On this date, November 11, 1887, August Spies, Albert Parsons, Adolph Fischer and George Engel are executedas a result of the Haymarket affair.
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Execution of defendants—Engel, Fischer, Parsons, and Spies |
The next day (November 11, 1887) four defendants—Engel, Fischer, Parsons, and Spies—were taken to the gallows in white robes and hoods. They sang the Marseillaise, then the anthem of the international revolutionary movement. Family members including Lucy Parsons, who attempted to see them for the last time, were arrested and searched for bombs (none was found). According to witnesses, in the moments before the men were hanged, Spies shouted, "The time will come when our silence will be more powerful than the voices you strangle today." In their last words, Engel and Fischer called out, "Hurrah for anarchism!" Parsons then requested to speak, but he was cut off when the signal was given to open the trap door. Witnesses reported that the condemned men did not die immediately when they dropped, but strangled to death slowly, a sight which left the spectators visibly shaken.
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Portraits of the seven Chicago policemen killed in Haymarket Square, from Harper’s Weekly, May 15, 1886. |
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