Bloody Williamson Read Online Free PDF Page B

been aware of what was happening while they exchanged congratulations on the passing of the crisis, they would have been less complacent. For Fox Hughes bungled the mission he had agreed to undertake. He did go to the mine, but with the piece of white bunting he took along stuffed inside his shirt, and he kept it there. Instead of taking several responsible men with him, he went alone except for the driver of his car. From Crenshaw Crossing he proceeded on foot. By his own story, there was still desultory shooting, and he could see no flag on any part of the mine dump. (The next morning, when the Lester men surrendered, their sheet hung forlornly from the telephone wire on which they had placed it.) Concluding that the strikebreakers had not kept their promise, Hughesreturned to Herrin. When he learned there that after his own departure Hunter had been in touch with Hugh Willis, his superior in the union organization, he concluded that the truce was no longer his concern, and made no further effort to do anything about it.
    Thus, as darkness fell, the best chance of peace slipped away. And on the streets of Marion and Herrin there was plain evidence that the chance had gone for good. In both towns mobs formed; once again they tried to obtain arms and ammunition from stores and even from individuals. Men and boys, many of them armed, packed the streets. Policemen had great difficulty in keeping traffic moving. Cars loaded with armed men made their way at high speed in the direction of the Lester mine. The officers on duty asked no questions. What might happen several miles away was no concern of theirs.
    Early in the evening Circuit Judge D. T. Hartwell, who had been holding court at Metropolis, reached Marion. During supper his wife told him what had happened, and what threatened. He drove uptown. There he heard all kinds of rumors, but learned nothing except that serious trouble was impending.
    Shortly after nine p.m. he found the sheriff in the State’s Attorney’s office. Thaxton and Duty had just come in from investigating the morning’s shooting. In a short time Hugh Willis appeared. He had heard in Herrin, he said, that a group at the Greater Marion Association had induced Lester to shut down the strip mine; he had come to find out about it. Duty located Hunter and asked him to come to his office. After some delay the colonel and Major Davis, who had come over from Carbondale that evening, joined the meeting.
    Once again the group faced the problem of putting into effect the truce that had been agreed upon late that afternoon. There was no argument over the terms: the mine was to be shut down, and Lester’s men were to be given safe conduct from the county. The sheriff, they decided, should see that the truce was carried out. Hunter and Hartwell urged him to take his deputies and goto the mine immediately, and Hunter, Davis, and Hugh Willis offered to accompany him. Thaxton refused: he must have sleep. He would go to the mine, but not until morning. With that the others had to be satisfied. Before the conference ended, Hunter, Davis, and the sheriff agreed to meet at Thaxton’s office at six o’clock the following morning.
    Hunter put through a final call to General Black. The truce, he reported, would still go into effect. Troops would not be needed.
    After the meeting broke up, Hunter and Davis returned to the office of the Greater Marion Association. There they found Edrington, his wife, and his secretary. For two hours the five people talked about what had been the most eventful day of their lives. As they talked, the sheriff slept. Hugh Willis, back in Herrin, made a little speech to a group in front of the union office. Thaxton, he told them, was a mighty good fellow: they shouldn’t forget him at the election in the fall. At the mine, he said, there was nothing more to do until morning; then the scabs would come out.
    “God damn them,” Willis concluded, “they ought to have known better than to come