Biography
The March chronology dates Taub’s obstructing-justice arrest January 6, 1932. The January 15 issue describes seven days of detention ending with dismissal January 14. These accounts do not resolve the arrest-day discrepancy, so no exact field is silently overwritten. Daily Worker, March 12, 1932, original PDF page 3. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1932/v09-n061-NY-mar-12-1932-DW-LOC.pdf#page=3
At the New York writers’ report meeting, Taub described being kidnapped and beaten with the delegation the previous Wednesday, February 10, 1932. Liston Oak names Taub and Waldo Frank as beaten by Pineville businessmen and threatened if they returned. This is a separate episode from Taub’s January obstructing-justice detention.
The report identifies Taub as a member of the writers’ delegation arrested, herded into cars and kidnapped, then beaten with Waldo Frank. This supports the separately recorded February 1932 episode and does not extend the January detention.
Vern Smith’s account dates Taub’s arrival in Pineville to Wednesday, January 6, 1932 and says he was arrested within two hours while seeking raid witnesses with local ILD attorney Stone; it calls the initial accusation criminal syndicalism. This account differs from other reported arrest timing and obstruction-of-justice descriptions already preserved in the record, so no exact custody field or charge is overwritten. Smith describes postponed examining hearings and a defense effort to have Taub accepted as counsel. These preliminary proceedings and arguments are not a completed trial verdict, invalidation of the law or physical release.
The jail visitor’s narrative lists Taub among Pineville prisoners and says he had been arrested within two hours of arrival to defend the nine organizers. Its group chronology of nine days’ confinement does not displace the separately documented January 6 individual arrest and January 13 dismissal/release. The same issue separately recalls his later jailing, kidnapping and beating while providing legal defense; the two episodes remain distinct.
Hevener places the ILD attorney’s jailing on Wednesday after the Monday January 4, 1932 headquarters raids, or January 6, and reports actual release the day after the January 13 hearing on his promise to leave Kentucky. This agrees with the reported January 14 dismissal/release chronology while leaving the existing arrest-day discrepancy visible. Hevener also describes his return with the February writers’ relief expedition and subsequent beating at Cumberland Gap; that is distinct from the January jail episode.
John Watts Hevener, A New Deal for Harlan: The Roosevelt Labor Policies in a Kentucky Coal Field, 1931–1939 (Ohio State University PhD dissertation, 1971), printed pages 153, 156, 162, 163 (PDF pages 162, 165, 171, 172). Source 805 SHA256 03766c260a4cf06629fb296358baf9e49448a191f9d290929ecd947963b0e125.
