Anarchy and Anarchists / A History of the Red Terror and the Social Revolution in America and Europe; Communism, Socialism, and Nihilism in Doctrine and in Deed; The Chicago Haymarket Conspiracy and the Detection and Trial of the Conspirators

A police captain provides a detailed account of late nineteenth-century radical movements, combining investigation reports, courtroom records, and contemporary reportage to examine socialist, communist, nihilist, and anarchist theories and actions. The narrative traces intellectual origins and organizational development in Europe and the United States, analyzes the adoption of political violence including explosive devices and historical assassinations, and reconstructs the detection, prosecution, and trial of a major Chicago conspiracy. Technical explanations of explosives and international incidents are interwoven with procedural descriptions of policing, propaganda, labor politics, and the social forces that fueled revolutionary agitation.