The Molly Maguires

When the wind blows wild at night past the breaker melancholy 
If you stand in the dark with your ears to the wind you can hear the sons of Molly. 
Deep in the dark of the old mine shaft you can smell the smoke and the fire
And the whisper low from the mine below is the ghost of Molly Maguire.
(The Sons of Molly by Chuck Rogers)

In 1862 an organization of Irish Catholic coal miners sprung up in Eastern Pennsylvania's coal country.
"The Mollies were all Irish Catholics, drawn mainly from the desperately poor men who worked in the coal mines of eastern Pennsylvania. Theirs was a hard life of cave-ins, explosions, flooded mines, and long hours of back-breaking labor in the darkness, all for wages that were barely sufficient to support a family. The mine workers even had to buy their own work tools and dynamite at the company store for elevated prices. The terrible conditions led many of the miners to join the Workingmen's Benevolent Association, a trade union that fought for better conditions in the mines. The mine owners, however, were equally determined to smash the union. The resulting conflict between workers and owners sparked the creation of the Molly Maguires, who vowed to fight the exploitation of the workers by predominantly Protestant mine owners and supervisors."
(From "Undermining the Molly Maguires" American History, April, 2000)

"Breaker boys", aged 7 to 16, worked like slaves in the breakers under mine bosses
whose character left much to be desired. An editorial in the Boston Pilot exposed
conditions in the coal mines; the inadequate pay, the "murderous neglect" of
ventilation, the "rancid provisions" available at high prices in company stores, the
explosions in the firedamp caverns in which Irish and Welsh miners were blown to
pieces, and the "scandalous ungenerosity" subsequently shown by the operators
toward their mutilated workmen, and concluded by denouncing some of the
owners as men with "the conscience neither of Christian or Pagan".

I'll tell ya boys Mickey Doyle is my name and I come from Carbon County 
And I shot the boss of the Lansford mine now my soul is up for bounty 
But I will die with my head held high for I fought for the men below 
Those men who slave and sweat and die down in a black hell hole.
(The Sons of Molly)

"In 1873 Franklin B. Gowen, president of the Philadelphia & Reading Railroad, had a meeting with Allan Pinkerton of the Pinkerton Detective Agency. Gowen had considerable investments in the coal-mines of Schuylkill County and feared that the trade union activities of John Siney and the Workingmen's Benevolent Association would result in lower profits.
Allan Pinkerton decided to send James McParland to Schuylkill County. Assuming the alias of James McKenna, he found work as a labourer in Shenandoah. Soon afterwards he joined the Workingmen's Benevolent Association and the Shenandoah branch of the Ancient Order of Hibernians (AOH), an organisation for Irish immigrants run by the Roman Catholic clergy. 
After a few months of investigations McParland reported back to Allan Pinkerton that some members of the Ancient Order of Hibernians were also active in the secret organization, the Molly Maguires. McParland estimated that the group had about 3,000 members. Each county was governed by a bodymaster who recruited members and gave out orders to commit crimes. These bodymasters were usually ex-miners who now worked as saloon keepers. 
Over a two year period McParland collected evidence about the criminal activities of the Molly Maguires. This included the murder of around fifty men in Schuylkill County. Many of these men were the managers of coal mines in the region. John Kehoe, one of the leaders of the Molly Maguires became suspicious of McParland and began to investigate his past. McParland was tipped off that Kehoe was planning to murder him so he fled from the area." 
(From a Spartacus Educational article, author unknown)

So I'll tell ya boys Edward Kelly is my name and I'm hanging in the morning
For I shot Jack Jones for skinning my bones now I curse the sound of mourning 
And I will die with my head held high for I fought for the men below 
Those men who slave and sweat and die down in a black hell hole. 
(The Sons of Molly)

"In 1876 and 1877 McParland was the star witness for the prosecution of John Kehoe and the Molly Maguires. Twenty members were found guilty of murder and were executed. This included Kehoe, a former union leader who was convicted of a murder that had taken place fourteen years previously. 
There was a great deal of controversy about the way the trial was conducted. Irish Catholics were excluded from the juries while Protestant immigrants from Germany who could not speak English were accepted. Welsh immigrants, who had for a  long-time been in conflict with the Irish in Schuylkill County were also well represented on these juries. Most of the witnesses who provided evidence in these cases were like McParland on the payroll of the railroad and mining companies who were attempting to destroy the trade union movement. In other cases, defendants were persuaded to turn state's evidence to help convict their alleged collaborators. 
It was also pointed out that most of the murder victims were employees of small coal companies that were later taken over by the Philadelphia and Reading company. Some historians have suggested that it was the company run by Franklin B. Gowen, and the man who initiated the original investigation, that had the most to gain from these murders and the destruction of the emerging trade union movement."
(From a Spartacus Educational article, author unknown)

So I'll tell ya boys Alex Campbell is my name and no pistol did I fire 
But I will fall from the gallows wall just for being a Molly Maguire 
And I will die with my held held high for I fought for the men below 
Those men who slave and sweat and die down in a black hell hole. 
(The Sons of Molly)

"Their wives and families huddled on the steps outside the Carbon County Prison waiting for word that the four men were dead. They had said goodbye to them the night before in their cells.
By 10:45 a.m. June 21, 1877, a day that would long be remembered as Black Thursday, it was over and they waited to collect the bodies of their loved ones to take home for a proper burial. Three hundred people, including reporters from the New York Times and The Philadelphia Inquirer, crowded into the main cellblock to watch the execution of four members of the Molly Maguires convicted of murdering two coal mine bosses. Even though the sun poured through the skylight and warmed the slate block floor, there was a chill of death in the air as Alexander Campbell, John Donohue, Michael Doyle and Edward Kelly, shackled with chains, walked to the gallows specially constructed to accommodate four people and end their lives at the same split second.
"Four men, shackled like wild animals, steel manacles on their hands and feet, were taken from their nearby prison cells and led to the gallows of death which had been erected on this very spot. The priests asked the four men to kneel and all were given absolution. After the priests left the platform, the sheriff and his deputy removed the chains and slipped the ropes and the hoods over their necks."
(from a newspaper account of the time)
Campbell was the first to climb the gallows. He and Kelly and Doyle were convicted of the 1875 murder of mine boss John P. Jones of Lansford. Doyle was next followed by "Yellow Jack" Donohue, who was found guilty of the murder of Summit Hill mine boss Morgan Powell in 1871.
Campbell proclaimed his innocence to the last moments of his life, and placed his hand on the wall of his cell,declaring its imprint would remain as a sign of his innocence.
(From The Memory of the Molly Maguires Kept Alive by Marigrace Heyer, a writer for The Coalcracker, a publication for coal miners.)

Thus ended the Molly Maguires. Guilty or innocent is almost irrelevant. They were the first martyrs in a cause that would become the American Labor movement. They were Irish...and they fought for what they believed in.

For a detailed history of the Molly Maguires please follow this link. It contains far more detailed information then what I can put on one page, including photos of Alex Campbell, Frank Gowen and other people involved in the organization.