Volume 17 , Issue 15

1915 - Robbers of Burbank Bank Are Arrested

The Daily Ardmoreite, out of Ardmore, Oklahoma reported on their front page, Tuesday, May 18, 1915: "Robbers Of Burbank Bank Are Arrested." Fleeing in an automobile, machine turns completely over, pinning two as other one surrenders.

Burbank, Okla., May 17 (1915) -- Forty minutes after Lee Harris, James Parker and W. H. Hancock had secured $943 by a daylight raid on the Farmers State Bank of Burbank, the 1915 model automobile in which they fled was a total wreck. The three robbers were under arrest, and $443 of the money recovered.

The trio entered the bank about 10 o'clock Monday morning, held up Cashier J. B. Yount, secured the money and fled in the automobile, taking cashier Yount with them. The robbers were massed while in the bank and did not remove their disguise until they had released Yount two miles out of town.

One of the trio was captured by Hugh Johnston, sheriff of Kay county, the other two being extricated from beneath their wrecked automobile by Mayor W. H. McFadden and companions of Ponca City.

While the robbers in their automobile were fleeing from a posse composed of George Wallace, Dave Donaldson and W. F. Proffer, who were also in an automobile, the bandits' car suddenly turned completely over, seriously injuring two of the occupants. The third man ran into the Arkansas river bottoms nearby. Wallace and his companions came upon the injured robbers about the time that McFadden was extricating the two men from beneath the wrecked car.

Sheriff Johnston, accompanied by Deputy T. Driscoll, N. A. Acton, cashier of the Germania National bank of Ponca City, and J. Q. Louthan had gone out from Ponca City to head off the robbers. As the posse neared the Arkansas river near Ponca City, a haggard man ran out of the brush along the river bottom, threw up his hands and said: "I guess I am the man you are looking for." He was taken in charge but only $8 in money was found on the man, who gave his name as Lee Harris, of Pawhuska. He was armed with a heavy revolver.

The men extricated from the wrecked automobile gave their names as James Parker and W. H. Hancock, and assert that their homes were in Bartlesville. Parker's collar bone an arm and three ribs were broken as the result of the automobile being wrecked. Hancock was badly bruised about the head and body. Parker and Hancock were now in the county jail at Pawhuska in Osage county, while Harris the one captured by Sheriff Johnston and his party, was in the county jail at Newark, in Kay county.
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