1883-11-28ss

    The controversies engendered by the Hamilton Salvation Army using the Hamilton sidewalks and roadways for their enthusiastic, if noisy, street processions were almost continuous in late 1883.
     On November 28, 1883, the Spectator carried the following account of yet another disturbance at a Salvation Army street procession :

“A number of the members of the Salvation Army figured in the police court proceedings this morning.

“William Porter, a lad, and a member of the army, charged Edward Arnott with assault. Three witnesses were examined, all of whom said they saw a stone pass Porter and strike another member of the army. They also saw a tall man catch hold of him and run him down King street to Ferguson avenue, and then strike him, and subsequently they saw some hard substance strike him on the back of the neck. Porter said that he had been rendered partially deaf by the treatment he had received. He did not know why he should be so treated as he had not said anything to anyone. Neither Porter nor any of the witnesses could identify Arnott as the man who committed any of the misdeeds, but when he (Arnott) was called, he admitted that he had thrown an apple, which he had in his pocket, at Porter and struck him in the neck. He said that the tall man who ran the prosecutor off King street and assaulted him, was a man named Teeme or McLaughlin. He was very sorry for what he had done, as he and Porter were friends. The magistrate at the wish of the Salvation army man, made the fine as light as possible, namely $2.”

For the editorial writer at the Spectator, his frustration and annoyance at the situation is evident in the editorial which he wrote and which also appeared in the November 28, 1883 issue of the newspaper under the heading 'Lawbreakers":

 

“The members of the Salvation Army firmly believe that they enjoy a sole proprietor interest in Paradise, and it is generally understood that the principal enjoyment to which they look forward is that of looking over the walls at the rest of unclothed mortality burning in Tophet. That is all right, if it pleases the Salvation people and does not specially prejudice the welfare of other people. These folks are as much entitled to their belief as anybody else. It is a very serious question, however, whether they are entitled to annoy the whole community. Possibly they have a legal right to beat drums, triangles, tambourines, bones, and other savage instruments as they worship on the public streets. But we seriously doubt that they have a right to obstruct the thoroughfares with their processions; and it is very certain that they have no right, legal or moral, to assault those against whom they themselves may accidentally tun. We believe other people  have the privilege of the sidewalks as well as the Salvation Army. If the people referred to keep within the law, they will be protected by the law and by public sentiment as well. But of late they seem to have come to the determination to defy the law and to have no respect for public right. If that is their intention, they will be brought to book, and that speedily. It is too late in the nineteenth century for a parcel of fanatics to go about the streets assaulting peaceable citizens with impunity."