Anarchy and Anarchists / A History of the Red Terror and the Social Revolution in America and Europe; Communism, Socialism, and Nihilism in Doctrine and in Deed; The Chicago Haymarket Conspiracy and the Detection and Trial of the Conspirators

by Michael J. Schaack

While the Anarchists were confined in the Cook County Jail they were quartered in that portion of the premises known as “murderers’ row.” This row faces south on the first gallery, in view of the entrance to the jail corridor, and had been so designated because in times past men accused of murder and awaiting trial, or men convicted of murder and awaiting execution of sentence, were kept in the cells on that tier. Lingg, the most defiant Anarchist of them all, occupied cell No. 22; Engel, No. 23; Spies, No. 24; Schwab, No. 26; Fielden, No. 27, and Fischer, No. 28. During Neebe’s detention, before being taken to the penitentiary, he occupied cell No. 21. All the prisoners were subjected to strict prison discipline. The rules of the jail knew no relaxation in the case of any one brought into that part of the establishment, and each regulation was carried out to the very letter.

Jailor Folz is a veteran in the service, having filled the jailorship off and on for twenty-two years, and he thoroughly understands all the requirements in the way of jail discipline, to prevent escapes and guard against suicides and assaults. I know him well, and he always has one ear and one eye open to the conduct of the prisoners and the other eye and ear for his own security, like a sailor who gives one-half of his body to the ship and reserves the other half for his own safety. Where so many desperate characters are confined it requires the utmost vigilance to keep them under control and restrain them from violent outbreaks. Men whose lives have been almost a continual record of misdeeds, crimes and murders are not, as a rule, easily handled, and the wonder is that there have been so few to create trouble in Folz’s bailiwick.

One of the rules is a regular inspection of all the cells for contraband articles and the exclusion of all implements calculated to aid a prisoner in effecting his escape. Sometimes a revolver may be found during these inspections; at other times a tiny saw for cutting the bars, and then again some tool for cutting through the flagstones with a view to reaching the air-shaft or getting into the sewer underneath; and, though rarely, even smuggled poison has been discovered.

All prisoners are carefully searched before being locked up, but it frequently happens that prisoners are permitted to talk with their friends through the lawyers’ cage. This cage is an inclosure ten by sixteen feet in dimensions, with iron bars and strong wires, and while it would seem impossible to pass anything through the narrow interstices, now and then an aperture is pried open wide enough to pass in contraband articles. In this way many things have been found smuggled into the jail. Food and delicacies handed into the jail office for prisoners are always carefully examined, and this precaution was particularly exercised in the case of the Anarchists as the time approached for their execution.

On Sunday morning, November 6, 1887, Mr. Folz gave orders about eight o’clock to have the cells of the Anarchists searched, and Deputies John Eagan and O. E. Hogan were detailed for that purpose. Lingg’s cell was first examined, and while the search proceeded he was locked up in the “lawyers’ cage.” A lot of revolutionary books, copies of the Arbeiter-Zeitung and other papers were taken out and thrown temporarily in the corridor. In one corner of the room stood a ten-pound starch-box, in one nook of which there was a kerosene lamp, about which again some onions were piled. Box and onions were placed on the gallery platform for the time being.

The officers were next about to proceed to a search of Engel’s cell, but just before doing so Hogan happened to kick box, onions and all over the platform, down onto the main floor. At the time some of the prisoners, who were exercising themselves in the corridor, got curious as to the contents of the rubbish, and, in the hope of finding something they might desire, began a search of the pile. Some of them seemed particularly interested in something they had discovered, and Hogan, noticing their intent gaze, stopped to look at them. He noticed that one of the prisoners had something strange in his hands. Eagan also noticed the same thing and started on a run down-stairs. Arriving at the place where the knot of prisoners had gathered, he found that the curious object which they were scrutinizing was nothing else than a dynamite bomb. The bomb, it appears, had been dashed out of the box as it fell on the floor from the gallery platform above, and interest at once centered in the innocent-looking box. Mr. Eagan found therein three other bombs, and they were immediately taken to Jailor Folz’s office. The box was next carefully examined, and it was found to have a false bottom, in which the bombs had been concealed. Some six days before this box had been brought into the jail, and, being apparently empty, it had been passed in to Lingg. It was evident that it had been made according to Lingg’s instructions by some handy carpenter who was a close friend, and, judging from its construction, it seems to have been patterned after Lingg’s trunk, which, it will be remembered, also had a false bottom, and in whose secret apartment I found a lot of dynamite, together with a coil of fuse and a supply of caps. Either the bombs were in the box at the time it was brought to the jail, or they must have been smuggled in through a temporarily-forced opening in the wire cage. The officials incline to the former theory.

Lingg was a most interested spectator. It was evident from his actions that the discovery greatly troubled him. His face became almost livid with rage, his eyes fairly snapped fire, and he fumed in his cage like an imprisoned beast of prey. He was speechless with anger, and every motion betrayed an energy of passion that was fearful to behold.

After a little while Lingg was taken out of the “lawyers’ cage,” and thereafter he was confined in a cell fixed up for him on the lower floor, where he could be directly under the eyes of the officials, who by this time had come to regard him as a very dangerous man. At ten o’clock on the same morning, I received a dispatch from the Sheriff asking me to call at the jail immediately. Arriving there, I met Sheriff Matson and Jailor Folz, and after they had explained the circumstances of the morning’s find, the four bombs were handed to me for examination. I found that they were all loaded with dynamite of the regular kind, and I gave it as my opinion that they were manifestly intended for suicidal purposes, to escape the gallows. I could not believe that they were made for any other purpose. Both the Sheriff and the Jailor concurred in this view, and they so expressed themselves to outsiders, although sensational reports were circulated in the newspapers that the bombs were smuggled in to be used especially on the day of the execution, to blow the jail, prisoners and visitors to the four winds.

I took charge of the bombs, and subsequently, at the station, gave them a more thorough examination. They were all of the same size, being six inches long, three-eighth gas-pipe, and one end of each had been plugged with a boiler rivet one inch long. On each rivet there had been cut about a dozen notches with a sharp chisel, and after the rivets had been inserted hot lead had been poured into the pipe from the top, thus fastening them in place. A wooden plug, through which a hole had been bored in the center for the cap and fuse, had been put at the other end of each pipe; and thus plugged, with a charge of dynamite inside, it was a most destructive implement. The dynamite used was of the regular factory make, the percussion cap of English manufacture, and the fuse of the tar-cloth, water-proof kind. The fuse was cut scarcely an inch long, and a fuse of that length would explode the cap as soon almost as it was ignited. I explained these features in a general way to Sheriff Matson and Jailor Folz, and told them that with such a short fuse no one using one of these deadly contrivances could light it and then throw the bomb away before it would explode. It might, as I explained to them, be kept about the body or inserted in a man’s mouth, and in an instant after being lighted an explosion would follow. Hence my theory was that they were designed exclusively for suicidal purposes. A photographic illustration of the suicide bombs appears on page 595.