Comrade Whyte was shot while organizing the I.W.W. in Tonopah, Nevada. Badly wounded, he died two months later in a San Francisco hospital on February 2, 1915.

‘A Tribute to Jack Whyte’ by R.E.R. from Mother Earth. Vol. 10 No. 2. April, 1915.

OUR friend is dead—your friend and mine, and we are poorer, vastly poorer than we were when he lived.

It may be you did not even know he was your friend, but that doesn’t matter. He was not the less your friend because of that.

And even if you knew him and were his enemy, neither does that matter. Jack Whyte had his friends. He also had his enemies. But Jack Whyte was the enemy of no man, His fight in this life was on another issue.

Some of us stand up in this life when occasion calls. Others of us lurk in corners and either pretend we do not hear, else refuse to answer, without pretext. Jack Whyte was of the stripe which both hears and answers. In that he was an example which, alas, is not in too plentiful numbers.

San Diego came. Jack Whyte was there. Originally he had not intended to make a lengthy sojourn. But the Court, espying the piercing glint of his mettle, ordained otherwise. He paid the penalty courage usually has to pay. His payment took the form of a six months’ enforced residence in the county jail.

But jails only whet the appetites of some offenders. The spirit of the Jack Whytes in this life rallies under oppression. This prisoner, like others before him, emerged—to strike again at the thing which had enmeshed him.

Never once did he murmur a complaint about the treatment which had been accorded him. Jack Whyte was not the manner of man to whimper when the blade of injustice happened to swing his way. He could smile at pain and forget a wrong done to himself. But the wrongs of others was a thing he neither smiled at nor forgot. His memory on that score was luminous as day, always.

These things are known. But what I have to say now is not known, save to the few: The reason Jack Whyte lies dead is because he chose to give his life, rather than that another’s should be taken. When he could have saved himself he did not. Rather did he intervene and take the shot which was intended not for him but for another. “Greater love hath no man than this.”

It must be good to die and feel you stood up to Life—not upon it. Here was one who, even when his life was ebbing—when he knew the hours were sealing his fate, had no wish to avenge himself on his slayer—said: “What good, what good to prosecute! Let him go.”

I lift my cap to you, Jack Whyte. I lift it reverently, humbly. To meet you in passing was worth the pain and trial that are a part of this uncertain journey. I am sorry the world was so dumb, so callous, so perversely unfeeling as not to accord you your due. You deserved better than you got.

But you gave more than you received. And it may be that when the accounts are finally straightened, you will get the balance which you earned here below. Those who knew you and loved you believe that the measure must needs be even to the unsettled score.

Mother Earth was an anarchist magazine begin in 1906 and first edited by Emma Goldman in New York City. Alexander Berkman, became editor in 1907 after his release from prison until 1915.The journal has a history in the Free Society publication which had moved from San Francisco to New York City. Goldman was again editor in 1915 as the magazine was opposed to US entry into World War One and was closed down as a violator of the Espionage Act in 1917 with Goldman and Berkman, who had begun editing The Blast, being deported in 1919.

PDF of full issue: https://archive.org/download/mother-earth/Mother%20Earth%20v10n02%20%281915-04%29%20%28c2c%20Harvard%29.pdf