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Part One Hundred Fifteen: American Insurrectionism

Anarchy in the US:
While anarchism had started as a movement in the 1870s, the movement did not enter the American consciousness largely until the turn of the century. By 1900, many small groups, particularly in the Old Northwest and the Northeast, had been created to promote the anarchist ideals. Some of these organizations delved into insurrectionism, or violent anarchism, and perpetrated a number of attacks in the northern United States.

The first significant anarchist attack started as a demonstration in front of the Chicago City Hall on June 14, 1896. The demonstration was organized by Albert Parsons and other labor activists in the city to protest conditions in meat packing plants in Chicago. The demonstration was timed in order to coincide with a campaign event by Carter Harrison Jr. who was running for reelection as mayor of Chicago at the time. Harrison and his father, Carter Harrison Sr., had controlled the mayoral office for nearly twenty years with Harrison Jr. succeeding his father to the post in 1889. At the event, later known at the City Square Riot, rioters possibly associated with Parsons incited the labor activists and started a riot. The police attempted to contain the crowd, but were overrun. Amid the confusion, a bomb was thrown at the mayor which exploded and killed him[1].

While this was the first and one of the most famous anarchist attacks in the turn of the century United States, there were several others. In 1899, the governor of Ohio's party was attacked by gunman Anthony Morrison[2] in Columbus. Four shots were fired at the party before Morrison was restrained by city police. Governor Mark Hanna was injured, but lieutenant governor Warren G. Harding was hit in the chest and died the next day in hospital. Morrison claimed that he was cleansing the Ohio political system of corruption, and later is was discovered that he was a member of a local insurrectionist organization. Part of the motivation for the attack included that as Attorney General, Hanna had cracked down on anarchist and labor movements in Ohio during the late 1880s.

Two years after the assassination of Harding, another bombing took place in Philadelphia. On August 12, 1901, a carriage loaded with pyroglycerin stopped outside the Philadelphia Mint. Two men were seen leaving the carriage after it stopped in front of the Mint. Ten minutes later, the dynamite in the carriage exploded. The bombing destroyed the front portico of the Mint and a large portion of the front rooms. While the majority of the interior of the building survived, it was decided to demolish the seventy year old structure and construct a new building in its place[3]. After a two months search by police, brothers Giuseppe and Vincenzo Morello were found guilty. Further investigation uncovered a large counterfeiting ring organized by the Morello brothers[4], and they were executed in 1905.


The Bureau of Investigation and the Liberty Republic:
With the increased frequency of anarchist attacks in the United States, the federal government under McKinley and Roosevelt began to specifically crack down on these movements. In 1903, the McKinley administration authorized the creation of a special federal prison for individuals deemed particularly dangerous by the Department of Justice. The Justice Department under Attorney General Joseph McKenna selected the War of 1812 era Fort Wood on Bedloe Island in the New Jersey half of New York Bay[5]. The star fort was converted into a federal prison complex, and by 1905 held forty inmates transferred from other prisons.

When Theodore Roosevelt was elected, one of his goals was the expansion of the executive branch and the Justice Department, specifically over the monitoring of anarchist and other potential threats. In 1905, Roosevelt and Congress authorized the creation of the Bureau of Investigation under the purview of Attorney General McIlhenny. The creation of the Bureau was the subject of bitter battle in Congress, with many Republicans and Democrats opposing the strengthening of the executive branch. But after numerous hearings and efforts by Roosevelt to woo Congress, the bill passed and the Bureau of Investigation was created. In the fall of 1905, the Bureau officially began service with twenty-six employees.

One of the biggest actions of the insurrectionists in the United States occurred in late 1907. During the early days of Fort Wood as a penitentiary, many of the inmates had been organizers for radical labor, socialist, and anarchist groups. While the prisoners on the island were guarded and watched, the surveillance was not completely perfect and the prisoners managed to organize. On October 9, 1907, the prisoners led by Patrick Eugene Prendergast[6] rioted and overwhelmed the police force on the island Prendergast had been convicted in Baltimore on conspiracy to commit treason, and while he was most likely insane an insanity plea failed. On the 11th, the United States flag was lowered from the fort and a tattered rudimentary flag was raised. In a manifesto, Prendergast proclaimed the island as the "Liberty Republic". The occupation of Bedloe Island lasted for several weeks before a coordinated effort took the island and the prisoners surrendered.

[1] This incident is partly based on the OTL Haymarket Affair.
[2] Fictional person.
[3] The Second Mint Building was demolished in 1901 in OTL as well, though this was because the Mint sold the property and moved.
[4] Giuseppe Morello in OTL was the first boss of the Morello crime family. Vincenzo is his TTL brother.
[5] The island that is now the OTL site of the Statue of Liberty.
[6] OTL assassin of Carter Harrison Sr. TTL Prendergast comes to Baltimore instead of Chicago.