could be more useful for inspiriting an organization with a mission than a stirring, militant song that was well known, simple enough to be easily adapted, and could be sung by all? It is not surprising, therefore, that the Noble and Holy Order of the Knights of Labor changed both the title and the words of Bliss's song and, leaving its origin unmistakable, helped raise it to at least a modest folk status.
According to Philip S. Foner, "Storm the Fort, Ye Knights of Labor" became the Knights' most famous song and was widely translated and sung by workers of various nationalities. Foner puts it graphically and with eloquent sensitivity: "Out of the misery in America's coal mines and railroads, the oppression in the textile mills, the degradation of the men and women in the sweatshops rose the militant cry in English, German, Polish, Italian, French, Jewish, and other tongues":
Toiling millions now are waking,
See them marching on;
All the tyrants now are shaking,
Ere their power is gone.
Storm the fort, Ye Knights of Labor,
Battle for your cause;
Equal rights for every neighbor,
Down with tyrant laws![121]
Perhaps, as Edith Fowke and Joe Glazer suggest, this version found its way to England,[122] where the Knights were established by 1884. The Knights also had assemblies in Australia and New Zealand, and there was "at least one" assembly in Ireland.[123] It seems most likely, however, that the British labor movement adapted to its own uses the original version of the song after picking it up from the Salvation Army.
By 1 July 1886, at the height of their power, the Knights of Labor had 729,677 members, with 702,924 in good standing. The total fell to 548,239 the next year, and thereafter the decline was rapid. By 1893 there were only 74,635. This decline coincided with the rise of the national unions, which joined together in the American Federation of Labor (AFL). Descriptions of the mid-Victorian luxury of the Knights' new headquarters in an old Philadelphia brownstone mansion created hostility in the membership and helped grease the skids. "'The General Executive Board has squandered the funds of the Order in a reckless purchase of a palace among capitalists and nabobs' was one of the mildest expressions of this hostile feeling." As an effective organization, the Knights of Labor died before the turn of the century, although the body
