Biography
Gus Madsen was a class-war prisoner held at San Quentin (inmate no. 44461), listed on the ILD's roster of American labor prisoners in Labor Defender in 1928. Like most of the rank-and-file labor prisoners of the criminal-syndicalism era, little else about his case entered the historical record.
The October1931 Labor Defender roster lists this SanQuentin prisoner as GusC.Madson with a ten-year sentence. The source spelling is retained as a variant rather than a separate identity.
A San Quentin letter signed Gus C. Madsen in the July 1930 Labor Defender, page 148, acknowledges a $5 International Labor Defense payment and sends greetings to other labor prisoners. Madsen said the money bought small comforts and that he continued to support the defense movement. The letter independently documents his continued confinement at publication, without supplying a new arrest or release date.
Tom Mooney’s March 1931 open letter to Warren Billings identifies George Pesce and Gus Madsen as two carpenters among California prisoners for whom he sought continuing solidarity. This supplies an explicit occupation and contemporary defense context without a new custody interval. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1931/v08-n060-NY-mar-10-1931-DW-LOC.pdf#page=4
The September 8, 1930 Laisve, page 5, reproduces an International Labor Defense political-prisoner directory. Its row prints Gus C. Madsen, a term of life, the year 1926 in the sentencing-year column, and confinement or correspondence location San Quentin, California. This is an attributed historical directory entry; printed years and nominal terms are not exact intake dates or measured time served, and mailing boxes do not independently identify a prison. The directory contains stale or conflicting chronology, so this row does not override independently established conviction, death or release facts. Source: https://www.spauda2.org/laisve/archive/1930/1930-09-08-LAISVE.pdf#page=5
The Behind the Bars directory on printed page 4 lists this prisoner under San Quentin State Prison, California, with life, 1926; printed Gus C. Madsen. This is an attributed historical directory entry: the year and nominal term do not establish an intake day, uninterrupted imprisonment, completed service or physical release.
