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Re: JOHN L. LEWIS, ET AL ViLEWEe SE <<<": to be a very his story in a very ogical manner as is apparent from his statement. Ga: he had a very poor memory for dates and it took a great deal of prompting on the part of Agents to elicit information from him. It is believed he would be a poor witness. There is set forth below the signed statement executed by Py at the time of this interview: re pt. Ji, 1943 "I make the following voluntary statement to oth of whom have identified themselves.as being pecial Agents o Federal Bureau of Investigation. No threats or promises have been made to induce me to make a statement. "Tl was born o and cane to the U. 5. in FY and became a citizen_in ihave been 4 miner all my life and joined ‘the U.M.W. in about I have never held a union office. "FY started working for Mine B in about BB enc was working there at the time of the strike in 1937. I joined Progressive in 1932, but ‘ didn't have anything to do with the formation of progressive. Things went along about the same under progressive, but I think progressive officers were all good men & everything was fine. "In the spring of 1937 I recall that the question of a new contract came up, but my memory is rather bad as to any of the details of the contract question. I didn't go to many metings a: Ss 2° meetings were in Springfield. "I recall that some of the men in progressive were supposed to be working for united, but I do not remenber anything they were doing. I heard later they were kicked out of the union though. I went to work as usual on the day of the strike in May of 1937. I was then a digger in boyZfp I do not remember any disputes or fighting that took place the last day the mine was in operation. As I remember it, I worked that whole day as usual and can't even remember as to when I first heard the mine was on strike. "I remember that a couple of weeks after the strike the progressive union got out some kind of a petition, but I don't remember whether or not I signed it. I also recall that we had a picket line at the mine and I was out there for about four or five weeks when I had to go to the hospital. I voted in the NLRB election in Dec. of 1937 and everything was quiet at that time. I saw a man passing out some kind of bills, but forget what they were - 161 -