molly maguires

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a 19th-century secret organization of Irish Americans in the coal-producing area of Pennsylvania, US, which used often violent means to try to improve working conditions. (1862-76) Secret organization of U.S. coal miners in Pennsylvania and West Virginia. To protest poor working conditions and employment discrimination in the 1860s, the Irish-American miners formed a group named for an Irish widow who had led antilandlord agitators in Ireland. Acts of sabotage and terrorist murders in the coalfields were blamed on the group, and mine owners hired a Pinkerton detective, James McParlan, to infiltrate the organization. Based on his testimony in the widely publicized trials (1875-77), 10 "Mollies" were convicted of murder and hanged

Related Terms

Molly Maguire
member of a secret terrorist society established in 1843 in Ireland to prevent expulsion by the government; member of a former secret association established around 1865 fighting for better working conditions (USA)