Haymarket (31 page)

Harrison strode directly up to him. “There’s no need for this,” he said sharply, looking around at the armed officers. “I’ve just come from the rally, and the tone throughout, with a few minor lapses, has been moderate and unthreatening. Nothing has occurred, or seems likely to occur, to require the intervention of the police.”

“I entirely agree with you, Your Honor,” Bonfield replied. His voice was smooth, his expression benign, but the hunched tension in his shoulders conveyed anything but compliance. “I’ve had plainclothes detectives at the meeting from its onset and they confirm your characterization of the proceedings.”

That came as a relief to Harrison. “Very well, then. I suggest you give the order at once for your reserves at the other stations to go home.”

“The order, sir, has already been issued.” The surprise on the mayor’s face pleased Bonfield. He despised the man for his womanish scruples—and for how easy it was to circumvent them.

“And what of the men assembled here?” Harrison asked.

“With all due respect, Your Honor, I think it’s advisable to hold them on standby until the meeting has actually concluded. We’ve heard rumors of plans for a violent confrontation to coincide with adjournment.”

“There have been rumors of every kind and description,” the mayor responded tartly, “and not a single one has proven true.”

“I’d take it as a personal kindness, sir,” Bonfield said deferentially, “if you’d allow me the peace of mind of holding my men here for just a short while longer.”

Bonfield sounded downright humble, and the mayor, in his decency, was moved by it. “Very well, Mr. Bonfield. But not a moment more than is needed.”

“Exactly my intention, sir.” Bonfield respectfully bowed his head, chuckling inwardly at the gullibility of the old fool. “I am the one,” he thought contentedly, “who will decide what is needed, and when.”

Convinced that all was well, Harrison bid Bonfield and his officers good evening, and left for home.

Back at Haymarket, Fielden had been speaking for only a few minutes when a sudden gust of cold wind swept in off the lake and the darkening
sky threatened a downpour. Parsons yelled up to Fielden that they should adjourn to Zepf’s Hall, a popular tavern nearby.

“There’s a meeting of the furniture-workers union going on there,” Fielden called back. “Don’t worry, I’ll wrap it up in two or three minutes, and we can all go home.”

“The children are getting cold,” Parsons said, “we’ll go on ahead to Zepf’s and meet you there.”

Seeing the Parsons group leave, and with the weather growing more ominous, a number of others, including Adolph Fischer, decided to call it quits; no more than a few hundred people remained to hear Fielden’s closing remarks.

Aiming to end on a forceful note that might reenergize the dispirited crowd before it scattered into the night, Fielden, eyes bloodshot and voice hoarse, told the crowd in his blunt way that there was “no security for the working class under a social system that had shot down the men at McCormick’s in cold blood.” He implored them to “have nothing more to do with the law, except to lay hands on it and throttle it until it makes its last kick.”

The two plainclothes detectives hanging back in the crowd raced over to the Desplaines station. Fielden, they breathlessly reported to Bonfield, was inciting people to riot. Before they had even arrived, Bonfield had had an officer follow Harrison from the station with instructions to report back the moment he saw the mayor mount his horse and ride away. That report had arrived five minutes before the plainclothesmen and Bonfield had already ordered his men to shoulder their Winchester repeater rifles and fall in line outside the station house, which they were already doing.

For weeks Bonfield’s men had been conspicuously practicing advanced techniques of crowd control, marching shoulder to shoulder up and down Chicago’s streets, alarming the citizenry with their militaristic maneuvers. Lucy had written an article about it for the
Alarm
. “What foreign enemy,” she wrote, “is about to invade America?” She answered her own question: “The only sovereignty at risk, the only lives, are those of American workers.”

With his men now assembled in front of the station, Bonfield ordered them to march at once, and in strict formation, to Haymarket Square. “And
on the double
!” he called out, fearful the meeting would disperse before he
got the opportunity to break it up. His throat was dry with excitement, his penis swelling uncomfortably in his tight-fitting pants.

The police, 180-strong, arrived at the square just as Fielden was finishing his remarks. “Any animal, however loathsome,” he yelled, “will resist when stepped upon. Are men less than snails or worms?”

Bonfield and his second in command, Captain Ward, strode directly to the front of the wagon on which Fielden stood. “I command you in the name of the people of the state of Illinois,” Ward called out loudly, “immediately and peaceably to disperse.”

“But we
are
peaceable,” Fielden said quickly.

Ward repeated his command, this time louder still.

“All right then, we will go,” said Fielden, “We were about to anyway.”

He stepped down from the wagon. At the precise second his foot touched the ground, a noisy device sputtered overhead, giving off a faint glow and landing directly in the front ranks of the police. It exploded with enormous force, killing one officer, Mathias Degan, outright, badly wounding half a dozen others, and shattering windows throughout the area.

After a moment of stunned silence, the police regrouped, firing round after round directly into the crowd. The noise was so loud that some mistook it for cannonry. As Spies dismounted from the speakers’ wagon, an officer aimed his revolver directly at his back. Seeing the officer out of the corner of his eye, Spies’s brother, Henry, grabbed the weapon just as it went off—and fell to the ground with a bullet in the groin. Unaware, Spies was pushed along by the fleeing, panicky crowd.

Amidst shrieks and groans, people fled in every direction to escape the onslaught of bullets and clubs, scattering down the side streets with the police in enraged pursuit, firing in every direction. Not satisfied with a single revolver, Bonfield grabbed the weapon of a fallen officer and started blazing away double-fisted. The Desplaines station sent out a riot alarm and patrol wagons from all over the city descended on the area. Within minutes some thousand officers had made a clean sweep of the three blocks surrounding Haymarket, ruthlessly clubbing anyone who dared to linger.

The wounded, their moans filling the air, lay strewn across the pavement; those able to crawl away pulled themselves into nearby stores; others, dragged by friends, disappeared down alleyways. One young boy bled to death in a drugstore at the corner of Halsted and Madison. In the
weeks ahead roughly equal numbers of officers and civilians—seven in most estimates—would also die of their wounds, and the total number of seriously wounded would rise above a hundred. It had all happened in five minutes.

Mayor Harrison arrived home at 10:20, got undressed, and was about to get into bed when he heard what sounded like a cannon go off in the distance. Raising his bedroom window, he was bombarded with the noise of small arms and revolver shots coming from the direction of Haymarket Square. Dressing quickly, he rode on the gallop back to the Desplaines Station.

When Harrison pushed open the door to the station, a jolting scene of devastation met his eyes. Some two dozen wounded officers lay scattered on the floor and benches, their groans filling the air as a handful of doctors and nurses attempted to minister to them. Several of the injured, ashen and silent, blood oozing from multiple wounds, were clearly near death.

Harrison, stunned, went straight up to Bonfield. “What in God’s name has happened?” he demanded, his eyes dancing with disbelief and anger.

“When we arrived at Haymarket, sir, my men—”

Harrison broke in. “What were you doing in Haymarket?! I had your distinct promise that—”

“The decision to hold my men on standby,” Bonfield said calmly, “to which Your Honor graciously acceded, proved to be a wise one. The final speaker, Samuel Fielden, did indeed—just as predicted—attempt to incite the mob to violence. We had no choice, as defenders of law and order, but to hasten to Haymarket to prevent a bloodbath.”

“But a bloodbath,” Harrison said, glancing over at the wounded, “seems to be precisely what you precipitated.”

“Not at all, sir. These noble men have prevented a far greater disaster.”

There’s no point arguing with this man, Harrison told himself in exasperated anger. In his arrogance, he’ll lie through his teeth. I must attempt to get what facts I can, and deal with his insubordination later.

“And when you got to Haymarket,” Harrison said evenly, “what happened?”

“I ordered the mob to disperse, sir,” Bonfield said. “But instead, it
opened fire on the police. In self-defense, my men were forced to fire back. Then some villain in the crowd threw a bomb directly into our ranks.”

“A bomb?”

“Yes sir, a bomb.” Maybe that’ll open the old fool’s eyes, Bonfield thought to himself. “Some of my men say it came from a window, others say from within the crowd itself. Several insist it was thrown from the wagon on which Fielden was giving his speech.”

One of Bonfield’s lieutenant’s suddenly spoke up. “It’s also been suggested, sir,” he said to Harrison, “that the bomb may have been intended for the crowd, not the police. We’d been driving the people forward at such a rapid pace that had the bomb struck a mere two or three seconds earlier, it would have landed where the workers had just been standing …”

A fierce glance from Bonfield silenced the lieutenant. “That view, Your Honor, has already been discredited.”

A reporter from the
Inter-Ocean
newspaper stepped forward and asked the mayor what he planned to do. “I can’t tell yet …” Harrison replied. “This is the sort of thing where a man must be guided by the facts, and the facts alone, not theories. This disgusts and saddens me … But I will protect this city.”

Albert was looking out of the window of Zepf’s saloon, with Lizzie, Lucy and the children seated at a table not far off, when the sound of the explosion ripped through the air. It was so loud that Adolph Fischer, seated at another table, feared that the police had attacked the meeting with a Gatling gun. Immediately after, volley after volley could be heard and people started rushing into Zepf’s to escape the hailstorm of bullets, some of which whistled into the saloon through the open doors before the owners were able to rush over and close them. Just before they did, Spies staggered in, panting from exhaustion.

Lizzie and Lucy dashed over to aid him, while Albert scooped up the children in his arms and tried to soothe them. “Don’t be frightened, little ones, don’t be frightened.” Lulu’s face lit up with excitement at all the unexpected liveliness, but Albert Jr. buried his head in his father’s shoulder, shut his eyes tight and screamed.

Someone shouted that for better protection they should vacate to the saloon’s back room, and nearly everyone quickly moved there, shutting the door behind them. There they sat in total darkness until, after some
fifteen minutes, someone opened the door and told them the firing had ceased and all was quiet.

The street in front of Zepf’s was deserted. At the moment, no police were in sight, and the people who’d been inside the hall quickly scattered in various directions. “We’re all in danger of imminent arrest, you realize,” Spies said. “Let’s not make it easy for them by sticking together as a group.” He embraced the others quickly, then swiftly left the building. The Parsons and Lizzie hurried down Desplaines Street toward home.

Lizzie was the first to speak. “If any of our people are in danger, Albert, it is you. You dare not stay in the city.”

Albert looked startled and said nothing, but Lucy immediately seconded Lizzie’s view. “Lizzie’s right. You’re the best-known labor leader in the city. The administration’s going to have to blame this massacre on somebody, and you can be sure it won’t be themselves. You’ve got to leave, at least for a few days, until the hysteria passes.”

“I couldn’t possibly,” Albert said firmly. “It’s not an option. I can’t leave our friends behind.”

“They’d all agree with me, I’m certain of it,” Lizzie said with unexpected passion. “They love you. They want you safe.”

“You don’t want to be taken unawares,” Lucy added, knowing that Albert wouldn’t consent unless appealed to on grounds of what was right for the movement. “Once you’re at a safe distance, you can see what’s needed for the good of the whole and make your decision accordingly.”

“I don’t think I ought to go,” Albert repeated, but this time with less vehemence.

“I insist.” Lucy sounded implacable. “You must go for our sake.”

Albert looked puzzled, allowing Lucy to press the advantage. “Think of the effect on the people’s morale if you were locked away in Bridewell. And what of our own children? Do you want them to see you dragged in cuffs from our home? What would they do with their father locked away for months, or years? What would I do?” She threw her arms around him, and Albert buried his face in her neck.

“You really think I ought to go?” he said quietly.

“Yes—go!” She held him at arm’s length, making a strenuous effort not to let the qualms she felt show in her face.

“Me, too! Me, too!” Albert Jr. clamored, folding himself under his father’s arm.

“Next time, sweetheart,” Albert said quietly, “I promise … next time …” He turned to Lucy. “Where will I go to?” he asked plaintively.

“You’ll go straight to William and our house in Geneva,” Lizzie said.

“Perfect!” Lucy exclaimed. “The police won’t immediately make the connection, and by the time they do, William will have secured a more distant hideaway for you.”

Reluctantly, Albert gave his consent. But he warned the two women that he wasn’t convinced and might easily have a change of heart within a day or two.

“Well don’t come knocking on
my
door,” Lucy said, “Just take yourself straight to the Desplaines police station. Bonfield will give you a warm welcome, even if I won’t.” Lucy suddenly looked as if she might burst into tears.