organization in Pittsburgh was limited to the least possible number in membership, and all members were kept busy. Great care was used in the selection of the men enrolled, and each applicant was subjected to a rigid investigation. If he did not meet the requirements, his application was rejected or placed on file to provide material for future replacements when urgency demanded it. As a result, the highest interest in the work was maintained throughout the war period.
The Pittsburgh district being the most important manufacturing, munition, fuel and chemical center in the country, was largely dependent for its labor upon foreigners, many of whom came from countries at war with us. It therefore was imperative that many of our operatives should be of diverse nationalities and able to speak many tongues. As an illustration, it was estimated that at the beginning of the war fully fifty per cent of the Austrians in the United States were at work in vital coal mines, coke works, steel mills and other industrial plants within a radius of 50 miles of Pittsburgh. This naturally made the alien menace a grave one, but so intensive was the organization of the League that not an important industrial operation in the great district was without one or more of the League agents as active employes. In fact, intimate connection was maintained with every alien gathering or meeting place, and nothing of moment was planned that the League officials were not soon familiar with. In fact, in one of the largest industrial concerns, the principal official was chief of a league unit, and many of his trusted employes were his active associates.
Pittsburgh industrial concerns, vitally interested in meeting the Government’s demands for constantly increasing output of war material, quickly solved the question of finances, and the League had ample funds to meet every requirement. This made possible a highly efficient office organization and a suite of offices on the fourth floor of the St. Nicholas Building, which permitted the Department of Justice and Army and Navy Intelligence Bureaus also to locate quarters there, giving a compact working organization reaching every branch of the service and promoting that intimate contact and close coöperation which assured success. This reciprocal arrangement was especially effective in the case of the Department of Justice, which, under the operation of Mr. Judge, rendered and was rendered assistance on all occasions.
Director Charles B. Prichard, of the Pittsburgh Department of Public Safety, recognized the possibilities of effective coöperation at the beginning, and there was not a moment when the patrolmen and municipal detectives did not do everything possible to promote the success of the League’s activities. This spirit of patriotic coöperation on the part of the municipal authorities was constantly maintained through the friendliness and enthusiasm of Robert J. Alderdice, superintendent of police; Magistrate Walter J. Lloyd and Commissioners of Police Dye, Kane, Johnson and Calhoun. Pittsburgh certainly was well policed. In all, the League maintained constantly throughout the trying period over 2,000 active operatives.
The effectiveness of this far-reaching organization was revealed in the complete absence of those disturbances which had been feared. At the outbreak of war, troops had been located at bridges and important public works, but the thorough manner in which the League ferreted out those who were willing to foment trouble soon rendered unnecessary the guarding of industrial plants by soldiers or police. There were no interruptions to the enormous output of munitions and manufactured material, nor were there any accidents, explosions or labor troubles traced to agents of the enemy. In the Pittsburgh division alone, over 25,000 cases were investigated, and every person upon whom the least suspicion had been cast was soon rendered powerless to do harm. Every effort was made to eliminate troubles by preventing alien sympathizers from perfecting their plans. No meetings where incendiary talk could be fostered were permitted to continue, and it was not long before those who had trouble in mind realized that to continue their purpose would only lead to their own downfall and also that of their followers. The record of the League is a tribute to the wisdom of this preventive policy.
It was feared that because of the large proportion of foreigners in the Pittsburgh district, the wide diversity of languages spoken, and the great illiteracy among certain of the nationalities, there would be great difficulty in securing proper observance of the Selective Service registration regulations. During the Civil War, there had been serious draft riots in Pittsburgh, when the percentage of foreigners and of illiteracy was much less. The American Protective League, in coöperation with Mr. Judge, gave the widest publicity in every possible way to the plans for the registration and the penalty for failure to comply. The result of this work of preparation was that the registration was effected without disorder, and there were no occasions for wholesale arrests to bring evaders or possible evaders to justice. In fact, the League’s policy was to prevent trouble by advising those inclined to resent the Government’s call, and to make no arrests until other means failed. It was only necessary for an American Protective League operative to appear in open court on one occasion.
I. W. W. propaganda was never permitted to take root. Work to eliminate this menace occupied a large amount of the League’s attention. A well organized scheme of the Socialists to evade the Selective Service Law was broken up when a prominent radical and anarchist, a ringleader in the movement, was taken from a meeting he was about to address and compelled to register. The facts that the plans of the scheme were so well known to the League cooled the ardor of the malcontents.
The division had considerable trouble with a Jewish family which used every artifice to protect a lad of selective service age and prevent his being taken into the army. They finally succeeded in spiriting him away, but he was convicted of evading the draft, and by pressure on his family, who were placed under bond to return him, he was brought back to Pittsburgh, sent to jail for six months and then inducted into the army.
A number of Italians, through one of their societies, conceived a plan to make money by filling in questionnaires to enable evasion of selective service. Two ringleaders were arrested, and the chief of the society afterward rendered the League valuable service in preventing labor disturbances. The League also uncovered a scheme of a few unscrupulous lawyers to extort money from men on the ground that their advice would permit them to evade the law. Arrests were not necessary, as the warning of the League of the consequences of any continuance of the practice was sufficient.
The League was able to break the backbone of a dangerous plan of German propaganda through an international organization known as the Geneva Association, whose members were principally alien enemies. The officers were arrested and placed under bond for trial.
One very dangerous draft evader and conscientious objector was arrested and court-martialed after considerable trouble. He was Walter L. Hirschberg, a student at the University of Pittsburgh. He registered for selective service, but wrote and sent to his draft board his “declaration of rights,” as he viewed them, and maintained such an attitude of defiance toward the Government that it was decided to investigate him. In the meantime he disappeared and was traced to New York, where he was placed under observation. He was detained in a locked room in a hotel until sufficient evidence could be obtained against him, but was so shrewd and resourceful that he outwitted his captors and made his escape. It was suspected that he had gone to Chicago, and a Pittsburgh operative went there to find him. The use of commendable strategy secured his arrest and his return to Pittsburgh at the point of a revolver. Although he condemned war as organized murder, he carried a loaded revolver and blackjack for emergencies! The details of his escape and flight read like a thrilling story of Sherlock Holmes. As an instance of his resourcefulness and quick wit, he related that when he arrived at the depot in Chicago, he picked up a newspaper to learn quickly the lay of the land. In flaming headlines he discovered that Chicago police that morning were making wholesale arrests of all young men without registration cards. He had none. He espied a woman with a babe and a large traveling case, and politely offered to assist her by carrying the valise. When he was approached by an officer and requested to show his card, he quickly retorted, “Oh, you are too late. You can see that this is my wife and child.” He was allowed to leave the depot and go unmolested. He went into hiding until the scare was over. Hirschberg was sent by a court-martial at Camp Lee to the Atlanta prison for twenty years.
“Pittsburgh had some amusing incidents,” says the Chief who has been so freely quoted, and he has included several of them in his report:
There was little bootlegging as liquor dealers endeavored to comply with the law forbidding the sale of intoxicants to soldiers in uniform or within restricted areas adjacent to army camps. One negro was suspected, and upon being approached by an operative, readily agreed to sell a quart of “cold tea” for $9.00. The operative bought—and then arrested the negro. When the “cold tea” was tested, it was found to be just what the negro said it was—cold tea!
An alien enemy refused to register and was taken to the League headquarters for intensive examination. The operative was called to the telephone on an urgent message just as he entered headquarters. He hastened to the telephone, leaving his prisoner where he could not escape. When he had finished, he discovered his prisoner missing. It transpired that another operative had come into headquarters, and the prisoner had asked him where aliens registered. The operative asked “Why?” and when he was informed that the man wished to register, he obligingly agreed to accompany him to the United States Marshal’s office. He was chagrined to find that he had deprived his fellow operative of a case.
A peculiar case came under the notice of the League. A Russian of draft age, whose father and brothers and sisters were naturalized, claimed exemption on the ground that the father had not taken out his citizenship papers until after he, the subject, had passed his majority, and he had never lost his Russian citizenship. The objector was sent to jail, but the decision was rendered that his point was well taken and he was released.
The League did a wonderful work in reconstructing families, returning wayward sons to sorrowing mothers, and in rehabilitating young men whose patriotism and fidelity to duty were lukewarm. In correcting and preventing trouble the American Protective League performed a splendid service to the Government.