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On Monday morning, June 11, 1917 the climax of the strike occurred. Contrary to what South River historian Jesse Selover wrote "...The company made no attempt to hire strikebreakers...", at 7:18 a train arrived at the Raritan River Railroad Station less than half a block from the Herrmann, Aukam mill entrance on Whitehead Avenue. On the train were about 60 strikebreakers, described in contemporary accounts as being "mostly Italians" from Newark and New York City.
The use of one ethnic group against another was a common technique in breaking strikes, as was using blacks or foreign-born workers to break strikes of white native-born workers. (For example, during a 1923 strike in neighboring Sayreville, African-American workers would be imported to break a brickmakers strike.) It should be noted that Italians were among the most active strikers in the Paterson strike of 1915 and during the pottery workers strike in Trenton which was going on at the same time as the Herrmann, Aukam strike. Also, Russians made up one-third of the strikebreakers in the previously mentioned Roosevelt chemical workers strike.
It is possible that the men sent into South River were not even aware of the strike, as had happened in Roosevelt. Certainly, they would have had difficulty communicating with the Russian and Polish-speaking strikers.
The strikebreakers were guarded by about 20 men from the Sherman Detective Agency. The strikers, estimated at 50-100, either, forewarned, met them at the station or were met by them in front of factory.
The ensuing clash, using common terminology of the day called a “strike riot" in contemporary accounts, would be reported in the New Brunswick Home News as well as papers in New York City and other NY cities, the Washington Post and the Philadelphia papers. Papers in NJ towns like Trenton, Newark,, South Amboy, Paterson and Bergen and, most sympathetically, by the pro-labor socialist newspaper The New York Call, whose headline on June 12, 1917 would read:
The numerous accounts all vary widely with the local Home News account being one of the least detailed. The local Cranbury Press put it best when it reported, “So much excitement has prevailed in town since the affair that reports of the riot...are conflicting”.
The strikers attempted to, as the NY Herald put it, "...induce by oral arguments the strikebreakers not to enter…” and the strikers began throwing "...sticks, bottles and other missiles" (NY Times). The guards fired warning shots over the heads of the strikers, although in the account given in the Newark Evening News, guards claim that strikers fired at them first. Other accounts claim the first shots came from a guard who had been struck in the face by a thrown bottle.
After the warning shots, the guards fired into the crowd. The New York Call account suggests that the first shots fired into the strikers came from guards behind them who came running to the scene from the mill when they heard the initial gun fire.
The first striker to be shot dead was Vincent Sosnowski (alt. Susnowski), a strike leader. In most accounts, it is stated that he had attacked a guard “...beating him senseless...” (NY Times). In other accounts, it is added that he was wounded first, attacked the guard who shot him, and was then gunned down (Newark Evening News ). The guard who shot him is usually identified as John Van Allen.
[BELOW - Sosnowski's widow's town directory listing 6 months after the strike,
possibly living in one of the former Herrmann, Aukam houses purchased by Alexander Schak].
The second death is even more confusing, the victim is usually stated to be Mike Sudnikowicz (Sundikowisz) though two sources would initially name him as Ignatz Maum/Naum.
The murderer was generally agreed to have been guard Gordon Thom.
Thom, during the battle, had been separated from the main body of detectives and took refuge in a nearby home. The New York Herald claims it was a striker's house and he was either thrown out or left, firing 5 shots at the crowd outside. Sudnikowicz fell and his “aged mother...cast herself upon the body and her wailing intensified the feeling of the strikers, who...for hours resisted the attempts of the authorities to remove it. "(NY Times)
In all, 9-10 other strikers were wounded, four being hospitalized at St. Peter's in New Brunswick. Some reports that one of the wounded (unknown) would die. The Cranbury Press reported that he suffered stab wounds in the left shoulder, suggesting the "strike riot" included hand to hand combat. The Plainfield Courier-News reported the third wounded striker was Vincent Kosslowski. Other strikers, stated the Cranbury paper, "...are under the care of local doctors suffering from stabs, lacerations and bruises caused by knifes, bricks and blackjacks which played an important part in the conflict."
Also wounded during the event was John Britenmoser, superintendent of one of the embroidery rooms and the supposed reason stitchers walked out during the 1912 strike.
Some accounts claim that the melee lasted for up to four hours until authorities arrived. They also suggest that the strikers cornered a numbered of guards and strikebreakers in a building, threatening to burn it down and would not let them leave.
Middlesex County Sheriff Houghton arrived with a force of deputies, assisted by "volunteers" (in some accounts said to be town firemen) as well as members of the South River Home Guard (a branch of the Home Defense League, meant to be a war-time emergency police force - for more see RRRR Strike Riot), the Sherman detectives and the other special detectives that had been sworn in by Mayor Fee. The Sheriff also asked Major Frederick Hall of the State Militia (then activated due to the World War) to send troops to patrol the town but it was later decided that they were not needed. Hall said they would be sent from Parlin if trouble broke out again.
The Whitehead Avenue area of town in which the Herrmann, Aukam plant and most of the strikers' homes were located was placed under martial law (NY Call). According to Selover, the Home Guard was stationed on both sides of Whitehead Avenue and no one was allowed through without being searched. In addition, every tavern in town was ordered closed, all homes in the area were searched for weapons and "John Doe" warrants were issued for all strikers.
"A show of force has over-awed the Russian strikers," noted the Home News [6/12/17].
By the end of the day, authorities had arrested the two guards, John Van Allen and Gordon Thom, and four strikers ("ringleaders" according to the Home News [6/12/17]) "Alexander Pileski, Adolf Marashko, Antone Robefeski and Mike Vilikoff" (the latter possibly Mike Bellkoff, listed as a trustee of The Embroiderers union).
When the police attempted to remove the prisoners from the local South River jail to a jail in Somerset County, strikers tried to prevent it. The Home News, in what can only be described as one of the most blatantly anti-striker and anti-immigrant accounts (as well as unbelievable), claimed that scores of women were at the scene and as the police vehicles pulled away carrying the arrested strikers and guards, the women "...tried to throw their babies in the cars so as to stop them..." (!).
Not content with that bit of reporting, the same paper editorialized the day after the shootings:
"Whether or not the guards were justified in firing upon the strikers depends solely upon whether or not their lives were in danger. It is a terrible thing to snuff out a human life, though it be the life of one from far distant shores whose ways are unlike ours and who is the last degree removed from normal American citizenship.”
"More trouble" was expected the next day and Sheriff Houghton ordered all saloons in town to close for the day and refused a request by the strikers for a public funeral and parade. Still, "thousands" attended the two funerals, which were held at the "Russian Catholic Church" and the "Polish Catholic Church" as the Herrmann, Aukam plant, located in between the two churches, "ran as usual" [Home News 6/13/17], apparently with the Italian strikebreakers helping to man the plant.
The day of the funerals, a grand jury probe began. Judge Daly quickly released the two guards before the testimony was finished, noting that they were "blameless". When six strikers appeared before the Prosecutor and gave testimony against the guards they "implicated themselves as having thrown brickbats...and other missiles", they were arrested. "The men, all of whom have unpronounceable names, were charged with inciting a riot..." noted The Home News of 6/13/17. They were Joseph Rusin, Konstanti Urbanowicz, Thomas Macunonicz, Mike Majiernicki, John Bujewicz and Louis Sempkowski.
Also charged were two strikebreakers, Peligrino Napolitan and Loretti Garrenge, for carrying concealed weapons and attempted atrocious assault and battery [Home News 6/14/17].
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