Today -100: July 28, 1913: I walked, the sooner to be free

Lois Marshall, wife of Vice President Thomas Marshall, says that “the fashions of today ought to convince anyone that a woman is not fit to vote.” Instead, women should work to do away with the slashed skirt and the turkey trot.

British suffragist Sylvia Pankhurst describes being violently arrested by the Metropolitan Police, and her subsequent hunger, thirst and sleep strike. “By Friday to walk about the cell meant to faint many times; but, when I could summon up the strength for it I walked, the sooner to be free.” Released again on license, she leads a crowd from Trafalgar Square toward Downing Street to deliver a petition from the East End to the prime minister, but they are broken up by police. Sylvia, no less militant than her mother and sister, is increasingly turning to the poor women of the East End and towards mass protest rather than the individualistic acts of property damage in which the WSPU now specializes (although she did break a window in the police station).

The bodies from the Binghamton Clothing Company fire that could not be identified, 21 of them, are buried. They had to use a trolley to bring all the caskets to the cemetery, since there were not enough hearses in the city.

The US demands the Mexican government arrest soldiers who shot an American immigration officer in Juarez. He was there investigating an American negro white slaver, who may have bribed the soldiers to kill him. They arrested the immigration cop and when he realized they were not taking him to hq and were probably intent on murdering him, he ran away and was shot in the back, as was the custom.

The NYT editorializes in favor of recognizing the Huerta Junta in Mexico: “The character of Gen. Huerta is none of our business. It need not be considered”.

Don't see comments? Click on the post title to view or post comments.