The colonel came to me one day and told me that my lawyers had obtained a habeas corpus for me and that I was to be released; that the military would give me a ticket to any place I desired.
“Colonel,” said I, “I can accept nothing from men whose business it is to shoot down my class whenever they strike for decent wages. I prefer to walk.”
“All right, Mother,” said he, “Goodbye!”
The operators were bringing in Mexicans to work as scabs in the mines. In this operation they were protected by the military all the way from the Mexican borders. They were brought in to the strike territory without knowing the conditions, promised enormous wages and easy work. They were packed in cattle cars, in charge of company gunmen, and if when arriving, they attempted to leave, they were shot. Hundreds of these poor fellows had been lured into the mines with promises of free land. When they got off the trains, they were driven like cattle into the mines by gunmen.
This was the method that broke the strike ten years previously. And now it was the scabs of a decade before who were striking—the docile, contract labor of Europe.
I was sent down to El Paso to give the facts of the Colorado strike to the Mexicans who were herded together for the mines in that city. I held meetings, I addressed Mexican gatherings, I got the story over the border. I did everything in my power to prevent strike breakers going into the Rockefeller mines.
In January, 1914, I returned to Colorado. When I got off the train at Trinidad, the militia met me and ordered me back on the train. Nevertheless, I got off. They marched me to the telegrapher’s office, then they changed their minds, and took me to the hotel where they had their headquarters. I told them I wanted to get my breakfast. They escorted me to the dining room.
“Who is paying for my breakfast?” said I.
“The state,” said they.
“Then as the guest of the state of Colorado I’ll order a good breakfast.” And I did—all the way from bacon to pie.