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436 BETWEEN THE OCEAN AND THE LAKES
There were 250 laborers at the pier at Piermont, handling strikers, but really for the purpose of frightening them into
freight. They were divided into night and day gangs, and submission. No provision was made for their protection,
were known as laborers, checkers, tally clerks, porters, and and the result was that they had no sooner landed on the pier
Stowers. Their pay had been $1 per day. It was reduced than they were attacked and driven off. Some were thrown
to 90 cents for eleven hours' work. Six hours were reckoned off the pier into the river, and would have drowned but for
half a day's work. Steady men could make from S25 to $30 the aid of men in boats who were spectators. The Company
a month at the old wages. President Moran was getting a called upon the sheriff of Rockland County to protect its
salary of $25,000 a year, and it was current all along the property and disperse the strikers. He summoned the
railroad that, owing to financialstraits the Company was in, he Piermont Guards, who turned out to the number of twentyfive,
in citizens' dress, with bayonets fixed and supplied with
was taking no chances, but was collecting his salary,//'' rata,
every day. When his order to reduce wages and salaries was ball cartritlge. Friday evening, December 4th, the steamer
issued, inquiry was made by the men as to whether the president
had submitted to a reduction in his own great stipend.
When it was learned that he had not, the feeling was bitter,
and the laborers at the Piermont docks protested against the
" Esquimaux " arrived at the pier from New York with about
100 men, escorted by twenty-five Metropolitan policemen.
The sight of this force ahead and the military in the rear hail
the effect of cowing the strikers, but to avoid a collision the
cut in their wages and quit work. The brakemen on that police remained on board the boat all night. Saturday
division of the railroad joined the laborers, as tlid the laborers morning they landed and were joined by the Piermont Guards.
along the division. Traffic came to a standstill.
'Phe martial array had the desired effect. About half the
Up to Saturday afternoon, December 5th, 200 carloads of
freight from the West had accumulated at antl above Piermont.
A few straggling trains only departed for the West. They
had to be loaded by the agents, clerks, antl other non-striking
employees. Only three or four cars were sent by each train,
so that they could be easily controlled by the engineer, the
conductor and flagmen acting as brakemen. Hugh Riddle,
superintendent, and Dispatcher Watson themselves went
out on trains as brakemen to help get them through.
The laborers, and those whose interests were closely connected
with them, such as boarding-house keepers, grocers,
etc., constituted nine-tenths of the population of Piermont,
and there was such a combination among them that no new
force that might be sent there to take the places of the
strikers could find a night's lodging or a meal. The exposed
situation of the dock, built out, as it was, a mile from the
shore, with its freight sheds and offices at the extreme end,
and a railroad track running the entire length, put it in the
power of a disorderly antl evil-disposed gang to inflict almost
irreparable injury on the Company.
Wednesday evening, December 21I, the steamboat " Erie "
was seen coming up the river, and a rumor was circulated
men returned to work at once, and at noon nearly all of
them were back. The police, however, were detained over
night, and the Piermont Guards slept on their arms. The
brakemen held out until Saturday night, when they gave in
and went to work. The emigrants who had been taken to
Piermont by the police to replace the strikers were returned
to New York Sunday. One thing that had its effect in conciliating
the strikers was the declaration that President Moran
had been removed by the Directors, which the men believed.
'Phe strike cost the Company half a million dollars.
1859.
March 15, 1S59, the dock laborers at Piermont struck, not
for an advance in wages nor against a reduction, but because
they had not receivetl any pay at all for three months. They
were not the only employees that were months in arrears, but
none of the others joined the strike. The Company, not
caring to have a repetition of the costly experiences of 1857,
and the strike being in every way justifiable, raised money
enough to restore a measure of content to the men, and
they resumed work after being idle only two days. But for
that a new gang of laborers was on board. Immediately a the fact that the Company went into the hands of a receiver
fish-horn was sounded, and 300 men swarmed down upon the the following August, President Moran retiring, a strike in
pier to prevent them from landing. It proved to be 300 which the great body of employees all along the line would
emigrants bound West. The clerks anil agent, assisted by the have joined, could not have been avoided much longer.
crew of the boat and such miscellaneous help as was at hand, There were then employees who hatl not received any pay
transferred the baggage to the cars while the strikers stood by for seven months. 'Phe receivership restored confidence
and jeered them. 'Phe train started on its way West, but it and hope. No disturbance of relations occurred, and within
had proceeded only as far as the water-station, where it three months all arrearages for labor, amounting to 8500,000,
encountered a railroad bar spiked across the track, which were paid.
threw the locomotive off and down a steep enbankment,
wrecking it badly. The cars narrowly escaped a similar fate
by the breaking of the coupling, and as there were 300 emigrants
on the train, many of them women and children, this
narrow escape saved many lives.
A force was collected by the Company along the line of the
road and sent to Piermont, ostensibly to take the places of the
1869.
May 10th, one brakeman of the three that made up
the force of brakemen on each freight train on the Eastern
Division was discharged by ortler from headquarters. The
discharged men, antl their sympathizers among the men who
were not tlischarged, prevented the making up and get-