OUSTING THE J.W.W.

Thames Star, Volume LII, Issue 13847, 6 November 1918, Page 4

OUSTING THE J.W.W.

A Sydney < con-e^p'oudfent writes: — The little town of Hughenden, ...in Queensland, h closing the br.glhvest. and most sparkling week ot its ©xistence. It has been discouraging a band of I.W.W. agitators and dialoyaliste who bad made their nest tihere. The nieithods ■employed have been dra&tic, but effeofi,ve. The rapidly-leng.tiheiuirLg trails of • the disloyalists who have just lai't the town would, if .painted on &> map, make Hughenden look like the centre of a. spider'ys web. Hughendeiii. isi still celeibiuting; the oa-gy will not cease until the last disloyalist hag "folded Ms tent.''

New Zealanders !jt will reroeinjibea* something thsat happened a,t Waini sow)© years ago—how the townsfolk, driven to distraction >by petty strikes and industrial turmoil rose furiously one morning, and literally chased the agitators out of the. town and - fur over, tibe, surrounding (hillsides. The Hugheoden affair is very like tih'at. The disloyalists, became . more and me nodsy and confident, mid the townsfolk kept quiet and said nothing. Thee came a "beer strike." The publicans raised the pi-ice of beer, and tolie extreme unionists- refused to, buy it. or tlie.bamnaids sell it. The pulblicans discna.rged the barmaids. . The unionists tightenied tb& boycott, and, demiajided the reinstiii;enveiit of the btainniaids. Tibey also tried to prevent anyoixe ■entering the hotels, and .employed cave-men methods to enforce their wish. Out of tihis foolislh qua,rrel, no one knows how, tihere developed a, • .bitter war between loyalists and disloyalists'. Apparently the e^tiremists insulted and iittacked soime retiwned soldiers, and all the othetr soldiers. flnd tlhe d6ce.nt-niiinded townsfolk sarose in revenge. In a little wsiile there was fighting atl over tih© town. Tlie .soldiers Wjerekept out of it • na for as possiiWe, and tlie townsifolk set to work to root out the., I.W t W. men and the more p'TOimiinent disloyalists. The .system, w:a,s to warn a niian to "get out." If he refused, and stayed, he was thrashed to tilie point of sevea'e injun-y. Tihere was rioting in all direction. 1?; but the fistats went generally in favour of t!he loyalists.