“That sort of talk,” said Lehman, “made me as bad as the rest of them.”
He had fully believed, as his friends had informed him, that it was legal to talk dynamite, and that they could form plans for murder with impunity and without molestation. Mr. Furthmann read and explained the law to him, when he said:
“I am glad now that I have been arrested.”
And he demonstrated the sincerity of his statement by furnishing strong evidence against all the Anarchist leaders that he knew. He was kept in confinement until after the trial and then released by order of the State’s Attorney. He was forty years of age, a carpenter by occupation, and ever since his release he has attended to work and means to live until a good age to make amends for his past life.
The statement he gave me was as follows:
“I belong to the armed section of the International Carpenters’ group. Whenever we had a meeting, the armed section remained five minutes later. To my group belonged myself, my brother, William Hageman, who lives on Rees Street, over Lehman’s grocery store, also Hageman’s brother, who was boarding at the same place, Ernst Niendorf, on Groger Street, Waller, William Seliger, John Thielen and Louis Lingg, all of the North Side group; also Abraham Hermann, Lorenz Hermann, Ernst Hubner, Charley Bock and his brother, William Lange, Michael Schwab, Balthasar Rau, Rudolph Schnaubelt, Fischer and Huber. I attended a meeting, May 3, at 71 West Lake Street, at nine o’clock. I heard Louis Lingg speak there, also Schwab. I saw the circular there which called for revenge and to arms. Waller, or Zoller, opened the meeting as chairman. Lingg said at the meeting that they must arm themselves and attend the meeting at the Haymarket to get revenge for those workingmen who were killed at McCormick’s factory that day by the police. I also heard Schwab urge them to arm themselves and seek revenge on the police. I heard one man call out that all armed men present should go to Greif’s Hall, 54 West Lake Street, that a meeting would be held there in the basement. I went there, as also did my brother Gustav, the two Hagemans, Louis Lingg, Schnaubelt, Breitenfeld, John Thielen and Hubner. The meeting occurred at 54 West Lake Street. I was there during the whole session. My brother was on the outside watching. I heard the speaker say that there would be a meeting at the Haymarket and that they expected a big crowd there, which would give them a chance to use their arms. He also said that the police would no doubt come there to disperse them. If they refused to go, the police would shoot, and they would have a good chance to shoot at them. The speakers at that meeting would be Spies, Fielden and Parsons. The North Side armed group would meet at Neff’s Hall, 58 Clybourn Avenue, on Tuesday night, and they were to be ready with their arms and wait for orders. The Northwest Side group would also be ready and wait for orders. As soon as there was trouble at the Haymarket, they would be at Wicker Park ready for action. I heard the word ‘Ruhe’ spoken of at that meeting in the basement. If that word appeared in the paper—the Arbeiter-Zeitung—the next day, it would mean a revolution, and the attack on the police would be made that night. ‘Y, komme,’ was a sign published in the Arbeiter-Zeitung, meaning that there would be a meeting of the armed men. When I saw that revenge circular at No. 71 West Lake Street, it excited me very much and brought me to the meeting at 54 West Lake Street. I saw Adolph Fischer at that meeting. He made an address to us calling us to arms and urged that we should take revenge on the capitalists and the officers who had killed our brother workingmen on that day at McCormick’s. This man Fischer, whose picture has just been shown me by the Captain, is the person who said he would see that circulars were printed for the Haymarket meeting next day. The word ‘Ruhe’ was our signal word, adopted by the meeting that night at 54 West Lake Street, to attack the police. I heard some one say at the meeting that we should also attack the police station-houses and the police who might be within. They should make dynamite bombs and have them ready to throw into the stations. Lingg said: ‘I will have the dynamite and bombs ready to be used when called for.’ I did not hear of any one else saying or offering to furnish dynamite bombs. I was about fifteen feet away from Lingg when he made the remark. Then I left the meeting and the hall. The unanimous understanding among us all was that all who desired bombs must go to Lingg and get them. And we did not look to any one else for them. It was further stated at the meeting that, in case we should see a patrol wagon on the night of the attack, we should destroy the wagon, the horses and the officers, so that they could not render assistance to the officers at the Haymarket. On Tuesday evening, May 4, at nine o’clock, I went to Neff’s Hall, 58 Clybourn Avenue, and there I met both Hermanns, Rau, the Hagemans, Bock, Seliger and Lingg. Lingg gave me some of those long dynamite bombs and said: ‘Here, you take this and use it.’ He then started away. I heard that night—Tuesday—at eleven o’clock, at Ernst Grau’s saloon, that there had been some shooting that night, that a bomb had been thrown and that many were killed and wounded at the Haymarket. A tall man came into Neff’s Hall that night, May 4, at eleven o’clock, and told us about the shooting, the explosion of the bomb and the killing of the people. His clothes were all covered with mud, and he appeared greatly excited. He said: ‘You are having a good time here drinking beer. See how I look. I was over to the Haymarket and lost my revolvers.’ His name is August. He is the man—about thirty years of age, five feet ten inches tall, smooth face or a slight mustache, and is a bricklayer by occupation. [This was August Groge.] The dynamite bomb I had was made with a gas-pipe. My statement I will swear to at any time I am called upon.”
The bomb he speaks of was among those found by Officer Hoffman at No. 189 Hudson Avenue.
Gustav Lehman was arrested on the same day—May 20—with his brother Otto, only a little earlier in the morning. He was working as a carpenter, on a new building at the southwest corner of Sedgwick and Starr Streets, when Officers Schuettler and Hoffman accosted him, and his home at the time was at No. 41 Fremont Street, in the basement of a small building. He had a poor, sickly wife and six children. His wife,—who subsequently died in the County Hospital, in July, 1888,—when she was notified of his arrest, said: