This biographical look at Bill Haywood’s family by Socialist Party activist Hattie Titus was written during Haywood’s 1907 trial for murder in Idaho.

‘The Haywood Family’ by Hattie W. Titus from The Socialist (Seattle). Vol. 7 No. 327. May 25, 1907.

So much has been said about the man “whose greatest crime is loyalty to the working class,” his invalid wife, and his two daughters, that many may think they have read all there is to know about them.

But no, some of the most interesting facts about this most interesting family have never been published. I think anybody who is really interested in this man about whom the whole world is talking is desirous of learning about the family influences which have surrounded him in the past and which surround him now.

A stranger to Haywood, a German, when he saw Haywood for the first time in the courtroom, exclaimed: “Mein Gott! That man never could haf done it!”

When you see Haywood’s invalid wife, who has been his special care and the object of his tenderest love and solicitude through long years of illness, till he was forcibly taken from her, you exclaim: “My God! he never I could have done it!”

When you see his two daughters, the older between 16 and 17, the younger between 9 and 10; and when you see the 9-year-old with her arm around her father’s neck or caressing his hand; and when you note the loving glances exchanged between the two, you exclaim more than ever: “He never could have done it!”

It would be a hardened juryman indeed who could not find it, easy to presume “this man innocent” as he sees him in the court room with his family around him.

Mrs. Haywood is the most cheerful invalid I ever saw. Though she watches every adverse move of the prosecution and notes the possible effect on the trial, still she never loses heart. “Vernie,” the older of the two girls, is unusually mature. She is vivacious, quick-witted, a good conversationalist, plays the piano, has real musical talent and is lovable as well as interesting and attractive. Henrietta, the younger, is affectionate, playful, full of life and is unspoiled, though it would be difficult to refuse her anything she set her heart on, she has such a “fetching way” with her.

A MOTHER’S LOVE.

But of all the love surrounding this man probably the love that feels this awful heart stab the most is the love of the one who had born into her life the mother-love for the helpless infant some 40 years ago, a love the most devoted, the most unselfish the world can ever know. And what of this mother! When her beloved “Will” was about 4 years old, the father died. Since then there has been a step-father and several half- brothers and sisters, but “Will” is the mother’s darling still. In February, 1906, the same month in which the son was arrested and kidnaped into this state on the charge of murder, the husband died, and this woman had this double blow in a single month. For months following, until the next July, this devoted wife and mother was bordering on utter collapse. But by midsummer she made up her mind to go to “Will.” She secured her railroad transportation and traveled hundreds of miles alone. She was exceedingly nervous and broken and when she arrived she knew of but one place in Boise to go and that was to the COUNTY JAIL.

In fact she was so afraid that she would overhear someone say something about her beloved son that she could not bear to hear, that she got into a cab and told the driver to go immediately to the County Jail. She did not wait to see her son’s attorneys, she did not wait for a permit, she even forgot to pay the driver of the cab. It so happened that Haywood was out in the court house yard. The minute the cab stopped she caught sight of her boy. She forgot the cabdriver, the guards and everything else. She rushed by them all and held out her arms, crying, “Will, Will, come here to your mother!”

THE ROSE PILLOW.

The Haywoods have two homes in Boise, a furnished house of seven rooms, modern and well furnished, including a piano, AND THE COUNTY JAIL. The real home of the Haywoods, if the old saw that “Home is where the heart is,” is true, is The County Jail. It is not well furnished, though it might be considered modern, it has “wall-beds” which consist of two or three planks about 2 ft. 6 wide, hinged to the wall, watch can be put up and let down as is required. There is a mattress on the planks. This elaborate bed is inclosed in a steel cage. These steel cages are in a separate room, walled off from the day room which is used for serving meals, receiving friends, etc. At night the public is doubly sate-guarded by the prisoners being enclosed in the steel cages, where their wall beds are adjusted to suit the reclining position and the door is closed on them till morning.

For 15 months these men who are “presumed to be innocent before the law” have enjoyed such privileges of the “presumption of innocence.”

Mrs. Haywood said to her husband when she learned of these things, “To think you have been here for 15 months!” And Haywood answered, “Just think of what it has done for the working class!” The Western Federation of Miners has gained 14,000 new members since “the boys” have been in jail. The present slogan of the Western Federation is, “Wanted, volunteers to go to jail to insure the continued prosperity of the Federation.”

And the near-sighted and dull-brained capitalist doesn’t seem to see that the more persecution we have the greater the success of our movement! But what I really started to tell you about was the Rose Pillow. No doubt it will go down in history as the Famous Rose Pillow.

The County Jail has one pleasant, even delightful feature, and that isn’t the jail but the yard surrounding the jail. It was the greenest lawn, some of the finest trees and some of the largest and most beautiful roses to be found anywhere in Boise or elsewhere. And here from the time the roses began to bloom till August of last year Haywood picked the rose leaves which have since been made into the most beautiful Rose Pillow I ever saw. The rose leaves were picked in the Court House Yard. They were dried in the windows of the jail. Mrs. Moyer got the material and made up the pillow. It was expressed to Denver last August from the loving husband to the invalid wife with the request that she would use it for her own comfort. In all things else Mrs. Haywood does everything her husband requests. Her one thought is to do just the thing he would like her to do, but she says she simply can’t use that Rose Pillow in any such way, as she would use other pillows. She said in her own words, “I think too much of it.”

The latch string is always out at the Haywood’s house to every Socialist, and here nearly every evening after the trial is over for the day, will be found some of the comrades. The Rose Pillow is always shown to everyone who has not seen it before and Mrs. Haywood listens with the keenest interest to the expressions of admiration and appreciation. The outside is of rose-colored satin in floral design of about 20 in. square with a ruffle of rose-colored ribbon shaded from light to dark. But it is the inside that counts.

Nobody can guess how many rose leaves there are and still less can anybody measure the amount of love represented by each leaf!

There are many other things I could tell of interest about this family, but time and space will not permit this time. In next week’s issue I shall take up other phases of interest to Socialists concerning the trial.

There have been a number of journals in our history named ‘The Socialist’. This Socialist was a printed and edited in Seattle, Washington (with sojourns in Caldwell, Idaho and Toledo, Ohio) by the radical medical doctor, former Baptist minister and socialist, Hermon Titus. The weekly paper began to support Eugene Debs 1900 Presidential run and continued until 1910. The paper became a fairly widely read organ of the national Socialist Party and while it was active, was a leading voice of the Party’s Left Wing. The paper was the source of many fights between the right and left of the Seattle Socialist Party. in 1909, the paper’s associates split with the SP to briefly form the Wage Workers Party in which future Communist Party leader William Z Foster was a central actor. That organization soon perished with many of its activists joining the vibrant Northwest IWW of the time.

PDF of full issue: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/thesocialist-seattle/070525-seattlesocialist-v07n327.pdf