Biography
Peter Darck was a New York window cleaner and union organizer. He belonged to the Window Cleaners Protective Union and subsequently the Building Maintenance Workers Union, affiliated with the Trade Union Unity League. He and Peter Lahowit were convicted of assault following a window cleaners’ strike. Darck wrote from Welfare Island in 1930, describing their imprisonment and thanking the International Labor Defense for supporting his family and pursuing their appeal.
Page 2 reports that Darck and union business agent Peter Lahowit were arrested October 18, 1929, two days after the window-cleaners’ strike began. Initial felonious-assault charges had been reduced to simple assault before their Fifth Street Court hearing. The newspaper alleges planted victims and a frame-up. The prospective hearing does not replace the later existing conviction and Welfare Island sentence. This is the 1929 strike case, separate from his 1927 arrest. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1929/1929-nat/v06-n234-NAT-dec-06-1929-DW-Q.pdf
The August 26, 1930 Daily Worker publishes a Welfare Island letter signed Peter Darck (printed Dark in the introduction), identifying Peter Lahowit (Lahawit in the subheading) as imprisoned with him in the window-cleaners’ strike assault case. Darck acknowledges the ILD’s August 14 letter and $3.50 money order, thanks it for weekly family support, and sends greetings to the August 22 Sacco–Vanzetti demonstration. His postscript says their lawyer and union had written that they must complete six-month terms and there was no hope of taking them out. The editorial introduction instead calls the term four months; this discrepancy is preserved. The signed letter establishes actual Welfare Island confinement, not six completed months or an exact physical release date. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1930/v07-n205-NY-aug-26-1930-DW-LOC.pdf#page=2
The window-cleaners assault prosecution was pending in 1929
The November 1, 1929 Daily Worker, page 2, identifies former Window Cleaners Protective Union secretary Peter Darck and business agent Peter Lahowic as defendants whose assault trials had been postponed to November 7. The article describes their earlier arrest after a strike meeting. It therefore places Darck’s arrest before November 1, 1929, rather than in 1930. The inherited 1930 year-only arrest field is contradicted by this earlier report, but the article gives no calendar year for the arrest itself: its reference to leadership in this and previous strikes does not rule out an older pending prosecution. It establishes an upper bound, not a proven 1929 arrest year. The unsupported structured 1930 arrest date is therefore cleared without selecting another year. The separate inherited year-only physical-admission entry for 1930 is left unchanged and is not independently validated by this report. The source does not establish the precise arrest day, physical prison admission or release; the later Welfare Island sentence and its custody phase must not be backdated merely from this pretrial report.
Daily Worker, November 1, 1929, pages 2. Contemporary allegations are attributed to the newspaper.
A specific October arrest report, not a prison-admission date
The December 6, 1929 Daily Worker identifies Peter Darck, former secretary of the Window Cleaners Protective Union, and business agent Peter Lahowit as the defendants in the pending assault prosecution. It explicitly reports their arrest on October 18, two days after the start of the window-cleaners strike, and says the initial felonious-assault accusation had been changed to simple assault. In this contemporary strike account October 18 is the arrest day in 1929, not a physical admission day. This supplies a more specific source than the earlier November 1 report, which only established that the inherited 1930 arrest year was unsupported. The existing later Welfare Island confinement, conviction, sentence, physical-admission year and unknown release are not backdated from this arrest. The article’s prospective Friday appearance is not installed as an executed hearing or sentencing date.
Daily Worker, December 6, 1929, original pages 2. Contemporary allegations are attributed to the newspaper.
The November 9, 1927 Daily Worker reports a separate strike-period arrest of Window Cleaners Protective Union secretary Peter Darck, two years before the October 1929 prosecution already recorded. According to business agent Harry Feinstein, detectives arrested Darck at the union office on a felonious-assault allegation and took him to the Fifth Street station and then a magistrate for arraignment. The union disputed the allegation and said Darck had been at his office when the assault was said to occur. These competing allegations remain attributed. The report gives Monday as the arrest day but no printed calendar date; November 1927 month precision is used without converting the weekday. The station trip is not a verified overnight prison admission, and no term, conviction, discharge or served total is inferred.
In two prison letters published in November 1930, Peter Darck reports irregular access to newspapers at Correction Hospital, Welfare Island, and censorship of correspondence by Deputy Warden Mr. Deeley. Darck says Deeley would not allow letters containing criticism that might be published. This is Darck’s attributed account of conditions during his established strike-related confinement; it supplies no admission or release day.
Labor Defender, November 1930, original PDF page 26 (printed 233).
Daily Worker, December 6, 1929; relevant page stated in the accompanying profile note.
