COXEY'S ARMY - Five - AT THE GATES

 

I suppose, in the category of those seeing Coxey's Army as a relief from oppression,  we have to include 14 year old Albert Hicks, of East 83rd street in Manhattan. According to the Brooklyn Eagle, Albert had a fight with his mother and ran away from home, saying he was going to join Coxey’s Army.  

According to the Eagle, Albert made it no farther than the ten year old Brooklyn Bridge, where a police officer took him into custody, and called his father to come to collect the boy. It was a common story, an angry fourteen year old running away from home, not worth repeating on the front page of a large newspaper, except for the dubious connection to “Coxey’s Army”. 

Which may explain why the hero of this story bore the same name as the last pirate hung in New York City, back on Friday, 13 July, 1861.

Pirates were self employed sailors,  committing robbery without government sanction.  And in that spring of 1892, the Congressmen, members of the cabinet and lobbyist for the wealthy, considered the Commonweal Army as pirates, practicing the dangerously romantic concept that government can be petitioned directly by its citizens. It had not really been tried in America since the civil war.  And consider what that experiment cost. 

So working class Americans came out to have a look at Coxey’s Army, which was doing this odd thing. And the vast majority were not frightened by what they saw.   The mixing of whites and blacks did cause some unease, but not enough to deny the logic of joining people looking for work with work that ought to be done, such as building roads. 

But the stories of Coxey's Army did scare Congressmen and the President, and infuriated the wealthy and powerful who were not interested in sharing "their" money. 

"Once, indeed, the Tin Woodman stepped upon a beetle that was crawling along the road, and killed the poor little thing. This made the Tin Woodman very unhappy, for he was always careful not to hurt any living creature; and as he walked along he wept several tears of sorrow and regret."

1900  L. Frank Baum "The Wonderful Wizard of Oz"

On Sunday, 22 April, 1892 , the Philadelphia recruits, under the top hat wearing Christopher Columbus Jones, arrived in Hagerstown. They army had been waiting for them, but the reinforcements numbered  just 18 .  Similar reinforcements coming from Chicago, Kansas and Georgia were being cut off by local authorities and jailed or broken up. Clearly the wealthy in America were not going to surrender addiction without a fight. 

This day, too, William G. Moore, Chief of the District of Columbia Metropolitan Police , publicly announced that if the Commonweal Army entered the Federal City, he would enforce an 1830 regulation making it illegal for anyone to enter the District who would likely become a “public charge’.  It was an absurdly pompous threat on the face of it, since being arrested for violating the 60 year old ordinance would achieve the very object the ordinance was designed to discourage. Prisoners were by definition, in the public charge. There is a reason criminalizing poverty has been discarded. But, it seems, every generation must relearn that reason on their own.

But the commission that ran the District of Columbia went even further. Knowing that Coxey's soldiers sought donations of food and money, Moore announced that hence forth it would be illegal to solicit funds without a license, even though no licenses yet existed and no requirements had yet been written for such a license.

In addition it would now be illegal for there to be any assembly on public property without a license., despite no such license being in existence, and no procedure for obtaining such a nonexistent license was yet in existence.  And no obstruction of public roads would be permitted, either, said the commission, such as pedestrians walking down a public street.  If these regulations were meant to discourage Coxey’s Army, they failed.  In fact, the confrontational approach probably added to the Army’s numbers, as the unemployed, who before had just been desperate and rejected, now began to get angry.

Bright and early on 23 April the 300 plus members of Coxey’s Army marched (above) out of the Hagerstown camp, with flags and banners flying. They only made about six miles that day, stopping for the night at the little community of Hyattstown, where some of the men were provided with home cooked meals by locals, and the rest were welcomed to camp along Little Bennett Creek. Thousands of people turned out for speeches and general festivities in the Army’s camp that night.

One of the reasons Hyattstown was so welcoming was that for over a century, locals had been struggling with a “...deficient link of the Great National Western Road.”  The section between Rockville and Gaithersburg, Maryland, had heavy rain. Often it was nearly impassable, and its dismal condition was disparaged and deplored by the local press and public.”  

A generation before the American Revolution - in 1755 - , the English General Braddock had almost been defeated by this very stretch of road a year before he was killed on his way to Pittsburg (above). A generation after that war, Thomas Jefferson’s road improvements bill had failed to fix the problem. Now, four generations later, the problem persisted. In fact, this section would not be really fixed until 1925, when it was finally paved over, once the automobile became as powerful a lobby as the railroads.

The mayor of Frederick, Maryland (above), John E. Fleming,  lowered the old toll road barrier and boasted that Coxey's Army would never set foot in his town.  Forty additional deputies were sworn in to keep them out.  However, on 24 April , Coxey’s Army, now 340 strong, marched into town, escorted by the deputies. And the world did not end. That night the press reported a “drunken brawl”, but the details were never confirmed. And the next day, when the Army marched out, their numbers were now 400 strong. 

It was on Saturday, 28 April 1892  that Coxey’s Army reached the doorstep of their goal, Brightwood Riding Park – now the Brightwood Recreation Area - along Rock Creek, just outside the District of Columbia. Here they established what they called Camp Stevens. They were greeted by a crowd of 10,000 curious, friendly people. Also on hand were 1,500 federal troops (3 soldiers for every member of the Army), with more soldiers waiting in Baltimore, Annapolis, and Philadelphia, ready to rush to the capital to put down the first signs of any violence. There was none.

Instead, over Saturday and Sunday, an estimated 6,000 unarmed curious citizens visited the encampment in peace. Coxey was quoted in the papers as explaining the march this way; “Congress takes two years to vote on anything…Twenty-millions of people are hungry and cannot wait two years to eat.”

On Tuesday, May 1st, 1892  perhaps 15,000 people crowded around as the Army of 500 left camp (above) for their final seven mile march on the Capital. The Baltimore Herald said “Such a fantastic aggregation (had) never paraded itself in seriousness before the public.” 

First came Mrs. Annie L. Diggs, carrying the American flag. She was followed by Jacob Coxey’s 17 year old daughter on horseback, representing the goddess of Peace. Then came Carl Browne, dressed in his buckskin fringe (above).

Then came Jacob Coxey in his carriage (above, left), riding with his second wife and their infant child, “Legal Tender Coxey”.  They were followed by an actress on horseback, Ms. Virginia Le Valette.  She carried an umbrella (above, left center) and was draped in an American flag. And only behind this final exhibit of female pulchritude, did the public at last get a view of the object of the entire discussion, the army of the unemployed, totting banners and signs. It must have been the most bizarre procession that ever walked down Washington's 16th street, not excepting the parade formed by Dolly Madison as she fled the White House in 1813, with wagons piled high with silverware and paintings, just ahead of the British arsonists.

As they had formed up for the final march, Carl Browne told the men, “The greatest ordeal of the march is at hand. The eyes of the world are upon you, and you must conduct yourselves accordingly.” And they did.

Ahh, if they only knew the high drama and low comedy that was about to descend upon their heads.

"The Tin Woodman knew very well he had no heart, and therefore he took great care never to be cruel or unkind to anything. "You people with hearts," he said, "have something to guide you, and need never do wrong; but I have no heart, and so I must be very careful."
1900  L. Frank Baum  "The Wonderful Wizard of Oz" 

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COXEY'S ARMY - Four - PLAYING DEFENSE

 

I would say the last thing America needed in 1894 were more millionaires. Over the previous half century, unfettered capitalism had produced a ten fold increase in their number, growing to 10,000 by the centuries end.  But in a nation of 70 million the advantages of wealth were increasingly hoarded by the ten thousand. The accumulation of wealth is just another form of addiction. Like an alcoholic, those addicted to money are never sated. To feed their addiction, millions were starving and the American dream was increasingly a fairy tale.

The real alternative to the bankruptcy of supply side economics was demand side economics. In thirty years Roosevelt called it the "New Deal"  And Coxey's Army was one of it's birth pangs.

"Before them stood a little man...He was clothed all in green, from his head to his feet, and even his skin was of a greenish tint. At his side was a large green box. When he saw Dorothy and her companions the man asked, "What do you wish in the Emerald City?" "We came here to see the Great Oz," said Dorothy. The man was so surprised at this answer that he sat down to think it over.  "It has been many years since anyone asked me to see Oz," he said, shaking his head in perplexity. "He is powerful and terrible, and if you come on an idle or foolish errand to bother the wise reflections of the Great Wizard, he might be angry and destroy you all in an instant." 
1900  L. Frank Baum  "The Wonderful Wizard of Oz" 

On Tuesday, 17 April , 1894, Coxey’s Army arrived in Cumberland, Maryland, just a hundred air miles short of the nation’s capital. And for the first time Congress began to take public notice of the marchers, and their first reaction was, of course, panic. Congress stayed in session until 6:30 that evening, debating the impending doomsday of people actually petitioning their government for redress of grievances. 

Ohio conservative Democrat, 51 year old Representative Joseph Hodson Outwaite (above), called for Mr. Coxey to consider that if “...10,000 to 50,000 men can intimidate Congress to do one thing, then another 10,000 to 50,000 men can intimidate them to do another thing—which leads to anarchy.” Of course some might say that what Mr. Outwaite described was actually democracy. I might say that, for instance. And I just did.

In fact there had been government meetings behind the scenes before the march had even begun, on how to receive the Commonweal Army should it make as far as Washington. But after some hyperventilating, congress voted down appropriations for a military reception. And some of the people’s representatives found comfort in the genius of Charles L’Enfant, who had designed the capital as a series of angled broad avenues, each of which terminated in huge traffic circles - a plan guaranteed to reduce tourists to tears, be they barbarian invaders or rebelling peasants. And anyway, noted the Washington Post at the time, each of those broad avenues could be controlled with a single Gatling gun.

Meanwhile, back in Cumberland, Coxey’s Army camped out on a baseball field, and the businessman from Massillon, Ohio even managed to show a little profit, charging ten cents for people to observe his footsore unemployed. It was an absurd idea, since Cumberland was already overflowing with its own unemployed. But still, the process put $145 in the army’s coffers.

Cumberland (above) had once been Maryland’s second largest city, its surrounding mountains containing deposits of coal and iron ore.   It was also the junction of the National Road, the Baltimore and Ohio railroad, the Potomac River and the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal. 

The canal, also called the Grand Old Ditch, had not reached Cumberland until 1850, eight years after the railroad. And in the forty-four years since the canal had seen little profit. That was why Jacob Coxey was able to make a such good deal on hiring two canal boats, normally used to carry coal, to transport his Army down stream.

On Tuesday, 17 April 1892, the men marched through Cumberland to the loading wharf (above) at the Western Terminus of the canal. 

The boats cut a hundred plus road miles off Jacob Coxey's Army’s march, saving perhaps four days of shoe leather. As an added plus, Coxey and Carl Browne were also hoping to put their bad press behind them. Browne had begun to refer to the reporters as “argus-eyed demons of hell.”

The cadre of reporters  were not going to be left behind.  The self described "40 thieves" banded together, hired themselves a “press boat”, stocked it with food, a cook and alcohol, and named it “The Flying Demon”. It looked, recorded one of its denizens, “like a floating picture by Victor Hugo.” 

The "Argus-eyed demons of hell" (above) had never felt favorable toward Coxey’s Army, but with the loss of copy from The Great Unknown Smith, they turned even more hostile. 

Samuel Williams, accompanying the march for the St. Louis Post Dispatch, described the hundred and fifty unemployed men as “the nucleus of a band of marauders, whose object is to despoil their fellow citizens” and called them “a species of terrorism.”   “These bands,” he wrote,  “naturally inspire terror and clashes with the authorities or citizens must come.”  They had not yet, but they must. So insisted Mr. Williams. 

Babcock, writing for the Chicago papers, warned that the pair of boat loads of unemployed, “...can scarcely fail to cause bloodshed in Christian Communities”.  

But it did fail.  The terror was inspired only by those who believed the reporter’s inventions. Those who actually saw the Army were generally favorably impressed with its discipline and decorum.  

On Thursday, 19 April, Coxey’s Army disembarked at Williamsport, Maryland, and marched the six miles to Hagerstown. 

Here they camped for two days. The community, having been fed for weeks on the press reports of tramps, thieves and anarchists, were not happy to see them. The Associated Press reported on the 21st, that, “The people of Hagerstown are preparing to make the best of the…Army for another day, or perhaps two days. Browne has determined on revenge for the rather cold reception of yesterday”. 

In truth, the Army was awaiting the arrival of additional unemployed marchers from Philadelphia, which the A.P. described in the most alarming terms. “…A party of thirty tramps is reported moving down the valley from Carlisle.” In the village of Middletown, said the press, “deputies are being sworn in to protect the town.” Still, even the alarmist local press was forced to admit that “the conduct of the Coxey men In Hagerstown has so far been exemplary.”

More than that, it was evident that the Army had learned a thing or two about marketing. 

They erected a canvas screen around their camp, and again charged admission to stare at the unemployed men cooking their meals and tending to their daily needs, even selling their hard-tack biscuits as souvenirs to the gawkers. “The badges the men wear (above) have also acquired a market value, and sets of the several varieties bring good prices, some of them commanding a dollar each.”

They even published and sold their own pamphlets, to explain their objectives. It remained to be seen what profit the nation would make from the Army, now that it was so close to its goal.

"... I found myself in the midst of a strange people, who, seeing me come from the clouds, thought I was a great Wizard. Of course I let them think so, because they were afraid of me, and promised to do anything I wished them to. Just to amuse myself, and keep the good people busy, I ordered them to build this City, and my Palace; and they did it all willingly and well. Then I thought, as the country was so green and beautiful, I would call it the Emerald City; and to make the name fit better I put green spectacles on all the people, so that everything they saw was green." 
"But isn't everything here green?" asked Dorothy. 
"No more than in any other city," replied Oz; "but when you wear green spectacles, why of course everything you see looks green to you." 
1900  L. Frank Baum  "The Wonderful Wizard of Oz"

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COXEY'S ARMY - Three - REVOLT

 

I suspect there were murmurs among the growing ranks of Coxey’s Army as they finally breached the mountain ramparts southeast of Pittsburg, Pennsylvania. Late each afternoon the men formed a picket line while a circus tent was erected as their shelter. Then, each group would build a cooking fire, while their leaders would distribute rations either bought by Coxey or donated by sympathetic locals. After an early meal, groups would be sent out to canvass for more donations of food, clothing and money. But the vast majority of the men stayed in camp, where they had little to do but talk.

"Well," said the Head, "I will give you my answer. You have no right to expect me to send you back to Kansas unless you do something for me in return. In this country everyone must pay for everything he gets. If you wish me to use my magic power to send you home again you must do something for me first. Help me and I will help you."

1900  L. Frank Baum  "The Wonderful Wizard of Oz"

What the soldiers in Coxey's Army were talking about was their leader. Many nights, and every Sunday, Carl Browne would berate the men with ideological harangues, selling his vision of the unity of all working men, along with his version of Christianity - mixed with a little reincarnation. Most of the Army had long since stopped listening to his speeches, referring to him in private as the “Great Humbug.” 

But they also noticed that after the oration, while they settled into their bed rolls on the cold ground, Browne and Coxey spent every night in warm soft beds in local hotels. And should they ever forget to notice this disparity in creature comforts, The Great Unknown Smith was always careful to point out that he was sharing all the discomforts of the march with them, unlike Mr. Browne.

The Great Unknown Smith had been Carl Browne's partner in the patent “Blood Purefyer” business before Coxey had appeared in Chicago. 

Browne even knew The Great’s Unknown Smith's real name, A.B.P. Bazarro (above)...

...and he knew that the silent, mysterious veiled lady who never spoke but always followed Smith around was really Bizarro's wife. 

The "recording angels" (above), particularly those from Chicago, had known Bizzaro's (above, Center) real identity all along. But he was such good copy as The Great Unknown Smith, that they had not shared this information with their readers, or the Army. In fact there was also a rumor whispered among the reporters that the Great Unknown Smith was in fact a Pinkerton spy, sent by the wealthy to disrupt the march. And by his later actions, I suspect he may have been.

In the teeth of yet another snowstorm, on Wednesday, 11 April, 1894, the Army made the hard march south west, out of Uniontown, Pennsylvania. They were following the old National Highway, which had first been created by President Thomas Jefferson.  It was the last significant road improvement project the Federal Government had undertaken, over ninety years earlier.

Now this motley "Commonweal Army" was petitioning their government for a new, larger investment in national infrastructure. They were speaking, they said, with their boots, as they struggled past Fort Necessity, built by George Washington -  the construction of which had set off the French and Indian War in North America. They plodded in the snow past the grave of the British General Braddock (above) , who had been ambushed on the road to Pittsburgh by the French and Indians. 

Coxey's Army, seeking to speak for the vast armies of unemployed, mocked by every major newspaper in the nation, trudged step by step over the 2,000 foot high Big Savage Mountain. Every man was cold, wet and exhausted.  Patience was in short supply. Reason was slipping away. It was a bad time and place for a fight, so of course they had one.

As they reached the peak the Great Unknown Smith – who was mounted this day – rode back to the commissary wagons to grab a snack. Carl Browne saw this and was infuriated. He rode up to Smith and berated him, and then returned to the front of the column. After smoldering over the insult for a mile or so on the down slope, Smith rode forward and verbally unloaded on the buckskinned duomo, calling him a “fat faced fake” and threatening that if Browne ever spoke to him like that again he would “make a punching bag out of your face.” “I found you on your uppers in Chicago” Smith shouted. “I picked you out of the mud.”

Browne immediately ordered the marchers to halt. They stopped. Smith responded by commanding the Army to “Forward March”. The the men automatically leaned forward. Smith  sensed that hesitation and seized the advantage.

He turned his horse and rode back among the men. “You and I have roughed it together,” he reminded them. “You know I have been with you…while others were enjoying their ease. It is for you to say men, who shall command you…Will you have Smith …or this leather coated polecat?” It was a loaded question, and the Army responded as expected,  with chants of “Smith, Smith , Smith!” 

Even Coxey’s eldest son, Jesse (above), joined the mutineers. With that,  Smith led the army down the slope, while Browne, now bereft of command, galloped to the nearest telegraph office.

Jacob Coxey was in Cumberland, Maryland, arranging supplies and support in advance of the Army. It was there that Browne's desperate telegram reached him. Coxey immediately hired a carriage and drove all night to intercept his Army. They met just after dawn, Saturday, 14 April, as The Army  finally descended from the mountain top, in the well named town of Frostburg (above), just over the Maryland state line. In a perfect bit of historical staging, the Army’s headquarters for the night was in the town’s opera house (below), one of the few buildings not damaged by a tornado which had almost destroyed Frostburg the year before.

After listening to several  version of the drama on the road, Coxey stood on a box on the stage (he was not a tall man), and called for a vote for second in command. The results were not what he had hoped for; 158 for The Great Unknown Smith, and just four for Browne. There was an uncomfortable pause, and then Coxey did the greatest thing - the thing that proved him to be a real leader. He said to the men, “I cast 154 votes for Mr. Browne.” It took a few moments for the army to realize the choice they now had to make; give up the march, or give up the Great Unknown Smith. And just as that realization was dawning, into the stunned silence Coxey added, “I further order that the Unknown Smith be forever expelled from the Army.” And he called for an immediate vote of agreement.

A few voices were raised in protest, saying  that if The Great Unknown Smith were expelled, then so should Coxey's eldest son, Jesse Coxey. But even they were disarmed when Coxey  agreed to that logic. And thus so did the Army. 

The Great Unknown Smith (above) was out. Across the street from the opera house the Great Unknown unloaded again, this time to the press. “I have been deposed by a patent medicine shark, a greasy-coated hypocrite, a seeker for personal advancement.” Like all those caught in the act, Smith’s (actually Bazarro’s) accusations might have been better used as a self portrait.

The next morning Carl Browne called a press conference of his own and revealed what the press already knew, that the Great Unknown Smith was actually A.P. B. Bazzarro, a patent medicine salesman and a hypocrite. And with that weight lifted, the Army moved on 14 miles to Addison, Maryland.

Twenty years later, Jacob Coxey (above) would explain why he stood up for Carl Browne that cold morning in a half empty opera house, and why he had tolerated the bombast and pretense which Carl Browne so often exhibited, and why Jacob trusted him despite the man’s less than sterling past. Coxey called Browne “…the most unselfish man of my entire life’s acquaintance. He never gave a thought to pecuniary gain.  His whole heart was in the movement to emancipate labor."

The next day, as the march continued into Maryland, the eldest son Jesse Coxey was reinstated on the one (his father's) condition, that “he not sulk anymore”. The day after that, Coxey’s Army acquired a navy.

Don't speak so loud, or you will be overheard--and I should be ruined. I'm supposed to be a Great Wizard."

"And aren't you?" she asked.

"Not a bit of it, my dear; I'm just a common man."

"You're more than that," said the Scarecrow, in a grieved tone; "you're a humbug."

"Exactly so!" declared the little man, rubbing his hands together as if it pleased him. "I am a humbug."

1900  L. Frank Baum  "The Wonderful Wizard of Oz"

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