ST. AUGUSTINE, Fla. (UPI) -- Civil rights demonstrators, including a group of Jewish rabbis, staged a praying and singing demonstration at the white motel Thursday that developed into a shoving melee and a "jump in" at a swimming pool.
It was one on the wildest clashes in recent days here in a continuing campaign against segregation that often has broken out into violence.
An off-duty policeman who took off his shoes and socks and jumped into the swimming pool to pummel seven taunting demonstrators with his fists finally brought the 40-minute melee to an end.
Police hauled off 37 demonstrators, including 15 members of the the Jewish Reform Sect, part of a group who flew here from Atlantic City, New Jersey, tuesday to participate in the civil rights movement. All were charged with trespassing and disorderly conduct.
Authorities said some of the demonstrators may be confined in a chicken wire stockade because the St. John's County Jail may fail to accommodate the growing number of arrests.
The Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth of Birmingham, Ala., an aide to the integration leader Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., was among those hauled away in a convoy of police cars and trucks.
King watched from across the street.
The demonstration at the motel lodge began when about 70 demonstrators showed up at the motel.
Manager James Brock told them to leave. When they stood their ground and began to pray, Brock told them, "You are not going to pray here. This is private property."
Then he began grabbing the rabbis by the arms and started hustling them to waiting police cars.
With the first arrests the rabbis began reciting from the Psalms: "Yea though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death ..."
As officers were rounding up Negroes and rabbis, a group of five Negroes and two whites, dressed in bathing suits, darted from an automobile and jumped into the motel's swimming pool. Brock retaliated by pouring muriatic acid, a chemical usually used to clean brick and concrete, into the water.
The acid apparently had no effect on the swimmers and they refused to get out. The chemical was not believed to be harmful.
Police surrounded the pool and commanded the youths to leave.
"Come in and get us," the youths shouted.
Henry Billitz, an off-duty city policeman, took off his shoes and socks and jumped into the pool.
He advanced on the group, swinging both fists. They retreated. One was grabbed by an officer on the pool's edge and had his arm twisted.
The other crawled out of the pool and were put into a police truck and hauled away.
