BarbarousMexico JOHN KENNETH TURNER

FOUR MEXICAN STRIKES 201
its course;" that is, to starve out the workers, as they
believed this process could be accomplished inside of a
fortnight.
The strikers turned for aid to those of their fellowcraftsmen
who were at work in other localities. The
Rio Blanco workers themselves were already preparing to
strike, but thereupon they decided to wait for a time
longer, in order that they might collect from their meager
earnings a fund to support their brothers in the city of
Puebla. Thus were the ends of the company defeated
for the moment, for by living on half rations both workers
and strikers were able to eke out their existence.
But no sooner had the company learned the source of
strength of the Puebla strikers than the mills at Rio
Blanco were shut down and the workers there locked
out. Other mills in other localities were shut down and
other means taken to prevent any help reaching the
Puebla strikers.
Locked out, the Rio Blanco workers promptly assumed
the offensive, declared they were on strike and
formulated a series of demands calculated in some measure
to alleviate the COfl(litiOflS of their lives.
But the demands were unheard, the machinery of the
mill roared no more, the mill slept in the sun, the waters
of the Rio Blanco dashed unharnessed through the town,
the manager of the company laughed in the faces of the
striking men and women.
The six thousand starved. For two months they
starved. They scoured the surrounding hills for berries,
and when the berries were gone they deceived their
gnawing stomachs with indigestible roots and herbs
gleaned from the mountain sides. In utter despair, they
looked to the highest power they knew, Porfirio Dia,