Spokane Guardsmen Refuse to Break Strike
A Washington state militia company refuses to man a non-union train, sparking a tense standoff over labor loyalty and the role of the National Guard.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
At the Tacoma arrival of the state militia returning from encampment, Company G of the Second Regiment (Spokane) refused to board a train manned by non-union crews. Lieut. Col. McCarthy, viewing the refusal as mutiny, placed the men under arrest and disarmed them. When Brig. Gen. Curry arrived, he lined up the fifty men and asked if they would shoot strikers if ordered; the men affirmed their loyalty to the National Guard, leading Curry to reinstate the company. The soldiers reportedly balked at the order because they did not wish to fight against their 'American Railway Union' brothers, and some feared the train would be sabotaged. Meanwhile, federal troops have been mobilized across the region to clear lines as the strike continues to roil the nation.
“I disarmed them and placed them under arrest. That was in my opinion the only soldierly thing to do.”
This event captures a rare moment of rank-and-file solidarity during the 1894 Pullman Strike, when local citizen-soldiers were asked to choose between their neighbors and their state orders. It reflects the intense labor divisions of late 19th-century Washington, long before the labor movement secured its modern legal footing.
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