Q. Of those Knights of Labor?
A. Oh, no, sir; it was a committee appointed in this mass meeting of members and non-members. I went over there to that meeting, with the understanding that there were delegates to be there from all over the county. I do not know that our committee was notified officially of this meeting, only it was spoken all over the street, and I presume there was notice in the local press, that there was to be a meeting held. When I went there, there was a few thousand people there, and after a while the meeting was called to order by some gentleman, a stranger to me, and some gentleman, I forget his name, was elected chairman. He was also a stranger to me, and the meeting was orderly—there was a few disorderly men there, but the average of the meeting was an orderly meeting, with the exception of those few that may have been aggravated by seeing these men they termed blacklegs working in their places in the shops. I was told that the meeting was called by the Lackawanna Coal Company, to receive the report of some committee, but I never heard of any committee reporting. I did not take any part there, more so than going round, and when I would hear some one making remarks there, to try to quash him of all such remarks, until a letter was brought there by somebody and read—a letter purporting to be written, as I understood at the time, by W. W. Scranton, and in that letter, it was read there, that Scranton stated something, that the men should live on mush and milk, or something to that effect. I was so far off I could not hear the letter, and that drove these men around there to a rage.
Q. Did you understand that this letter had been written by Scranton?
A. I never thought that was the letter. That was my impression. The impression it left on me was that it was written by some men to accomplish their object—to inspire the men to violate the laws.
Q. Do you know of any resolutions passed at that meeting? Do you know the purport of those resolutions?
A. I do not know of any resolutions.
Q. When this meeting adjourned, what was the general understanding of what was to be done?
A. The meeting adjourned. There were a few that got up a cry to go and drive all the blacklegs out; and the meeting adjourned, and the men started and went up in the direction of the shops.
Q. What do you mean by the shops?
A. The manufactories, you know.