Biography
Adolph Ersson was one of the 74 Industrial Workers of the World members held in the Snohomish County jail and charged with murder after the Everett Massacre. On November 5, 1916, some 300 Industrial Workers of the World members sailed from Seattle to Everett, Washington aboard the steamers Verona and Calista to support a shingle-weavers' strike and the IWW's free-speech fight. At the Everett dock, Snohomish County sheriff Donald McRae and a posse of armed vigilantes opened fire on the Verona, killing at least five Wobblies and wounding dozens. The returning IWW members were arrested, and 74 were charged with the murder of two deputies (Jefferson Beard and Charles Curtis) killed in the gunfire. Only Thomas H. Tracy was brought to trial; after his acquittal on May 5, 1917, the charges against the others were dropped. At the time of the massacre he was 26, a laborer and sailor, born in Sweden.
From Kenyon Zimmer's Red Scare Deportees index (kenyonzimmer.com, compiled from INS deportation case files): Active in union and strike activity in Australia after emigrating there. Then migrated to the U, where he joined the IWW in Denver in 1914. Survivor of the 1916 Everett Massacre; arrested in its aftermath and held until charges were dropped in 1917. Arrested again in Seattle in October 1918 and in Los Angeles in May 1919. Deported on June 26, 1919.
After deportation made his way to Norway, where gave speeches about the repression of the IWW in the US. Found work on a ship sailing from Kristiana to New York, where he jumped ship in December 1919. 1924 working as a laborer in Buffalo. At some point he returned to Sweden, where he died in 1967.
