There were about three hundred and fifty anarchists carrying concealed weapons at the Haymarket massacre on the 4th of May, 1886, and probably about fifteen hundred present in all at the time of the explosion. A. R. Parsons had delivered his speech and Samuel Fielden was portraying to the sympathizing crowd, with all the eloquence he could command, the wide and yawning unbridged gulf between capital and labor, when seven companies of police, numbering nearly two hundred men, under command of their superior officers, swooped down upon the lawless mob. Captain Ward, in clear and ringing tones, commanded these land pirates to quietly disperse, when from an alley contiguous was seen in the darkness a little line of fire passing directly over the heads of the motley crowd. The hissing fiend, hurled by some practiced hand to perform its hellish mission, fell directly between two of the ranks of our brave and noble officers, and exploded with a detonation which seemed to shake the city from center to circumference, dealing death to several brave and noble officers, while the wounded and dying numbered over sixty, who a moment before were in the best of spirits and in the discharge of their duty as protectors of public peace, were stricken down without a moment's warning. But was there a man dismayed, although the groans of the wounded and mangled victims could be heard in every direction, not knowing but the next instant another explosion would strew the ground with fresh victims from their ranks? Scarcely had the sound of the explosion died away in the echoing distance, or the smoke from the fatal bomb rose up to be lost in the dark and murky clouds, ere the spirit of patriotism rose up in their hearts, inspiring them to deeds of noble daring, when they boldly charged in a solid column this band of treacherous outlaws. _Captain Bonfield_ seized a revolver from the hand of a fallen officer, at the same time drawing his own revolver, and from both hands he rained a shower of lead into the ranks of the enemy. Under this aggressive movement the anarchists began beating a hasty retreat. The wounded officers were removed to the _County Hospital_, while a large detachment were kept busy during the night caring for the dead and dying. The exact number of killed and wounded among the anarchists could not be ascertained, as they were removed from the ensanguined field immediately by their friends to places of safety, and medical assistance secured for them from among the socialistic fraternity.