Coxey's Army

(TSHA) In the wake of the 1893 panic Jacob Sechler Coxey of Massillon, Ohio, a businessman and reformer interested in fiat money, prepared to lead an army of jobless men to Washington to induce Congress to issue legal-tender currency to be spent on roads and other improvements. His appeal drew response from as far as the Pacific Coast, where contingents of his army were formed.
In charge in Los Angeles was Lewis C. Fry. Fry and his men set out on foot from Los Angeles on March 16, 1894, and later boarded a freight train. Several towns gave them food and sped them onward. On March 21 the mayor of El Paso wired Governor James Stephen Hogg, asking him to request the War Department to place the garrison at Fort Bliss at the service of the state to repel the expected invasion. Hogg refused, assuring him that Texas was able to enforce its laws and asking him to report any violations. Continued