Tom Lewis
Biography
Tom Lewis was a member of the "Baltimore Four", a group of antiwar protestors during the late 60s who poured blood on draft notices to protest the waste of blood in Vietnam at the time. Lewis also stole draft files on a separate occasion and destroyed them with napalm. For these actions,
he was sentenced to a total of 9 and a half years in prison.
While in prison, Lewis produced much art of his fellow inmates to depict their horrible states. After prison he continued to produce art in the Worcester, MA area and display his creations at the Worcester Art Museum. The Prince of Peace Plowshares was a six-person nonviolent direct-disarmament action at Bath Iron Works in Bath, Maine on February 14, 1997. Philip Berrigan, Susan Crane, Stephen Kelly S.J., Mark Colville, Steve Baggarly, and Tom Lewis-Borbely entered the shipyard and hammered on, and poured blood on, the Tomahawk cruise-missile vertical launching system installed on the destroyer USS The Sullivans (DDG-68) under construction. They were charged in U.S. District Court for the District of Maine with conspiracy and damage to government property, with prosecutors alleging $28,000 in damage. All six were convicted; in addition to prison, each received two years of supervised release and a $4,000 restitution fine.
Thomas Lewis was a Catholic Worker artist and peace activist, one of the Baltimore 4 (Oct 27, 1967 blood pouring on draft files at the Baltimore Custom House) and one of the Catonsville 9 (May 17, 1968 burning of 378 draft files at the Catonsville Maryland draft board with homemade napalm). He was convicted in October 1968 and sentenced to 3.5 years in federal prison. He served his sentence and continued decades of nonviolent direct action against U.S. militarism. He died on April 4, 2008.
