Biography
Rebecca Grecht was a Workers Party election campaign manager. Rebecca Grecht was arrested in the July 3, 1928 Wall Street demonstration against U.S. military intervention in Nicaragua, when police broke up the "Hands Off Nicaragua" meeting in New York's financial district and jailed the speakers and dozens of workers. Most of the defendants were given five days.
The September 14, 1929 Daily Worker identifies Grecht as district campaign manager arrested and beaten with section manager Rose Rubin during the September 13 Harlem election-meeting raid. The continuation lists other detainees and a planned September 14 arraignment before Judge McQuade. It does not establish discharge or a complete overnight term, and the other named people are not silently merged with similar names. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1929/1929-ny/v06-n163-NY-sep-14-1929-DW-LOC.pdf#page=2
As New Jersey district organizer at the April 1934 convention, Grecht discussed growing fascist organizations in textile centers and advocated defending foreign-born workers while exposing nationalist efforts to divide them. She also pressed work within American Federation of Labor unions. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1934/v11-n085-apr-09-1934-DW-LOC.pdf#page=5
The March 7 Burgettstown dispatch specifies that the meeting arrest occurred Monday afternoon, indicating March 5, 1928. Disorderly conduct was enlarged to sedition and inciting to riot; Squire J. A. McKnight of Houston postponed the hearing until the next day and the continuation reports release on $525 bail. The account does not give the exact physical bail-release day or a complete stay. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1928/1928-ny/v05-n057-NY-mar-08-1928-DW-LOC.pdf#page=1
The July 4, 1928 front-page caption identified Rebecca Grecht, Robert Minor and Kate Gitlow among fourteen arrested when police attacked the July 3 Wall Street demonstration against U.S. intervention in Nicaragua. Daily Worker, July 4, 1928, original PDF page 1. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1928/1928-ny/v05-n157-NY-jul-04-1928-DW-LOC.pdf#page=1
The July 11 report said these five Wall Street demonstration defendants remained virtually incommunicado and were expected to be released Friday afternoon. Men were held at the Tombs and women at Jefferson Market Jail. It described refusal of books, newspapers and family access to Minor. The expected Friday release is prospective, not proof of release. Daily Worker, July 11, 1928, original PDF page 1. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1928/1928-ny/v05-n163-NY-jul-11-1928-DW-LOC.pdf#page=1
1920s custody review: A separate Pennsylvania detention is documented in the March 8, 1928 Daily Worker, pages 1-2, in a Burgettstown March 7 dispatch. Rebecca Grecht was taken into custody while addressing a miners meeting; the original disorderly-conduct allegation was enlarged to sedition. The continuation reports that Squire McKnight released her on $525 bail, with the hearing postponed until the next day. This is a different incident from her July 1928 Wall Street arrest. A separate case is added with March 1928 release at month precision only; the exact arrest, admission and bail-release days are not stated and are not inferred from publication. No duration is calculated.
Source: Daily Worker, March 8, 1928, pages 1-2, original report and continuation visually inspected.
July 1928 Wall Street prosecution
The July 10, 1928 Daily Worker reports that the hearing and sentencing took place the previous day, July 9, after the July 3 Hands Off Nicaragua demonstration. It individually names Rebecca Grecht among five defendants given five days in the Tombs or a $25 fine, and states that all eight convicted defendants chose jail. Two other defendants had their cases dismissed; separate defendants still awaited trial. The five-day sentence is not used to calculate an actual discharge day or to assume uninterrupted custody from July 3.
In her first-person article Ten Days in the Workhouse, published in the Daily Worker on August 15, 1927, Rebecca Grecht described being arrested while picketing in the New York fur market on Seventh Avenue between 28th and 29th Streets. Judge Ewald sentenced members of her group. Grecht described her own transport to the island House of Correction for Women, intake and refusal with other women to pay fines instead of remaining in custody. She wrote retrospectively of their solidarity from entry until separation. This is a distinct 1927 strike detention, preceding her documented 1928 cases. The article does not establish exact arrest, admission or release days.
The Daily Worker, July 10, 1928, pages 1–2, reports that Magistrate Maurice H. Gottlieb sentenced the July 3 Wall Street anti-imperialist demonstrators on July 9. Robert Minor, Rebecca Grecht, Harriet Silverman, Emanuel George and Robert Wolf each received five days in the Tombs or a $25 fine and chose jail. Phil Frankfeld, Fanny Plotkin and Anna Bloch received two days or $10; Kate Gitlow and Sophie Melman were dismissed. This contemporary report documents actual committal after the hearing, not completed service of the entire nominal term. The inherited July 1 storage value is explicitly marked month precision in the existing record; it remains month precision, not an asserted July 1 admission day. This report does not establish a discharge day or demonstrate that the previous initial detention began on the sentencing day.
Reviewed original source 2084, relevant PDF pages stated in note.
The issue anticipates release July 13 after the five-day sentences imposed Monday July 9 for the July 3 Wall Street anti-imperialist demonstration. The announcement is prospective and does not itself establish physical release. The article once misprints the demonstration as July 13, while the Plotkin report and event context give July 3.
The completed UnionSquare welcome occurred yesterday,July13,1928 after this worker’s physical release from the five-day WallStreet-protest sentence. Minor and Wolf came out of the Tombs; Grecht and Silverman came out of the Workhouse. The retrospective report confirms release rather than merely announcing it. Earlier July3 arrest and intervening bail are not silently treated as one continuous term.
The July13 issue announces this afternoon’s UnionSquare welcome for the four named workers after their five-day WallStreet-protest terms. This is release-day reporting, but does not supply an individual physical discharge time; the next issue’s account of the completed welcome provides stronger retrospective confirmation.
