The "Holocaust" at El Paso, March 6, 1916 

 {Letters from a Former Federal Official) 



Here is the "bone" of the holocaust. The City Fathers 

 ordered the prisoners in the City Jail bathed in gasoline. Also 

 that a tub of gasoline be used to dip all clothing of the prisoners. 

 The work, it seems, was left to "trusties." The prisoners 

 were about }i Americans and }i Mexicans. When the air 

 in that part of the jail was thoroughly saturated, an American 

 "dope fiend" struck a match to light a cigarette. You know 

 the result. Some of the burning victims escaped to the street. 

 .One, at least, reached the river. It was said he crossed to Juarez. 

 Anyway, the report spread among the Mexicans on both sides 

 that the Americans officially rounded up the Mexicans, sat- 

 urated them with gasoline and set them on fire intentionally. 

 Three days later, Columbus! There were nearly as many 

 Americans dead as Mexicans. You have the concrete facts. 

 You can make your own deductions. 



... I know of no report of a telegram purporting to be 

 from Villa to Gen. Pershing, but I do know that Gen. Gavira 

 of Juarez warned the American army three days before the 

 Columbus raid. And I do know that it was in the El Paso 

 papers two days in advance of the raid. And I am reliably 

 informed that the troops at Columbus were armed with ten 

 rounds each for two days and that they were disarmed the 

 day previous to the raid, with guns and ammunition locked 

 up. I know that the "news" went over Mexico that El Paso 

 had rounded up the Mexicans and had burned them in a bath 

 of oil! And the ill-treatment of the Mexicans here and 

 the indignities they suffered at the international bridge by 

 being kicked and cuffed back into Mexico by the El Paso police 

 was enough to anger any people on earth. That went on for 

 months. 



I am of the opinion that the Carranzistas, Huertistas, and 

 Orozquistas had as much to do with the Columbus raid as 

 the Villistas. I have been as reliably informed that \'illa was 

 in Baracas Venezuela at that date as that he was in Columbus 



I 817 -] 



