STRIKE RIOTS.

Dominion, Volume 1, Issue 20, 18 October 1907, Page 11

STRIKE RIOTS.

♦ ENGLISH ATTACKED AT ANTWERP. A GREAT FIRE. The English strike-breakers sit Antwerp were 011 .Sontcmbcr 1 subjected to renewed attacks by the dockers" owing to tlio recrudcscnco of tile strike. As the Englishmen, accompanied by police, were driving.to the ship Cambronian, their home, they were stoned by some twenty dockers concealed behind piles of timber anil stones. Revolvers were fired by the policemen before the dockers fled. Another attack was made later on Englishmen coming from tlio steamer Nestor, but a shot from a policeman's: revolver put the attacking party to flight. A cart conveying mattresses for the use of tho English strike-breakers was surrounded by the dockers, who threw tho mattresses 011'tho ground and set them 011 lire. Tho police in tho end put the strikers to flight. Several Englishmen were again attacked in the evening, and another cart was thrown into the dock, whilo a number of articles and utensils intended for the strike-breakers were destroyed., Other accounts state: Tho warehouses of the "grain works" were taken by storm, several hundred strikers breaking into the yard. The police wore powerless. Rioters took the wheels off the carts and smashed up the articlos in them. Stones were thrown by the strikers at a steamer on which some Englishmen were at ■work. The Englishmen at another shed wore put to flight by the strikers. A char-a-banc on which strike-breakers were riding was attacked by the strikers, who took the wheels off and prevented the men from going to work. A crane was thrown into the water, and several other appliances were damaged. A distiller's dray was seized by the strikers, who shared out the liquor. A G.erman sailor, being taken for an Englishman, was badly mauled. The Commissary of Police declared that he could do nothing more, lis the police were overwhelmed with work. •

' 'A number 1 of women in the tanning yards also went on strike. In the, hall,, at a meeting of men, were many women in an excited state. A gang from Brussels, were stopped bv the strikers, who explaineditlie situation, whereupon they went back to tho station. Some men who threw stones wero arrested. An Antwerp advice dated Septombor 5 says that the timber fire which broke out at the docks—and which is believed to bo the work of strikers—has now been got under—in fact' it burnt itself out—but tho damage wrought is enormous. Tho loss is estimated varionslv at £160,000, £450,000, and' £800,000. Tho sight, when the conflagration, was at its height, was one never to bo forgotten, . .The crowds drawn to tho quays were immense, but over tho whole a spell seemed to hang. Men watched the flames in almost silence. Throughout the night'the light of day prevailed; and away in Holland tho impression given by the reflection was so powerful that hundreds of Dutch from all parts to render assistance in what,'it seomed to them, must bo a national disaster. Much foreign shipping was threatened with destruction as'.the frequent changes in the direction of 1 the wind drove tWe flames to where the vessels lay at tho' quay sides. Anwiig the English vessels thus iiicnaced wore tho Trojan Prince, Toxtoth, and Loch More, and the clippcr' ship Derwent. The, steamers, got up steam ready to haul out into the stream should occasion demand. Among the. property destroyed are the largo saw-mills of Messrs. Snieurs and Vanheufllon, which employ about 0110 hundred men; also many ''workmen's dwellings, whose occupants spent the night. miserably in tlio streots''in drpnehing rain.'. Infantry pickets now surround not only the devastated area, but all other timber stacks and property at the docks generally, with orders.to shoot all suspects. at sight. Tho tanks of pctroloum are also .objects! of special solicitude on tho part of the authorities. On September 5 the numbor of Civil Guard was'increased-to 1500. Tlio calling out of this force has completed tho genoral paralysis of business induced by the, fire. 1 The Civil Guard ombraccs citizens in overy.walk of'lifo, from 'gentlemen who furnish their own horses arid form the crack cavalry troop, styled tho Corps d'Elito, to butchers and bakers in the infantry battalions. In one large mercantile establishment 46 out of 50 :■ employees are serving at the docks. Another firm, which, curiously enough, is in the shipping trade, has oleven out of its staff of 26- clerks on (Jnty. The men arc heartily sick'.of thoir duties, which continue 14 hours 'a day without intermission, and include the usual van escorts, guarding the streets, and patrolling the docks. '■■■•!