LABOR-STRIKES. 



429 



the military, who were in danger of being con- 

 sumed by the fire which was raging around 

 them, emerged from the building, and, forming 

 in line, marched rapidly toward the United 

 States Arsenal. On their way thither they 

 were overtaken by a thousand or more armed 

 rioters. The commandant refused to admit 

 them into the arsenal, receiving only the wound- 

 ed. The militia then retreated across the Al- 

 leghany River, under the fire of the pursuing 

 rioters, and there disbanded. 



In the mean time a vast crowd remained 

 congregated around the railroad buildings, set- 

 ting fire to buildings and trains that had not 

 yet caught, until, by 7 o'clock, the machine- 

 shops, both round-houses, with 125 locomo- 

 tives, the Union Transfer Co.'s buildings, and 

 all the buildings of the terminus, were a mass 

 of flames. Many of the freight-cars were pil- 

 laged before they were set on fire, men break- 

 ing them open with sledge-hammers and hand- 

 ing out the goods to whoever would take 

 them away ; while men, women, and children 

 streamed to the spot and away with the booty, 

 in many instances even wagons being used to 

 convey off the plunder. The plundering was 

 carried on in the most barefaced, almost busi- 

 ness-like, manner. Every kind of goods, from 

 bales of cloth and silk to books and picture- 

 frames, from barrels of flour to oranges and 

 cigars, were carried, rolled, dragged through 

 the public streets, while the citizens looked on 

 half-amused. The mania for robbery seemed to 

 have possessed many people of ordinarily de- 

 cent behavior. Some, who had scruples against 

 stealing themselves, helped their neighbors to 

 get away with the booty. "Women took a prom- 

 inent part in the thievery. They left nothing, 

 however useless, but could be seen bearing 

 away laces, kid ball-shoes, parasols, coffee-mills, 

 whips, and gas-stoves. The detectives, in their 

 subsequent researches, came upon seven great 

 trunks of clothing in one house, and eleven bar- 

 rels of flour in another. Eye-witnesses relate 

 that a wagon-load of sewing-machines was 

 sold off at auction in the street, at from $1 

 down to 10 cents apiece. Barrels of spirits 

 were tapped and drunk on the spot. On Sun- 

 day evening, when the mob began to break 

 into private buildings and sack liquor-stores 

 and cigar-shops, the citizens and police began 

 to take vigorous steps to arrest the disorder. 

 When the plundering of the freight-cars was 

 at last partially checked by the efforts of the 

 mayor and police, the cars were burned with 

 their freight by the mob. During the whole 

 day the incendiarism was continued. The Union 

 Depot was fired ; the freight depot of the Pitts- 

 burgh, Cincinnati & St. Louis Railroad was 

 plundered and burned, and the offices, depot, and 

 engine-house of the Pun-Handle line, the depot 

 of the Adams Express Co., the offices and laun- 

 dry of the Pullman Car Co., the Union Depot 

 Hotel, and all the other railroad buildings, to- 

 gether with a number of private structures, were 

 consumed. The number of freight-cars burned 



was about 2,000. The direct loss of railroad 

 property was estimated at $8,000,000 to $10,- 

 000,000. Governor Hartranft, who was hast- 

 ening home from the Pacific coast, had sent 

 orders to call out all the militia of the State 

 The citizens of Pittsburgh had beheld the ex- 

 cesses of the mob on Sunday apparently with 

 indifference, but, on Monday morning, citizens' 

 companies were organized and armed for pro- 

 tection, while the fury of the mob had entirely 

 spent itself. The strikers had taken possession 

 of the track at various other points along the 

 Pennsylvania road, and the connecting roads 

 had suspended traffic as a matter of precaution. 

 In both the Pittsburgh and Baltimore riots all 

 the most violent spirits of the mobs were other 

 laboring-men, and not the railroad strikers; 

 while the worst excesses were committed by 

 low characters who did not belong to the me- 

 chanical class tramps, thieves, and loafers. 

 In both cities the sympathies of the majority 

 of the people were on the side of the strikers, 

 and bitter sentiments against the military pre- 

 vailed. A sullen and determined feeling was 

 rife along the Baltimore & Ohio road, and 

 the presence of the regulars was not enough 

 to insure the resumption of traffic, although 

 the United States troops were nowhere mo- 

 lested or resisted, except a slight stoning which 

 they underwent in Baltimore on Sunday. 

 There were 400 regular soldiers in that city, 

 under General Hancock. An oil-train was 

 burned there on Sunday. The strike on the 

 Erie Railroad centred at Hornellsville. A regi- 

 ment of militia was sent thither from Roches- 

 ter. Strikers boarded and stopped a passen- 

 ger-train which was sent out with a military 

 guard, while the militia made scarcely an at- 

 tempt to defend it. Regiments from Buffalo 

 and Brooklyn were ordered to this point. A 

 proclamation, in vigorous terms, was issued by 

 Governor Robinson. 



Strikes were now breaking -out all over 

 the country. Strikers forbade trains to be 

 moved at Philadelphia. At St. Louis a train 

 was allowed to start on the Ohio & Missis- 

 sippi line. Meetings were held by laborers' 

 associations in all the cities. On Monday, 

 the 23d, there was a disturbance at Buf- 

 falo. Erie and Lake Shore strikers took the 

 firemen and brakemen from the New York 

 Central trains, stopped the work in the car- 

 shops, and attacked a guard of 200 soldiers 

 at the Lake Shore round-house and gained 

 possession of the building. All trains were 

 stopped on the Ohio & Mississippi road. 

 Train, track, and shop men struck work on 

 Monday on the Cleveland, Cincinnati & Colum- 

 bus road at Cleveland, on the Hocking Val- 

 ley road, the Indianapolis & St. Louis, the 

 Vandalia, and the Chicago & Alton roads. 

 At Toledo, O., the Lake Shore & Michigan 

 Southern railway was blockaded at the Air- 

 Line Junction. A conference took place be- 

 tween the Erie strikers and Receiver Jewett, 

 at which they offered to resume work accept- 



