{{short description|American murder victim}} {{Infobox person | name = John Barcoski | image = | image_size = | caption = | birth_name = | birth_date = December 15, 1889<ref name="draft">''U.S., World War I Draft Registration Cards, 1917–1918''</ref> | birth_place = Płock, Russian Empire (now Poland)<ref name="draft"/> | death_date = February 10, 1929 (aged 39) | death_place = Imperial, Pennsylvania, U.S. | death_cause = Murder resulting from Blunt Force Trauma | occupation = Miner }}
'''John Barcoski''' (also spelled as '''Barkoski''', '''Borkovski''', or '''Barkowsky'''; December 15, 1889 – February 10, 1929) was a Polish émigré miner brutally beaten to death by Pennsylvania's Coal and Iron Police on February 10, 1929. His passing and subsequent acquittal of his murderers on the first-degree murder charges provoked public indignation, which eventually led to the end of Pennsylvania's private anti-labor Coal and Iron Police system.<ref name="ppg1949">{{cite news |title=Murder In the Police Barracks — The John Barcoski Story |url=https://www.newspapers.com/image/89428807/?terms=John%2BBarcoski |accessdate=January 27, 2020 |work=Pittsburgh Post-Gazette |date=April 24, 1949 |language=en |url-access=subscription}}</ref>
==History==
Barcoski immigrated to the United States in 1906. He was married to Sophia Blussick, a fellow Polish emigrant, and had four children,<ref name="ppg1949"/><ref name="pp1930">{{cite news |title=Widow Takes the Stand in Barcoski Trial |url=https://www.newspapers.com/image/141340167/?terms=sophie%2BBarcoski |accessdate=January 27, 2020 |work=The Pittsburgh Press |date=January 29, 1930 |url-access=subscription}}</ref> John Jr., Helen, Bertha, and Anthony.<ref>John Barcoski, Imperial and Santiago Road; ''1920 United States Federal Census''</ref> Anthony also became a miner and died of lung cancer at age 47.<ref>''Pennsylvania, Death Certificates, 1906-1967''</ref> He was both a farmer and a union employee of the Pittsburgh Coal Company's Montour Mine #9 in McAdams, Pennsylvania. On the evening of the 9th, he went to his mother-in-law's home, and there encountered two private officers also employed by the Pittsburgh Coal Company. Eyewitnesses said one of them launched an unprovoked attack on Barcoski, who received a laceration of the left cheek, five or six head wounds, two broken ribs and a fractured nose. Later at police barracks over the course of four hours, according to trial testimony, a third officer beat Barcoski with a strap while he lay semiconscious on the floor, twisted his ears until the miner cried aloud, and twisted his broken nose until he lapsed again into unconsciousness. Then he beat Barcoski over the chest with a poker until the poker bent, straightened the implement and beat the man again. He stripped the miner to the waist in order to better use a strap and kicked Barcoski until the miner's body rolled over and over on the floor. The original attacker also beat Barcoski, kicked him, struck him over the head with knucklers, and slapped him on the arms, legs and neck with his blackjack. The next morning he was taken to a hospital where he died. A jury acquitted the three officers of murder.<ref>{{cite magazine|first=Frank|last= Butler|title=Coal and Iron Justice|magazine=The Nation|date=October 16, 1929|url=http://explorepahistory.com/odocument.php?docId=1-4-29A}}</ref>
Later, two of the police responsible for his death were found guilty of involuntary manslaughter, and his widow was paid $13,500 by the Pittsburgh Coal Company as compensation.<ref>{{cite book|last=O'Conner|first=Harvey|title=Mellon's Millions: The Biography of a Fortune|year=1933|publisher=The John Day company|page=225|oclc=634189}}</ref>
== Legacy ==
In the words of the ''Chicago Tribune'', "It was the fatal beating of John Barcoski, a miner in the Pittsburgh district several years ago, that hastened the end of "the system."<ref>[http://archives.chicagotribune.com/1935/06/16/page/2/article/coal-and-iron-police-abolished-in-pennsylvania Coal and Iron Police abolished in Pennsylvania: Long reign marked by much violence], ''Chicago Tribune'', June 16, 1935</ref> Researchers acknowledged the historical role of John Barcoski's slaying in the demise of Coal and Iron Police.<ref>Klein, Philip Shriver, and Ari Arthur Hoogenboom. [https://books.google.com/books?id=AB24rFZOmzcC&dq=coal+police&pg=PA449 A History of Pennsylvania]. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1973, p. 449.</ref><ref>Sadler, Spencer J. [https://books.google.com/books?id=M9nsVEMuCnkC&dq=John+Borkowski+coal+police&pg=PA109 Pennsylvania's Coal and Iron Police] Charleston, SC: Arcadia Pub, 2009, p. 109.</ref><ref>Richard P. Mulcahy, University of Pittsburgh - Titusville. [http://mds.marshall.edu/asa_conference/2015/full/131/ A Murder at the Police Barracks: The John Barcoski Slaying], 2015 Annual conference of the Appalachian Studies Association</ref>
Pennsylvania state legislator and former miner Michael Musmanno was outraged by the case, and introduced a bill to banish this private police force. The bill was vetoed by the Republican governor John Stuchell Fisher, which led to Musmanno's resignation.<ref>[https://books.google.com/books?id=Tm-AAAAAQBAJ&dq=Michael+Musmanno&pg=PT722 The Italian American Experience: An Encyclopedia]. New York: Garland Pub, 2000</ref> Musmanno then published a short story about the case, entitled "Jan Volkanik," blending Barcoski's identity with a semi-legendary Polish coal mining figure. Fisher's successor, Gifford Pinchot, fatally crippled the private police forces by refusing to fund them or renew any of their state commissions, and the Coal and Iron Police officially ceased to exist in 1935.
That story in turn was basis for the 1935 film ''Black Fury'' starring Paul Muni and directed by Michael Curtiz.<ref name="Left Side of the Screen">Herzberg, Bob. ''The Left Side of the Screen: Communist and Left-Wing Ideology in Hollywood, 1929-2009.'' Jefferson, N.C.: McFarland, 2011, p. 42-46.</ref> The film's subject matter was controversial. The executive secretary of the National Coal Association, D.J. Battle, attempted to stop production through political pressure. Its release was banned entirely in Chicago and several countries.<ref>''Within Our Gates: Ethnicity in American Feature Films'', 1911-1960, by Alan Gevinson, 1997, page 101</ref> The British Board of Film Censors deemed a speech describing the unfair relationship between the miners and union leaders as inflammatory, and ordered it removed.<ref>Hollywood in Crisis: Cinema and American Society 1929-1939, by Colin Schindler, 1996, page 187</ref>
In 1966, Musmanno published a novel version of the screenplay also named ''Black Fury''.<ref>{{cite book|last=Musmanno|first=Michael|authorlink=Michael Musmanno|title=''Black Fury''|publisher=Fountainhead Publishers|oclc=1600729}}</ref>
==See also== * Murder of workers in labor disputes in the United States
==References== {{Reflist|2}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Barkoski, John}} Category:1889 births Category:1929 deaths Category:People from Płock Category:People from Płock Governorate Category:Emigrants from Congress Poland to the United States Category:American people of Polish descent Category:People from Allegheny County, Pennsylvania Category:History of labor relations in the United States Category:Polish torture victims Category:Polish murder victims Category:Deaths by beating in the United States Category:People murdered in Pennsylvania Category:Deaths by edged and bladed weapons