At least one excellent new book has been published to mark the centenary of the Haymarket riot of May 4, 1886, which resulted in the death of eight policemen and the wounding of many others, and the arrest and conviction of eight anarchists in one of the worst miscarriages of justice in American history.
Paul Avrich's recent work represents a major advance over the only other previous book-length assessment, whichwas written by Henry David fifty years ago, and was based almost entirely on secondary sources. Avrich's meticulous account confirms that it was the Chicago police who precipitated the violence at the meeting, which had been called to protest the fatal shooting of several strikers at the McCormick Harvester factory the previous day.