11/12/2020
On This Day, 133 Years Ago:
November 11, 1887, also known as Black Friday, is a day of remembrance for the four of the eight labor leaders accused, without proof, of conspiring to throw a bomb into a crowd that had gathered, in Haymarket Square in Chicago, to demand the right to the eight hour work day. Their names - Albert Fischer, Edward Parsons, George Engel and August Spies - are etched into history as symbols of the injustice of the state, horrific examples intended to scare and suppress the intensity of the uprisings of the time.
Emma Goldman attributed the moment of her political awakening to the night she heard a woman lecturing on the dramatic story of the Haymarket martyrs to the anarchist cause.
In her autobiography, “Living My Life”, Emma recalled :
At the end of Greie's speech I knew what I had surmised all along: the Chicago men were innocent. They were to be put to death for their ideal. But what was their ideal? Johanna Greie spoke of Parsons, Spies, Lingg, and the others as socialists, but I was ignorant of the real meaning of socialism. What I had heard from the local speakers had impressed me as colourless and mechanistic. On the other hand, the papers called these men anarchists, bomb-throwers. What was anarchism? It was all very puzzling. But I had no time for further contemplation. The people were filling out, and I got up to leave. Greie, the chairman, and a group of friends were still on the platform. As I turned towards them, I saw Greie motioning to me. I was startled, my heart beat violently, and my feet felt leaden. When I approached her, she took me by the hand and said: "I never saw a face that reflected such a tumult of emotions as yours. You must be feeling the impending tragedy intensely. Do you know the men?" In a trembling voice I replied: "Unfortunately not, but I do feel the case with every fibre, and when I heard you speak, it seemed to me as if I knew them." She put her hand on my shoulder. "I have a feeling that you will know them better as you learn their ideal, and that you will make their cause your own."
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In 1893, Governor of Illinois, John Peter Altgeld, acknowledged the injustice of the trial, and pardoned the men who remained behind.
In May 1940, Emma was buried next to the graveside erected in memory of the Haymarket Martyrs.
(Image taken from the Forest Home Cemetery Overview Project. Author Unknown. Accessed 2020. http://foresthomecemeteryoverview.weebly.com/uploads/2/1/3/5/21354910/351785_orig.jpg).
