Volume 16 , Issue 3

100 Years Ago, 20 January 1914

One hundred years ago, Tuesday, 20 January 1914, the Tulsa Daily World, Morning Edition, reported on its front page, "Convicts Dash for Liberty; Seven Persons Were Killed." Three officials at McAlester penitentiary killed and Muskogee lawyer were victims of the convicts. They used a girl as a child, the convicts shooting right and left escape from prison grounds. A sharpshooter picked off the convicts as they made their days across the open country surrounding the prison.

McAlester, OK, Jan. 19 (1914) -- (Special) -- Three state penitentiary officials, a Muskogee attorney and three convicts were dead, and three other persons were seriously inured, as the result of a desperate dash for liberty made by the three dead convicts at 4:30 o'clock that afternoon.

The dead were: D. C. Oates, assistant deputy warden; F. C. Godfrey, day sergeant; H. H. Drover, Bertillion expert and photographer; Judge J. R. Thomas, Muskogee lawyer; Tom Lane, convict; Chiney Reed, convict; Charles Kuntz, convict.

The injured: Miss Mary Foster, stenographer, shot in leg; J. W. Martin, turnkey, shot in cheek; C. B. Wood, guard, shot in arm.

Kuntz was serving 50 years for bank robbery, from Roger Mills county; Lane, Six years for forgery, Garvin county, with eighteen months to serve, and Reed, two years, for horse stealing.

It was in the inner office of the prison that the first shooting occurred. The three convicts after shooting the guard, Martin, inflicting a scalp wound, entered the warden's office, with the determination of seizing Miss Foster and using her as a protection.

Here they found Godfrey and Judge Thomas. Lane fired at Godfrey, killing him instantly and as Judge Thomas arose from a chair, Reed killed him. One of the first shots fired passed through two doors and killed Drover, who was on the other side of the hall.

Deputy Bates, who was in the room where Drover was killed, exchanged several shots through the door and wounded Kuntz but did not disable him. As the convicts came through the door, Oates got the drop on Lane and ordered him to drop his gun.

For a reply, Lane fired over his shoulder, killing the deputy instantly. Then using Miss Foster and Frank H. Rice patrol officer as a breast work, the convicts ran down the prison lawn, forced guards at the entrance to throw down their arms, climbed into a buggy and drove off, westward across the prison farm.

Firing as they rode away, the convicts wooded guard Woods, he receiving a shoulder and flesh injury.

It was half a mile front he prison that the three convicts were killed. R. J. Richie, who was mounted, in charge of the bloodhounds, overtook them out in a field. A crackshot, Ritchie, shot Reed in the forehead as he looked backward around the body of the girl. Both Reed and the girl fell from the buggy.

In quick succession, Ritchie killed Land and Kuntz, the latter already wounded, without receiving a wound himself.

Warden R. W. Dick with Paul R Jones, member of the prison board were driving over the farm when the trouble started. Deputy Warden E. M. Grey, was in front of the prison when the trouble started and seizing a gun from the arsenal rushed to the front door. Before reaching it, a guard above warned him that the convicts were in charge of the door and Frey ran around to the side entrance. Before he reached the scene the convicts were gone. Between the time the convicts left and Frey arrived, the whole main entrance was open but not another convict attempted to escape.

Judge Thomas was there to confer with a client. He was formerly a federal judge, former member of congress from Illinois and a member of the Harris-Day code commission.

How the convicts came in possession of their arms was a mystery. They had them when they first entered the main corridor. Inner guards at the prison were not allowed to carry arms, so Oates, who was given a gun by an outside guard after the fight started was the only officer armed. When Richie first overtook the fleeing convicts, they opened fire on him, but he dismounted and took refuge behind a rock, picking them off with a long range rifle.

Things were unusually quiet at the the prison that night. No general mutiny seemed to have been contemplated. Warden Dick in a statement that night said that no other prisoners were interested int he riot and he expressed the belief that no bad effects could result. Dick thought the prisoners had but one revolver and that had been shipped in by outside friends. A second revolver was obtained from Oates after he was shot down, said Dick.

Was Prominent Attorney

Muskogee, Jan. 19 (1914 -- John R. Thomas, who was killed in the riot at the Oklahoma state penitentiary that afternoon, was a former federal judge, appointed by President McKinley in 1897 for the northern district of the Indian Territory but was not re-appointed in 1901.

He was also a former United States congressman, having served from Illinois from 1879 to 1889. He was 66 years old and born in Mount Vernon, Illinois.

While in congress Judge Thomas was chairman of the committee on constitution, a sub-committee of the committee on naval affairs. He was a past grand master of the Masonic lodge in Illinois.

Judge Thomas was at the prison that day on business. He happened to be in the corridor when the prisoners made their rush and they shot him dead.

He left two children, a married daughter and John R. Thomas, Jr., a captain of the First United States infantry stationed at Honolulu.

Despite the commotion caused by the three men in trying to shoot down every one who came in their way no general attempt was made by other convicts to join in the delivery. The mutineers were encouraged by their less desperate fellows who cheered the onslaught of the armed prisoners. So rapidly did the three convicts shot down those in their path that they reached the prison gate before the guards could return their fire. The shot and wounded and sheltered them, the turnkey, John Martin, whom they had wounded and sheltered themselves through the prison yard by holding Mary Foster, a telephone operator, in front of them until the only shot fired by guards hit the girl in the leg.

Outside the gate the men seized the horse and buggy of Warden Dick and dashed away, only to be shot to death by pursuing guards. One of the convicts fought to the last, their stolen horse lashed to a gallop by the other two. They fired their last cartridge at the oncoming guards, who poured in a deadly fire from horseback.

Even after three escaped men were lying dead in the bottom of the careening buggy, the frightened horse dashed onward until felled by a bullet from the pursuers. How the men obtained the weapons and planned the escape had not been discovered but a rigid inquiry would be begun later.   |  View or Add Comments (0 Comments)   |   Receive updates ( subscribers)  |   Unsubscribe

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