GEORGE STONEY: Alright sir, now I want you to say how old you were when that
happened and where you were that morning and then how it happened.R.A. ATKIN: Let's see, I was --
GEORGE STONEY: Yes.
R.A. ATKIN: -- thirty-four. I was about thirty-four years old.
GEORGE STONEY: That's right.
R.A. ATKIN: I was thirty-four years old when that happened.
GEORGE STONEY: And you'd gone to the mill for what reason?
R.A. ATKIN: [I'd?] go to the mill for what reason?
GEORGE STONEY: Yeah.
R.A. ATKIN: They sent word to everybody, come over there and more (inaudible)
the union was the union, start the mill back up. But they started shooting and killed all them and (inaudible) start up for two weeks. (inaudible) oak tree. 00:01:00[preacher?] funeral over there on an oak tree. They didn't take them to churches, [tore?] all the churches up. It took them a long time to get over that.ETHEL ATKIN: Some people ain't over it to yet.
GEORGE STONEY: Could you tell us about the funeral? Cause it was a great big funeral.
R.A. ATKIN: Yeah I guess it was five thousand people over there at that
funeral. See, it was -- had six corpses sitting over under a tent and a tree. They preached the funeral over there and took and buried them.GEORGE STONEY: Now the people came from all over the country for that funeral --
R.A. ATKIN: Yeah, they come from all different places, all the way around.
Thirty, forty miles from here, to that funeral.GEORGE STONEY: Were you over there?
R.A. ATKIN: Yeah.
00:02:00ETHEL ATKIN: Yes, I was over there. I took a man's hat off his head, [laid?]
him on the ground, fanned him till he died. Till the breath left him. But I ain't got no more to say into it, I been trying to forget about all of that. And this just bringing it all back up.GEORGE STONEY: Alright sir, could you tell us a little more about the funeral?
R.A. ATKIN: That's about all I know about that funeral.
ETHEL ATKIN: They didn't have no churches, they had it over under them big tress.
GEORGE STONEY: Why did they do that?
ETHEL ATKIN: I don't know, (inaudible) I reckon. They said if [inaudible]
stayed out, it didn't belong to the union, and all that stopped it off till they got it straightened out but they didn't do it.GEORGE STONEY: Uh we -–
ETHEL ATKIN: I wasn't for the union or nothing, I was wanting to work. But I
00:03:00wasn't going in there or be – maybe shot at and killed.GEORGE STONEY: Were you -- you weren't -- Were you a member of the union?
ETHEL ATKIN: No, I wasn't no member of the union.
GEORGE STONEY: And were you a member of the union?
R.A. ATKIN: No.
GEORGE STONEY: Tell us about the people who were members of the union and people
who were not members of the union.ETHEL ATKIN: It's hard to tell about somebody else. You can't look at their
face and tell what's in their heart.GEORGE STONEY: Mr. Atkin?
R.A. ATKIN: Well, they just tried to organize, tried to get everybody to join
the union and said that you would make more money –-(crosstalk inaudible)
ETHEL ATKIN: -- You'd starve to death if they didn't, George.
R.A. ATKIN: -- if they had a strike, they had to feed you. But they struck and
they didn't feed them nothing.GEORGE STONEY: Where did --
R.A. ATKIN: A lot of [blacks?] starved to death before they got to go back to
work. And the Belton Mill and the Self Mill at Greenwood, he stayed out -- he kept them shut down for forty weeks. And they just begged to go back to work. 00:04:00Mr. Self told them down there, says, "I can live long as ya'll can [without?] work." But they begged and wrote notes and letters and cards and begging to go back to work. And they finally let them go back to work. And Belton Mill too, the same way. And there ain't never been no more strikings. [long pause] He come back over there [inaudible] two, three years after that, tried to get people to –- hand them cards, you know, and they just walked by him [inaudible], didn't pay him a bit of attention. They couldn't do nothing with him. They done had it fed up with that union.GEORGE STONEY: Now, where did the people come from?
R.A. ATKIN: I don't know where they come from.
GEORGE STONEY: Now the people who were killed, where did they come from?
00:05:00R.A. ATKIN: They just lived here in Honea Path, in the mill village.
ETHEL ATKIN: People that worked over there.
GEORGE STONEY: I understand there's some people from – from other mills came
over to try to persuade those people to come out. Were there?R.A. ATKIN: Belton Mill, a lot of them come down. They was there when the
shooting starting. They took all back to Belton hard as they could go. Didn't none of them get killed from Belton. Just the ones in the -- lived -- worked over here the ones that got killed -- shot.JAMIE STONEY: Did they give the people any warning about the shooting? Did they
warn them off before they started shooting?R.A. ATKIN: No, they didn't warn them or nothing. They just all gathered
around over there and walking around there and just started shooting over there -- out the mill window. 00:06:00GEORGE STONEY: Then it -– did you know any of the people who had guns?
R.A. ATKIN: Yeah, I knowed nearly every one of them that shot people.
ETHEL ATKIN: Well, I just keep my mouth shut, it's done and gone now. I
wouldn't tell nobody that I seen [with a gun?].GEORGE STONEY: I don't think you have to name them. That's why --
R.A. ATKIN: Yeah, you don't have to tell a name.
GEORGE STONEY: No.
R.A. ATKIN: But I know every one of them that shot -- that had guns.
ETHEL ATKIN: Bring it all up, fresh in your mind either.
GEORGE STONEY: What about the law enforcement people here?
R.A. ATKIN: Well they was on the mill company's side. They was out there
shooting too.GEORGE STONEY: Could you say, "the law enforcement people" and then say that again?
R.A. ATKIN: The law -- they was out there shooting – [big Charles?] from
(inaudible) out there on the ground shooting people.GEORGE STONEY: Could you say that again, "the law enforcement people," okay?
R.A. ATKIN: Yeah. The law enforcement people, they was in on it, shooting. The
00:07:00mayor told them all, "shoot to kill."GEORGE STONEY: Now who was the mayor?
R.A. ATKIN: Dan Beacham.
GEORGE STONEY: And he was also, could you say, that the mayor --
R.A. ATKIN: He was super of the mill and the mayor of the town too. And so you
had everybody on his side about it. If you got drunk, they'd take your job. You didn't have to get locked up. They heard you got drunk, they'd take your job. You'd be out of a job. If you didn't have people to feed you and keep you up, you'd starve to death.GEORGE STONEY: What about the people who got kicked out of the houses? Could you
talk about that?R.A. ATKIN: Kicked out of the houses?
ETHEL ATKIN: I don't know --
R.A. ATKIN: They didn't run none of them off. They worked on.
GEORGE STONEY: What about the people who they didn't -- who they didn't let
come back? Did they -- 00:08:00R.A. ATKIN: They let everybody go back on the job that didn't get killed.
[And of them?] that got killed, if they had wives or anybody working there, they went back to work. They had to make it the best way they could.GEORGE STONEY: Now since then, what's happened to the mill here?
R.A. ATKIN: What happened to the mill? They just went back to work and worked
like they was before it ever happened.GEORGE STONEY: Let me ask you something that is maybe more pleasant to talk
about. Do you -- talk about Roosevelt. President Roosevelt.R.A. ATKIN: Well I was working over there eleven hours a day when Roosevelt was
elected. And his policy was to work eight hours a day, passed the eight hour 00:09:00law. And if you making eleven dollars, twelve dollars a week and they cut you down to forty hours, and you make twelve dollars for forty hours. But I didn't believe that till it happened. And the first week I worked, [it?] stopped off two hours and put on my check, "did not work forty hours." And they didn't pay me no twelve dollars. And I went to my boss-man, and to him and I says, "well you can just have all this if you want it." I said, "I suppose drawed twelve dollars like everybody else." [Foreman?] said, "you stopped off two hours." Well, and they put more work on me and said, "you can dock them twelve frames and fan (inaudible) [when your around?] for twelve dollars a week." And I run that job a long time, and the biggest job that come (inaudible) was making fifteen dollars doffing a big box. And I doffed for years 00:10:00and years.ETHEL ATKIN: I don't know what good it's getting you to get all of this.
That's done gone. People tried to forget it.R.A. ATKIN: They're making an education –
ETHEL ATKIN: They ain't making no education to me. I got all that I wanted
over there.M2: It's for your grandkids, [ma?] and the kids coming up.
ETHEL ATKIN: Well I hope they never have to go through nothing like that and
know nothing about it.R.A Atkin: They won't. They'll see how things happened back then.
GEORGE STONEY: Now all this time you were also farming, weren't you? You had a
garden and all of that, could you talk about --R.A. ATKIN: Yeah, I worked a garden all -- every year. And in the mill too.
GEORGE STONEY: Now this is something your grandchildren -- your -- other
people's grandchildren wouldn't know about, so I want you to say that, "all the time I was in the mill I had a garden," and tell all about what you did, what you had.R.A. ATKIN: Yeah.
GEORGE STONEY: Okay?
00:11:00R.A. ATKIN: I worked in the mill and worked a garden and sowed vegetables and
'taters and things like that and saved up some money and bought this place here, we did, and paid half of it down. And I sold a lot off of it here, and I had a lot up here and sold it, put (inaudible) and in the first year we had it paid for. And I have sold high as seventeen-hundred dollars' worth of vegetables a year here. I'd raise a lot of Irish tater and sweet tater and butter beans, peas, and stuff. (inaudible), people come at them. You don't have to get out and peddle it much. [They'll hear, tell you?] (inaudible) and they'll come and get it. Build your trade up, see. [I'm?] done got too old 00:12:00for that now, I'm going to quit?.GEORGE STONEY: Why?
R.A. ATKIN: I got a good little mule to sell.
GEORGE STONEY: Okay. I think that does it Jamie.
(inaudible background voices)
M2: [inaudible] he says that every year.
R.A. ATKIN: Do what?
M2: [inaudible] you say that every year, you going to quit.
JAMIE STONEY: We just need everybody to just kind of be quiet for thirty –-
GEORGE STONEY: Okay.
JAMIE STONEY: -- seconds here. This is room tone for this sequence, or
atmospheric tone.ETHEL ATKIN: How come you all [knowed?] about us over here?
R.A. ATKIN: Nobody [tell you about us?].
00:13:00GEORGE STONEY: Okay.
JAMIE STONEY: (inaudible).
GEORGE STONEY: Okay. Jim [Deplacio?] over at the Anniston told us about -- I
mean, Greenville, told us about you. And I came by to see --ETHEL ATKIN: Told you about us?
GEORGE STONEY: That's right, yeah.
ETHEL ATKIN: What was their name? I don't know nobody in Green –
GEORGE STONEY: Jim --
[break in video]
[break in video]
JAMIE STONEY: (inaudible)
00:14:00[break in video]
[break in video]
JAMIE STONEY: This is for the insurance company if you don't make it. Are you
alright there?GEORGE STONEY: I'm fine.
[break in video]
00:15:00[break in video]
[break in video]
[break in video]
[break in video]
M1: (inaudible)
GEORGE STONEY: How long have you had the mule?
R.A. ATKIN: I've had this one for two years. I've had them all my life (inaudible).
00:16:00[break in video]
GEORGE STONEY: How much longer do you think this one's good for?
R.A. ATKIN: She's good for a long time, (inaudible) [on how you take care of
them?]. Just gardening with her, she'll live as she can eat good.GEORGE STONEY: How long do you plan to keep her?
R.A. ATKIN: I'm going to sell her this time then I'm going to quite.
00:17:00(inaudible) I took those radiation treatments, I ain't better now than before I took 'em.[break in video]
00:18:00R.A. ATKIN: Get up. Get up. Whoa. Get up. (inaudible)
GEORGE STONEY: She's still pretty sharp Now tell us (inaudible).
M1: (inaudible), you know.
GEORGE STONEY: What about your father and the mule?
M1: Well, he says that every year he's gonna quit about 2 or 3 times. When
00:19:00spring comes he's a hunting on a mule, I think he's about run out now.GEORGE STONEY: Do you remember anything about what he was talking about?
M1: No, I was five years old. I remember that morning coming from the neighbor's
-- I was at my house coming from the neighbor's (inaudible) at the mill.GEORGE STONEY: But your -- what do you remember?
M1: I remember going to that funeral, my aunt took us to that funeral over
there. I knew a lot of people that got shot, you know, and lived. But them others, they was -- I don't remember them (inaudible). 00:20:00R.A. ATKIN: Whoa. Come here. (inaudible). Whoa. (inaudible).
GEORGE STONEY: Okay. I think we're finished.
R.A. ATKIN: Huh?
GEORGE STONEY: We got enough.
R.A. ATKIN: (inaudible) --
[break in video]
[Silence]
00:21:00JAMIE STONEY: We're rolling. Yup we're rolling
[break in video]
GEORGE STONEY: Uh, Chris?
CHRIS: Sir?
GEORGE STONEY: Could you talk with the son, he's going to tell you how to get
the street is uh, uh (inaudible). 00:22:00[overlapping voices; inaudible]
GEORGE STONEY: He'll tell you how to get there.
[break in video]
[overlapping voices; inaudible]
[break in video]
JAMIE STONEY: Rolling.
GEORGE STONEY: Alright sir.
M2: I'm (inaudible) from Honea Path, South Carolina, standing in front of
Chiquola Mill and I'm standing in the same spot I was standing in on September the sixth in nineteen thirty-four. I was twelve years old at the time, on my way to school. At the time the strike took place, as you will see behind me, the people from the union came up, going towards the mill, and they were singing "I 00:23:00Shall not be Moved" carrying their union banners and the American flag. When they reached where the door is, as you can see at Chiquola Mill today, they began to shoot. At that time, I thought it was fire crackers going off, and knowing no better, being a child, only twelve years old, I stood there [until all the action was over with?] and the people dispersed. And a man, if you will -- to my right (inaudible), and they was (inaudible) came up right behind (inaudible) in front of where I'm standing now, but he lived in the in a two story house right here [as you can see?] to the right. And at that time there was six people killed immediately, but one died on the way to the hospital, and that made a total of seven people killed at this strike. 00:24:00GEORGE STONEY: Could you tell us what you saw as a boy of twelve?
M2: Well, as a boy of twelve, I saw hundreds of people. They came from
(inaudible), (inaudible), and (inaudible). But when the shooting started, they all dispersed. And as you can see, from right here you cannot see where the people were killed because the people were killed on the lower end of the plant. And there was a total of seven people killed plus all the others that was wounded.GEORGE STONEY: Now, tell us some of the people who were inside and some of the
people who outside.M2: The people that was on the inside I do not know because they were placed in
there during the night. And the people on the outside, I was not old enough, familiar enough, with them to know who they were.GEORGE STONEY: Do you know where they got the guns?
M2: No I do not. Because [at the day?] you could have a gun or own a gun, that's
the way it was back then. They all owned rifles, they owned shot guns, and 00:25:00pistols. And as I said, I did not know who did the shooting. You could not see who was being shot at from this point.GEORGE STONEY: Could you take us where we could see it?
M2: I certainly can.
GEORGE STONEY: Okay, let's go.
M2: Okay.
GEORGE STONEY: Just keep going -- moving.
M2: I -- we can't go by -- we can't go by walking.
GEORGE STONEY: Okay, then tell us about the house you went down to here.
M2: I left this point here, (inaudible) where the little second white house on
the -- on the right, a friend of mine by the name of [James Curly?] up there, and he says, "Come on inside, there's somebody being killed down at the mill." And there was a lady who lived across the street, [that immediately -- just fell over and fainted?] and passed away. So it was a dark, dreary day in Honea Path at that time because it was like the War Between the States. It separated sister from sister. It separated brother from brother, and fathers from sons. And they 00:26:00-- in other words, it separated the town, and I don't really think it will ever be back like it was.GEORGE STONEY: Now, what -- was your family in the mill? Tell us about that.
M2: Well, my daddy he was what you called a second hand. And he was at that --
there that morning, but as I said, we went off to school. At that time it was on Thursday morning and we went on to school, and so we didn't really know what took place.GEORGE STONEY: Now had you heard any talk about all of this strike and so forth
before that?M2: Oh, certainly have. We certainly have. There were people at that -- union
people would stop people going to work right there at the bottom of those hills, and they was also stopped on that other port trying to get them to convert over to the union. But you've got to take in consideration in 1934, people were hungry, they wanted to work. We were coming out of the Depression. Roosevelt just come into office in 1932, and the WPA coming along and all that, and these 00:27:00people that was union, they knew -- I mean, the non-union knew they had to work to support a family.GEORGE STONEY: And why do you think the union came in then?
M2: Well, because they wanted to bring the union in, they -- hoping to get
better -- better salary, better jobs, which a hill beans never amounted out of it. That's my personal opinion. As an old man 68 years old.GEORGE STONEY: Okay. You must have heard a lot in your -- you are the son of a supervisor.
M2: Right.
GEORGE STONEY: You were a son of management.
M2: Right.
GEORGE STONEY: Could you talk about the attitudes in this town between the
management and the workers?M2: Well, I think they were pretty close related myself, because everybody that
lived -- the manager, he lived on the mill village same as the worker. And you -- where you have neighbors (inaudible) your neighbor, their wives, [and?] 00:28:00friends, you can't break that bond. I don't care if you can be a manager, that's why you [need?] big corporations. They don't even want the people to even live in the same hometown with people. That's (inaudible) -- 'cause you don't care who you hurt or who you step on. But back then they did. I mean, you had to be hard and all to be a supervisor back then, but you still was fair.GEORGE STONEY: Have you ever worked in the mill?
M2: I certainly did.
GEORGE STONEY: Tell us about that.
M2: Well, I worked in the mill from nineteen thirty-eight to nineteen forty-one --
GEORGE STONEY: Start again and say -- start -- "I started working when I was so-many-years-old."
M2: Well, in 1938, so I would've been, nineteen 22, so I would've been 20 years
old when I -- let's say about 16 years old. And then in '42 I went into the army, and when I came back out of the army, I went back to work in the mill. And then in 1951 -- in other words, I worked all the way from a sweeper up to a loom fixer, over-hauler, and I was in the weave shop, so to speak. And, so in 1951 00:29:00though, I decided there was a better way of living, I got out of the mill.GEORGE STONEY: What is --
M1: Reload.
END OF INTERVIEW