1914.07.09: FOUR ARE KILLED IN ANARCHISTS' DEN

July 9, 1914

FOUR ARE KILLED IN ANARCHISTS' DEN

NEW YORK POLICE BELIEVE BOMB PLANT HAS BEEN DESTROYED

THINK EXPLOSION ACCIDENTAL

Friends of Victims Charge Murder, However--Much Inflammatory Literature Gives Officers Clew [sic] to Work on.

New York, July 7.--In the ruins of the Lexington avenue tenement house,wrecked Saturday by the premature explosion of a powerful bomb which killed Arthur Caron and three other persons, the authorities have found evidence that Caron's apartment was a center for the distribution of inflammatory literature which was printed there and that at the time of the explosion it was apparently a bomb factory, filled with the ingredients of death dealing missles [sic]. A small printing press, revolutionary pamphlets and circulars, an electric dynamo, two electric batteries, cartridges and bits of steel, were among the articles uncovered which tend, in the opinion of the police, to show an anarchistic plot at assassination.

Theory of Police

That a demonstration, halted by the bungling of some one who was preparing an infernal machine for its mission, was planned against the Rockefeller family in Tarrytown, is the theory upon which the authorities are working.

Two of those killed in the wrecked, apartment were prominent agitators who were to be placed on trial at Tarrytown today on charges of disorderly conduct in connection with the campaign of demonstration inaugurated against John D. Rockefeller, Jr., as a protest against his attitude in the Colorado coal mine strike.

The body of the fourth victim of the explosion has Just been found. It is that of Chas. Berger [sic], known in I. W. W. circles as "the big Swede," an associate of Caron. The other victims were Chas. [sic] Hanson and Mary Claves [sic]. 

The woman lived in an apartment; next to the one occupied by Caron and his associates.

Identification of Berger's [sic] body was made by Louise Berger, step-sister of Hanson, who lived in the flat where the explosion occurred.

Not An I. W. W.

Equally as interesting as the discovery of anarchistic literature and electrical machinery in the ruins of Caron's room, was the assertion by I. W. W. leaders that Caron was not a member of that organization, having recently been refused admission.

They declared that the I. W. W. had nothing to do with the explosion. Why Caron was denied a place among the workers was a point they did not make clear.

A gruesome but suggestive piece of evidence was a severed hand which clutched two small pieces of wire made ready for connections. The authorities believe that the owner of this, hand' was in the act of making an electric connection for one of the bombs and a battery when the explosion occurred
and he was blown to pieces.

Attack on Christianity.

The search for papers and notes was minute and some note books with the names of several anarchists were, found, but the police would not say any of them was important as documentary
evidence of a plot. There were also pamphlets which had been sold at I. W. W. meetings. One poem,
a vitriolic attack on Christianity is believed to have been on the little press.

Louise Berger declared that the three men who died in the explosion were murdered. She made this statement as she was being taken from the morgue, where she had identified Berg's body, to a police station for further questioning.

"Those boys were murdered, I know they were," she said.

Asked if she would continue her membership in tbe anti-militarist association, she replied:

"Why, of course. Why shouldn't I. Do they think that by killing some of our members they can destroy our organization. Well, they can't, nor will I rest until 1 have run down the murderers of my brother and the other boys."