1929 Loray Mill Strike in Gastonia

Panel Introduction

Although a union may have meant freedom to workers, to their bosses it meant decreased profits and control. As a result, bosses were more than willing to use whatever means necessary to ensure that a unionized workforce never arose. By the 1920s, violence had become a common tool of industrialists to ensure that their workforce remained unorganized. This often took the form of hired guns, euphemistically called “private detectives”. In the Homestead Strike in Pittsburgh for example, Andrew Carnegie and Henry Frick hired the Pinkerton Detective Agency to prevent the organization of a steel mill. Tensions between the union and the detectives soon boiled over, resulting in a battle that saw the Pinkertons kill seven workers.

Where private enforcement failed, capitalists often used the state to enforce industrial autocracy. Political corruption and ideological affinity meant that many elected officials were more than happy to deploy law enforcement as strikebreakers. This occurred most infamously at the Battle of Blair Mountain in Logan County, West Virginia, when an Army regiment confronted an assembly of miners attempting to unionize miners in a neighboring county. The Army forced the miners to return home, furthering the goal of the coal barons who owned the unorganized mines.

Textile workers at the Loray Mill in Gastonia, North Carolina, had to contend with these forces in their attempt to unionize their workplace. While they would not ultimately be successful, their struggle against both the mill’s owners and the National Guard demonstrated their willingness to fight for their rights, an example that other North Carolinians would soon follow.

Violence is still an unfortunate feature of the labor movement today, albeit a less common one now. At a recent strike at the Warrior Met coal mine in Brookwood, Alabama, a truck attempted to run over picketing miners several times. While no one was permanently injured, this episode demonstrates the degree to which some company owners will go to ensure that workers remain divided.