"The trouble in the public square started when Lieut. H. S. Bergen, who served with the 80th Division overseas, demanded that several soldiers among the Socialists on the platform remove their uniforms or the red flags they wore on their breasts. "The soldiers refused, and C. E. Ruthenberg, scheduled as the principal Socialist speaker, interceded for the Socialists. "Lieut. Bergen, followed by Lieut. John Hardy of Detroit, thereupon mounted the platform and tore the red insignia from the khaki uniforms. The act was the signal for a grand rush by thousands of Socialist sympathizers." On Sunday, May 4, 1919, serious trouble with the Socialist-Bolshevist element of Gary, Indiana, was narrowly averted. The account, as published in the "Chicago Tribune" on the next day, reads in part as follows: "There was no 'Red' parade in Gary yesterday.... "Fifty policemen, wearing revolvers on their belts and reinforced by a special shotgun squad of sixteen, a company of state militia, thirty deputy sheriffs, a group of secret service men from Chicago and hundreds of citizen volunteers, prevented the parade after the Russian Socialists flouted an order of Mayor W.H. Hodges prohibiting the march and declared they would proceed despite the authorities.... "Yesterday's demonstration was the result of a carefully planned plot matured for nearly a month by the foreign radical element of Lake County, Indiana. Its stated purpose was to protest against the conviction of Eugene V. Debs and Kate Richards O'Hare. An undercurrent of rumor among the radicals gave it a more significant meaning, however. "On Thursday secret service men obtained copies of pamphlets printed in Russian, containing a formula for the manufacture of explosives. More literature calling for the overthrow of the government was circulated. A third series of pamphlets contained the Constitution of the Russian Soviet Republic. "Friday Morris Lieberman, head of the Socialists, called on Mayor Hodges for a permit to parade. It was refused with the explanation that riots such as caused two deaths in Cleveland were feared.... "Early yesterday morning radicals began to arrive in Gary. Cars from Indiana Harbor, Whiting, Hammond, Crown Point, and trains from Chicago brought them by the dozens. "By noon several thousand had gathered in and near the Socialist headquarters, a mile south of the business district of Gary. Under portraits of Trotzky and Lenine they sang Russian songs and gathered about in knots waiting for 'zero hour'--one o'clock.