The 1919 United States anarchist bombings were a series of bombings and attempted bombings carried out by followers of the

Italian anarchist Italian anarchism as a movement began primarily from the influence of Mikhail Bakunin, Giuseppe Fanelli, and Errico Malatesta. Rooted in collectivist anarchism, it expanded to include illegalist individualist anarchism, mutualism, anarcho-sy ...

Luigi Galleani Luigi Galleani (; 1861–1931) was an Italian anarchist active in the United States from 1901 to 1919. He is best known for his enthusiastic advocacy of "propaganda of the deed", i.e. the use of violence to eliminate those he viewed as tyrant ...

from April through June 1919. These bombings were one of the major factors contributing to the Red Scare of 1919–1920.

April mail bomb attacks

In late April 1919, at least 36 booby trap dynamite-filled bombs were mailed to a cross-section of prominent politicians and appointees, including the

Attorney General In most common law jurisdictions, the attorney general or attorney-general (sometimes abbreviated AG or Atty.-Gen) is the main legal advisor to the government. The plural is attorneys general. In some jurisdictions, attorneys general also have exec ...

as well as justice officials, newspaper editors and businessmen, including John D. Rockefeller.Avrich, Paul, ''Sacco and Vanzetti: The Anarchist Background'', Princeton University Press, (1991), pp. 140–143, 147, 149–156, 181–195 Among all the bombs addressed to high-level officials, one bomb was addressed to the home of a Department of Justice

Bureau of Investigation The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is the domestic intelligence and security service of the United States and its principal federal law enforcement agency. Operating under the jurisdiction of the United States Department of Justice, t ...

(BOI) field agent once tasked with investigating the Galleanists, Rayme Weston Finch, who in 1918 had arrested two prominent Galleanists while leading a police raid on the offices of their publication ''Cronaca Sovversiva''. The mail bombs were wrapped in brown paper with similar address and advertising labels. Inside, wrapped in bright green paper and stamped "

Gimbel Brothers Gimbel Brothers (known simply as Gimbels) was an American department store corporation that operated for over a century, from 1842 until 1987. Gimbel patriarch Adam Gimbel opened his first store in Vincennes, Indiana, in 1842. In 1887, the compa ...

-Novelty Samples", was a cardboard box containing a six-inch by three-inch block of hollowed wood about one inch in thickness, packed with a stick of

dynamite Dynamite is an explosive made of nitroglycerin, sorbents (such as powdered shells or clay), and stabilizers. It was invented by the Swedish chemist and engineer Alfred Nobel in Geesthacht, Northern Germany, and patented in 1867. It rapidl ...

. A small vial of

sulfuric acid Sulfuric acid (American spelling and the preferred IUPAC name) or sulphuric acid ( Commonwealth spelling), known in antiquity as oil of vitriol, is a mineral acid composed of the elements sulfur, oxygen and hydrogen, with the molecular fo ...

was fastened to the wood block, along with three fulminate-of-mercury

blasting cap A detonator, frequently a blasting cap, is a device used to trigger an explosive device. Detonators can be chemically, mechanically, or electrically initiated, the last two being the most common. The commercial use of explosives uses electri ...

s. Opening one end of the box (the end marked "open") released a coil spring that caused the acid to drip from its vial onto the blasting caps; the acid ate through the caps, igniting them and detonating the dynamite. The Galleanists intended their bombs to be delivered on

May Day May Day is a European festival of ancient origins marking the beginning of summer, usually celebrated on 1 May, around halfway between the spring equinox and summer solstice. Festivities may also be held the night before, known as May Eve. Tr ...

. Since 1890 and the

Second International The Second International (1889–1916) was an organisation of Labour movement, socialist and labour parties, formed on 14 July 1889 at two simultaneous Paris meetings in which delegations from twenty countries participated. The Second Internatio ...

, May 1 had been celebrated as the international day of communist, anarchist and socialist revolutionary solidarity. Seattle Mayor Ole Hanson, who had recently attained national prominence for opposing a general strike in Seattle, received one of the mailed package bombs, but it was opened by William Langer, a member of his office staff. Langer opened the wrong end of the box and the bottle of acid dropped onto a table without detonation. He took the bomb to the local police, who notified the

Post Office A post office is a public facility and a retailer that provides mail services, such as accepting letters and parcels, providing post office boxes, and selling postage stamps, packaging, and stationery. Post offices may offer additional se ...

and other police agencies. On April 29,

Georgia Georgia most commonly refers to: * Georgia (country), a country in the Caucasus region of Eurasia * Georgia (U.S. state), a state in the Southeast United States Georgia may also refer to: Places Historical states and entities * Related to the ...

Senator Thomas W. Hardwick, who had co-sponsored the anti-radical Immigration Act of 1918, received a similarly disguised bomb. It blew off the hands of his housekeeper when she attempted to open the package. The senator's wife was also injured in the blast which severely burned her face and neck and a piece of shrapnel cut her lip and loosened several of her teeth. News reports of the Hardwick bomb described its distinctive packaging and an alert post office employee in New York connected this to 16 similar packages which he had set aside a few days earlier for insufficient postage. Another 12 bombs were eventually recovered before reaching their intended targets. The addressees were the following:

June bombings

Mitchell Palmer house in Washington DC 2132 R Street NW after bomb attack June 2 1919

June 3 1919 Newspapers of the 1919 United States anarchist bombings

On the evening of June 2, 1919,, 78 the Galleanists managed to detonate nine large bombs nearly simultaneously in eight cities. These bombs were much larger than those sent in April, using up to of dynamite''Plotter Here Hid Trail Skillfully; His Victim Was A Night Watchman'', The New York Times, 4 June 1919 and all were wrapped or packaged with heavy metal slugs designed to act as

shrapnel Shrapnel may refer to: Military * Shrapnel shell, explosive artillery munitions, generally for anti-personnel use * Shrapnel (fragment), a hard loose material Popular culture * ''Shrapnel'' (Radical Comics) * ''Shrapnel'', a game by Adam C ...

. Addressees included government officials who had endorsed anti-sedition laws and

deportation Deportation is the expulsion of a person or group of people from a place or country. The term ''expulsion'' is often used as a synonym for deportation, though expulsion is more often used in the context of international law, while deportation ...

of immigrants suspected of crimes or associated with illegal movements as well as judges who had sentenced anarchists to prison. The targets were: * Roman Catholic Church: Our Lady of Victory (Philadelphia) * Harry Klotz, a silk industrialist (335 East 31st Street) but the bomb damaged the house (331 East 31st Street) of Henry Morris (

Paterson, New Jersey Paterson ( ) is the largest city in and the county seat of Passaic County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey. *

Mayor of Cleveland The mayor of Cleveland is the head of the executive branch of government of the City of Cleveland, Ohio. As the chief executive in Cleveland's mayor–council (strong mayor) system, the mayor oversees all city services and is "responsible for e ...

Harry L. Davis (Cleveland) * Boston Judge Albert F Hayden (Boston) * Massachusetts State Representative Leland Powers (

Newton, Massachusetts Newton is a city in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States. It is approximately west of downtown Boston. Newton resembles a patchwork of thirteen villages, without a city center. According to the 2020 U.S. Census, the population of ...

) * Pittsburgh's Federal Judge W. H. S. Thompson (Pittsburgh) * Immigration Chief W. W. Sibray (Pittsburgh) * Judge Charles C. Nott (New York) * Attorney General A. Mitchell Palmer (Washington D.C.) Palmer, who was already the recipient of a mail bomb in April, was again attacked in the new wave of violence.''Wreck Judge Nott's Home'', The New York Times, 3 June 1919 None of the targeted men were killed, but one bomb took the life of New York City night watchman William Boehner and the bomb intended for Attorney General Palmer's home prematurely exploded and killed Carlo Valdinoci, who was a former editor of the Galleanist publication ''

Cronaca Sovversiva ''Cronaca Sovversiva'' (Subversive Chronicle) was an Italian-language, United States-based anarchist newspaper associated with Luigi Galleani from 1903 to 1920. It is one of the country's most significant anarchist periodicals. History Pr ...

'' and close associate of Galleani.Avrich, Paul, ''Anarchist Voices: An Oral History of Anarchism in America'' (AK Press, 2005) , , 496 Though not seriously injured, Palmer and his family were shaken by the blast and the house itself was largely demolished. Two near-casualties of the same bomb were Assistant Secretary of the Navy

Franklin Delano Roosevelt Franklin Delano Roosevelt (; ; January 30, 1882April 12, 1945), often referred to by his initials FDR, was an American politician and attorney who served as the 32nd president of the United States from 1933 until his death in 1945. As the ...

and his wife

Eleanor Eleanor () is a feminine given name, originally from an Old French adaptation of the Old Provençal name ''Aliénor''. It is the name of a number of women of royalty and nobility in western Europe during the High Middle Ages. The name was intro ...

, then living across the street from Palmer. They had passed the house just minutes before the explosion and their residence was close enough that one of the bomber's body parts landed on their doorstep. Each of the bombs was delivered with several copies of a pink flyer, titled "Plain Words", that read as such:

War, Class war, and you were the first to wage it under the cover of the powerful institutions you call order, in the darkness of your laws. There will have to be bloodshed; we will not dodge; there will have to be murder: we will kill, because it is necessary; there will have to be destruction; we will destroy to rid the world of your tyrannical institutions.

The flyer was later traced to a printing shop operated by two anarchists, typesetter Andrea Salsedo and compositor Roberto Elia, who were both Galleanists according to the later memoirs of other members. Salsedo committed suicide and Elia refused an offer to cancel deportation proceedings if he would testify about his role in the Galleanist organization. Unable to secure enough evidence for criminal trials, authorities continued to use the

Anarchist Exclusion Act The Immigration Act of 1903, also called the Anarchist Exclusion Act, was a law of the United States regulating immigration. It codified previous immigration law, and added four inadmissible classes: anarchists, people with epilepsy, beggars, and ...

and related statutes to deport known Galleanists.

Response

Fueled by labor unrest and the anarchist bombings and then spurred on by Attorney General A. Mitchell Palmer's attempt to suppress radical and non-radical labor organizations, the response to the bombings was characterized by exaggerated rhetoric, illegal search and seizures, unwarranted arrests and detentions and the deportation of several hundred suspected radicals and anarchists. Palmer, twice targeted by anarchist bombs, organized the nationwide series of police actions known as the

Palmer raids The Palmer Raids were a series of raids conducted in November 1919 and January 1920 by the United States Department of Justice under the administration of President Woodrow Wilson to capture and arrest suspected socialists, especially anarchists ...

in November 1919 and January 1920. Under suspicion of violating the

Espionage Act The Espionage Act of 1917 is a United States federal law enacted on June 15, 1917, shortly after the United States entered World War I. It has been amended numerous times over the years. It was originally found in Title 50 of the U.S. Code (War ...

, the Sedition Act and/or the Immigration Act of 1918,Theoharis, Athan G., ''The FBI: A Comprehensive Reference Guide'', Greenwood Publishing Group, , 9780897749916 (1999), p. 362 approximately 10,000 people were arrested, of whom 3,500 were held in detention. Of those held in detention, 556

resident aliens In law, an alien is any person (including an organization) who is not a citizen or a national of a specific country, although definitions and terminology differ to some degree depending upon the continent or region. More generally, however, ...

were eventually deported.

Media and popular culture

The bombings were dramatized in the 2012 film ''

No God, No Master ''No God, No Master'' is a 2012 American independent crime suspense thriller directed, written, and produced by Terry Green. The film stars David Strathairn, Ray Wise, Sam Witwer, Alessandro Mario and Edoardo Ballerini. ''No God, No Master'' wa ...

.'' The bombing of the home of Palmer was also dramatized in the 2011 film '' J. Edgar''. The June Bombings and the “Plain Words” fliers were referenced in the video game ''Arkham Origins'' by Anarky, one of the game’s antagonists.

Notes

References

* Allen, F. L., ''Only yesterday; an informal history of the nineteen-twenties''. New York: Harper & Sons (1957). * * Avrich, Paul (Prof.), '' Sacco and Vanzetti: The Anarchist Background'', Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press (1991), . * Avrich, Paul (Prof.), '' Anarchist Voices: An Oral History of Anarchism in America'', Princeton: Princeton University Press (1996). * * McCormick, Charles H., ''Hopeless Cases: The Hunt for the Red Scare Terrorist Bombers'', University Press of America (2005), , . * Neville, J. F., ''Twentieth-century cause cèlébre: Sacco, Vanzetti, and the press, 1920–1927''. Westport, Conn: Praeger (2004). * Post, Louis F., ''The Deportations Delirium of Nineteen-twenty: A Personal Narrative of an Historic Official Experience'' (NY, 1923), reissued: , . {{DEFAULTSORT:United States anarchist bombings Explosions in 1919 April 1919 events May 1919 events June 1919 events History of anarchism Political history of the United States Political violence in the United States Terrorist incidents in the United States in the 1910s Anarchism in the United States Presidency of Woodrow Wilson Improvised explosive device bombings in the United States 1919 crimes in the United States Terrorist incidents involving postal systems Galleanisti Red Scare

April mail bomb attacks

June bombings

Response

Media and popular culture

See also

Notes

References