After the Strike

The strike would continue after the shootings. In an executive committee meeting of the Herrmann, Aukam & Company held in their New York City office on June 25, 1917 it was resolved that no strikers - or, as they put it, "no one who left without due reason during the strike" - would be re-hired after June 30. On June 29, charges of murder were dropped against the four jailed strikers. Indictments were returned on charges of rioting against the four, as well as against the six out on bail. An interesting sidelight is that the Russian Consul contacted Middlesex County prosecutor Stricker. Consul General M. Oustinoff wished to conduct an investigation of the rioting and assist the strikers' defense.

The 10 were arraigned on July 6th for rioting and assault and battery against Van Allen and Thom. Bail was set at $1,000 (about 2 years embroidery stitcher's pay).

On July 7, the company's lawyer, former assemblyman George L. Burton of South River (who had also previously worked for the Embroiderers union, and would go on to become mayor of South River in 1920), asked for and received a court injunction to stop the Stitchers' from picketing, declaring that a state of anarchy existed in South River.

It also claimed that the Embroidery Stitchers Benefit Society, then represented by J.Randolph Appleby, Jr. of South River and New Brunswick lawyer Schuyler Van Cleef, deceived the government when it was chartered and was not a labor union (?). Appleby also represented 9 of the 10 indicted strikers, with Van Cleef council for the tenth, Anton Rabofski. On July 19, the Home News noted that the situation had returned to "normal" and that the Sherman detectives and special police had left. It implied that the strike continued although “...no effort has been made by the strikers to force their policy or demands upon the officials of the company...”

Later that fall, organized labor took note of the Herrmann, Aukam strike when, during the 39th AFL State Convention , New Jersey AFL Secretary-Treasurer Arthur A. Quinn gave a report to the convention on the strike. Quinn’s report implied that the Sherman guards and the strikebreakers had been employed since the beginning of the strike. This fact cannot be confirmed with the newspaper accounts of the incident, which tend to imply that the day of the “strike riot” was the first attempt to use strikebreakers. (Selover, it should be recalled, stated that strikebreakers were never used - "The company made no attempt to hire strike breakers but allowed the situation to take its natual course. [pg 288]" - and his explanation of the shooting are melodramatic and contrary to the dozen or so newspaper accounts of the time).

Quinn also asked AFL convention to allow the New Jersey AFL state attorney to "render every possible legal assistance" to the strikers.

A small news story on August 2, 1917 says that the company closed early the day before because temperatures in some departments had reached 100 degrees. The strike, if still in effect despite the injunction against picketing, was not mentioned.

Note that the above account claims 100 male and 250 female employees were on strike. All other accounts suggested, at least in the beginning of the strike, the majority of strikers were men.

NEXT PAGE - HERRMANN, AUKAM & CO IN SOUTH RIVER AFTER THE STRIKE