Newspaper+Article+Excerpts

**WHAT THE INQUEST REVEALED** **Positive Testimony of Many Witnesses Implicating the Anarchist Leaders.** The inquest upon the body of Mathias J. Degan, the West Lake Street Station police officer who died shortly after being hurt by the bomb which exploded at the corner of Desplaines and Randolph streets, was begun by Coroner Hartz yesterday afternoon at 2:50 o’clock in the office of the City Clerk, the Coroner not having the necessary room in his own office. The jury selected assembled at the County Hospital at 2 o’clock, and, proceeding to the morgue, viewed Degan’s body as it lay upon the marble slab. A ghastly hole in the abdomen of the corpse plainly indicated the cause of death. The features of the dead man were calm and placid, and showed no signs of violent death. The deceased was rather a handsome man and of perfect physical development. As the jury was about leaving the morgue John Degan, a brother, threw himself upon the body and cried pitifully, and it was with difficulty that he was induced to come away. The jury then took carriages to the City Hall, and the witnesses were summoned to the office of the City Clerk. A sensation was created in the room by the arrival of several officers, having in charge August Spies, Sam Fielden and Michael Schwab, the first editor of the Arbeiter-Zeitung, the second professional Communist with no other occupation, and the third associate or telegraph editor of the Arbeiter-Zeitung. These three had been arrested in the morning. Of the three Schwab appeared the coolest; Spies was nervous and worried, his countenance betraying great anxiety, while Fielden’s face was very red, and he shifted uneasily in his seat in his efforts to seem careless and indifferent. His head, face, whiskers, and hands looked as though they had seen neither water nor brush for many a day, and he was ill at ease. The trio had doubtless heard of the threats of lynching that had been made, and cast furtive glances on all sides, as if watching for somebody who might attack them. Though in their harangues these fellows have always denounced the police as assassins and cut-throats, they seemed at this time to be particularly glad of the protection afforded by the officers, though they squirmed under the angry looks cast upon them by the spectators. They paid close attention to the testimony given, and allowed nothing to escape that was going on around them.
 * May 6, 1886 Excerpt from Chicago Tribune article: "In the Grasp of the Law: Spies, Fielden, and other Socialists Behind Bars."**