Haymarket (48 page)

November 11 dawned bleak and cold on a city gripped by fear. Rumors abounded that anarchists had planted bombs in the basement of the jailhouse and intended either to blow it up or to storm it, in a last-minute effort to free their comrades. Many in the city thought a catastrophic outbreak of some sort inevitable, even though it was known that Parsons had several days earlier put out a plea to the workmen of Chicago not to resort to any form of violent protest.

“A diversion, a ruse,” Superintendent Ebersold had said when told of Parsons’s statement. “He’s trying to throw us off guard.” Proud of his superior insight, Ebersold ordered police units, supplemented by militia troops armed with Gatling guns and cannon, stationed throughout the city, with the larger portion concentrated on the blocks and rooftops surrounding the Cook County jail. Factories closed and stores boarded up their windows. Most of the well-to-do stayed indoors; the few men who ventured out armed themselves with revolvers. Those thought in the most danger of reprisals from the “mob”—among them, Judge Gary, Grinnell, Ebersold, and Bonfield—were given special police protection.

The day before, as an additional precaution, a secret court session had convened and issued the necessary legal papers for allowing the police to “arrest at will and put down summarily” any anarchist found loitering suspiciously in the vicinity, broadly defined, of the Cook County jail. The blocks immediately adjacent to the prison were sealed off with ropes and all traffic in the area suspended. Three hundred policemen armed with Winchester rifles surrounded the immediate perimeter of the jailhouse.
In New York City, seven thousand workers marched through the streets to protest the pending executions.

Having dozed fitfully for an hour or two, the prisoners were awakened early for breakfast. Albert washed his face, drank some coffee, and ate fried oysters, pronouncing them “tasty.” He felt anxious about how Spies, the most high-strung among them, was faring and felt relieved, when the four men greeted each other across the line of cells, to find that his friend seemed composed.

Albert wondered why Lucy and the children had not yet appeared. To chase their image from his mind, he sat down to scan the morning papers. But suddenly his cell door was thrown open and the turnkey admitted a man announced as “the Reverend Doctor Bolton.” Albert listened patiently to the reverend’s assorted admonitions to repentance and assurances of grace, but when he finished, politely told him that he thought religion was superstition and preachers were Pharisees. Reverend Bolton, plainly shocked, retained his poise. “So great is the Maker’s magnanimity,” Bolton said, “that He is able to disregard even the crudest forms of blasphemy.” He then bid Parsons, or rather his Soul, a hasty farewell. “Remember,” Albert called out to the reverend’s back, “I didn’t send for you.”

Early that morning Nina and her mother drove in their carriage to the jail and asked permission to say good-bye to Spies. A deputy sheriff told them that they had already had their final visit and turned them brusquely away. Returning to their home, the Van Zandts closed the curtains on every window and locked every door. A neighbor who snuck up close to the house reported with satisfaction that he’d heard sounds of moaning and intense crying coming from within.

The deputy sheriff had told Lucy, when turning her away the previous night, that she and her two children would be admitted for a final farewell
at eight-thirty the following morning. Lucy slept a fitful few hours, then at dawn aroused and dressed Lulu and Albert Jr. The morning was cold and Lulu had again been running a fever, so Lucy bundled her up in three layers of sweaters. Lizzie and William arrived promptly at seven-thirty to escort them downtown. Once there, William went off to the offices of the Defense Committee and the others proceeded to within a block of the jail, where they ran directly into the cordon of police guarding the approach.

Lucy identified herself to the police officer standing on the corner and told him that she’d been promised admission.

“Not at this entry point,” he blandly said, “but I think it likely that if you pass on to the next corner, the officer there will let you through.”

But at the next corner, the lieutenant in charge, refusing eye contact, stared above Lucy’s head and said, “You must first obtain an order from the sheriff.”

“And where is the sheriff to be found?” Lucy asked, her panic rising.

“If you proceed to the west corner of the next block, straight ahead, you’ll find facilities for sending a message to him.” But when Lucy arrived at the third corner, no one seemed to know anything about where the sheriff was or how to reach him.

And so it went for some two hours, as the dispirited band of four were shuttled, under this excuse or that promise, from pillar to post of the prison. Never once did an officer say outright, “You positively cannot see your husband; you are forbidden to enter the prison.” Instead, there was always the suggestion that if she passed quietly along, at some unspecified place a path would open and she and her children could make their farewells.

Precious little time now remained before the scheduled executions at 11:30. Lucy’s nerves had become unstrung, unwonted tears streamed down her face; and the children were shivering in the cold, little Lulu’s eyes glassy with fever.

Desperate, Lucy humbly begged the officer in command at the prison corner where they now stood to at least allow the children in for one last blessing from their father, one final image that might linger in their hearts. The officer told her to go away. Her agony suddenly spilling over, Lucy started screaming at the policeman, “Kill me in the same way you’re murdering my husband!” Lizzie took Lucy in her arms and tried to soothe
her, but to no avail. Her shrieks pierced the air and three police officers, desperate to shut her up and promising to “see what we can do about getting you inside,” dragged her around the corner, where she, Lizzie and the two children were thrown into a paddy wagon.

Thus were they finally taken “inside,” Lizzie locked in one dank basement cell, Lucy and the children in another. All four were stripped to the skin and searched, even the children, who screeched in terror. The search completed, the heavy doors of the cells clanged shut and they were left, without light, water, or food, to sit and wait.

Promptly at eleven-thirty Sheriff Matson, the county physician, and several deputies appeared at the entrance to Spies’s cell. With reporters crowding around, Matson, his voice tremulous, read the death warrant aloud as Spies stood with his arms folded across his chest, his face impassive. Spies was then ordered to step out from his cell into the corridor, where a leather belt about an inch and a half wide was bound around his chest to pinion his arms just above the elbows, and his wrists were handcuffed behind his back. The sheriff’s party then proceeded to the other three cells and repeated the same procedure. As Albert’s arms were being restrained, he looked up and saw Sam Fielden, tears pouring down his face, standing at the grating of his cell. “Good-bye, dear Sam,” Albert called out, giving him a wan smile.

The solemn march to the scaffold began, with the sheriff in the lead and reporters crowding in on all sides. Albert turned to one of them and asked sardonically, “Would you care to follow?”

The scaffold had been erected in the north corridor, with benches below it that seated two hundred people. They’d been gathering since six o’clock that morning. Every seat was taken and the room buzzed with agitated talk. But the moment the sound of the approaching procession was heard on the iron stairway, an instant and absolute silence descended.

In a few seconds the prisoners appeared, each with a deputy by his side. When they reached their respective places on the trap, they were turned to face the spectators. Each man remained composed, but each in his own fashion. Spies gave the audience a slightly contemptuous look, then fixed his eyes on some invisible object above their heads. Fischer,
erect and confident, glanced boldly around, as if immensely curious about who these people might be. Engel radiated happiness, the guest of honor at some noteworthy event. Albert looked merely reconciled and stared straight into the faces below him. His own face was ashen.

The impression had prevailed that the condemned would be allowed to say a few final words, but as the deputies stooped down and buckled leather straps on the feet of each prisoner, it was apparent that a swift conclusion had been determined.

As the nooses dangling overhead were lifted from their hooks, there were several audible gasps from the spectators. Spies was the first to have the rope placed around his neck. It was drawn a bit too tight and a deputy loosened it to ease Spies’s discomfort; he gave a faint smile in acknowledgment of the kindness. Next it was Fischer’s turn. Entirely self-possessed, he bent his head forward slightly to facilitate the adjustment of the noose under his left ear. When Engel received his, he turned his head several times to say a word or two to his deputy; judging from the smile on Engel’s face, he could have been thanking him for placing the nation’s highest decoration around his neck. When Albert’s turn came, he stood unmoving, seemingly resigned, but with a faraway look in his eye. For an instant, Aunt Ester’s face appeared to him, suffused with loving grace.

Shrouds were thrown over each man’s shoulders, fastened at the neck and waist. Then came the white caps, tied loosely under each man’s chin, completely blocking out the light of day streaming in from the windows. The caps were known to mark the last of the preparations. The moment had arrived.

Suddenly, from under his hood, Spies’s voice rang out like a thunderclap: “There will come a time when our silence will be more powerful than the voices you are strangling today!”

“Hurray for anarchy!” Fischer immediately shouted.

“Hurray for anarchy!” Engel echoed more loudly still.

A deputy was tying the last fastening in Albert’s shroud when Fischer yelled out again—“This is the happiest moment of my life!”

Then Albert, his voice firm and strong, was heard to say, “Let me speak, Sheriff Matson! Let the voice of the people be—”