Rioters fighting back , June 28 1969. Website from Spectrum News.
The Stonewall Riots
Depending on the source, 4 or 6 officers came into the bar, armed with a warrant for the lack of license to sell alcohol, on June 28, 1969. Immediately, they started to shove people outside and demand IDs. They would arrest the employees, and shove drag queens into wagons while the queens blew kisses at the forming crowd. Soon, the police wanted to get out, but the crowd was blocking their path. The crowds kept getting bigger. Then the rioters started to grab for anything they could get their hands on and threw them at the police. Being cornered the cops pulled their guns. Soon police fled inside the bar terrified. Four people pulled a parking meter from the ground and rammed it against the bar door.
"You could hear screaming outside, a lot of noise from the protesters, and it was a good sound. It was a real good sound to know that, you know, you had a lot of people out there pulling for you."
~ Raymond Castro, a Stonewall Inn patron being detained inside the bar during its siege.
Several other people tried to burn the bar. A few stomped on cars. Inside the bar, the police tried to call for backup. Not long after, squads of police cars pulled up and came out with shields, forming a line to thin out the crowd. The backup police had metal bats and hit the rioters brutally, which led the LGBTQ+ to fight back. The rioters ran around the neighborhood making the cops believe that the rioters were different people. At one point in the night, the rioters formed a line and sang,
After the first night on June 28, 1969. Website by National Park Service.
"We are Village girls, We wear our hair in curls, We wear our sweaters tight, and We give the guys a fright."