On this day in Labor History the year was 1887.
That was the day that four men were hung in Chicago for their alleged role in the bombing at a labor rally at the city’s Haymarket Square a year earlier.
Eight men were put on trial.
Although the prosecution did not prove any of the men had ties to the bombing, five were sentenced to die.
Louis Lingg died in jail before the execution could take place.
The others were martyred for their support of the labor movement and the fight for the eight-hour day.
Three of those executed were born in Germany.
August Spies and Adolph Fischer, worked for a Chicago German-language, worker’s newspaper.
George Engel owned a toy store.
Backlash against foreign-born anarchists helped stoke public hysteria over Haymarket.
The final martyr was southern-born Albert Parsons, the editor of The Alarm, an English-language workers paper.
The day after they died, the Chicago Tribunereported on the brutality of their execution, “Then begins a scene of horror that freezes the blood. The loosely-adjusted nooses remain behind the left ear and do not slip to the back of the neck. Not a single neck is broken, and the horrors of a death by strangulation begin....”
Thousands of mourners joined the funeral procession of the five slain men.
In 1893, Governor John Peter Altgeld granted the three defendants still a jail a full pardon.
The monument to the Haymarket eight stands at Forest Home Cemetery, just west of Chicago—drawing visitors from across the world to remember these martyrs for the eight-hour movement.
May Day is celebrated as the worker’s holiday around the world in commemoration of the events in Chicago.
October 23 - John Sweeney is Elected
October 22 - Pretty Boy Floyd Is Gunned Down
October 21 - Through Rain, Sleet, Snow & Anthrax
October 20 - Remembering Debs
October 19 - Tragedy on the Tracks
October 18 - Voice of an Era
October 17 - Fighting to End Poverty
October 16 - Thank A Farmer
October 15 - Too Little, Too Late for Radiation Sickness
October 14 - Marching for Equality
October 13 - We Whipped the Ivy League and You Can Too!
October 12 - Workers Begin to Come Together
October 11 - Remembering Mary Heaton Vorse
October 10 - With a Push of a Button, Oceans Are Joined
October 9 - The End of the Boom Boom RoOm
October 8 - The Great Chicago Fire
October 7 - Housing Now!
October 6 - Clinton Signs the Hatch Act
October 5 - Hollywood’s Black Friday
October 4 - A Chain Reaction of Human Misery
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