The San Francisco Examiner from San Francisco, California • 2

Friiy. mv j. 1944 SFratulsro Examitu Alcatraz Guards Rush Gun Gallery Manned By Revolting Convicts ir fi "Johnston Deploys Officers to Key Points 1 in Many Sniping Duels guards on catwalks pour fire into the convict stronghold for v.w-",, Zj Vis-Si; r-i; SLJS' '1 hour after hour. Coy 'Started It AW "It was a convict named Coy who started It all," gasped one of the five wounded guards who were brought to the mainland and rushed to surgery at Marine Hospital The only known Coy on the convict roster is Bernard Faul Coy, a Louisville, bank robber who has been on the island since 1937, serving a twenty-five year sentence. State Highway Patrolman James Morgan, who said 3 he talked to one of the prison officials, gave this account of 1 i the break: "Coy overpowered a guard In a tower, took the guard's machine gun and forced the guard to take him Into the room where most of the island's guards were at that moment changing clothes to come off or go on duty.

Convicts Seize Ammunition "Coy captured these guards, threw a switch that opened all of the cell blocks and invited all of the convicts to join him. Only twelve joined. "They made their way to an arsenal where guard weapons were kept and loaded up with guns and ammunition but by that time the alarm was out and the officials ho had not been captured went into action." Francueant found vantage points to gat at tho "Roelc." Thit icene, taken at tho bat of Coit Towar en Telegraph Hill, show A11CFII VlWlC 'u't OTr Alcatras latt night U1I5IJIV lillS ad th (rim battU continued, San Alcatraz, with light ablate and obterTer eilhouetted in the foreground. Phots br Eximlner Btff hntormphsr, Jo Dnrlt. An Army officer who was on the island briefly last night said the convicts obtained enough ammunition to last them rection via telegram to newspapers a few minutes after it forty days.

Reporter Sees Alcatraz 1 began, sent them a second telegram at 5:45 p. m. which said: The possibility that the impregnable Rock would at last SLAIN OFFICER 1 II HERD fall to convict cunning was, at the moment Coy captured so Battle From Police Boat 1 "Our situation is difficult and precarious. Our officers are all being used in every place that we can man. "The armed prisoner or prisoners are still eluding us so that at the moment we cannot control them." A few minutes earlier he had sent calls for doctors and James A.

Johnston, warden of By RAY CHRISTIANSEN Examiner Staff Writer ABOARD THE D. A. WHITE OFF ALCATRAZ nurses to the mainland and to nearby San. Quentin Prison. At 6 p.

m. three doctors from Marine Hospital left for Sitting here on top the cabin of this police launch, I am Alcatraz Prison since the day It became a Federal penitentiary nearly twelve years ago, has a record of more than thirty-four many guards at a stroke, real and immediate for the first time in the island's history. Warden Johnston himself admitted the extent of the threat when he sent newspapers a telegram saying "most of our officers" are imprisoned and admitting island officialdom did not have control. It was then that, for the first time in the Rock's career as safekeeper of the Nation's most dangerous criminals, Warden Johnston called for Navy help, Marine help, Coast Guard help, police help and any other help he could get Many Boats Circle Isle Five Coast Guard boats, two Navy vessels, a police watching the Battle of Alcatraz. Across there to the west, maybe 200 yards from us, I Aboard the police boats also were eight police officers years service as a State penology see six guards creeping along a catwalk, alternately hugging Harold B.

Stites, guard listed as dead in the Alcatraz rioting yesterday, was by no means a stranger to violence and sudden death on 'The Rock." It was Stites who in 1938 smashed an abortive Alcatraz escape attempt In which Guard Royal C. Cline was battered to death with a hammer. James C. Lucas and Rufus Franklin, Alcatraz convicts. wer in charge of Sgt.

Richard Hanlon. They were sent after expert. walk to fire into windows a few olice Chief Charles W. Dullea received a call from John A San Franciscan who served feet above their heads. FIRE AND JUMP ston's office saying it was believed the revolt was under control but "we may need help." They fire and jump back, fire as city supervisor In the Taylor administration, Johnston was president of the State Board of Control in 1912 when Governor Dullea was told that the convicts were cornered in a cell and Jump back.

me snots come to us as a steady, slow fire. We hear the Hiram Johnson put him In charge block. The Examiner succeeded in getting one hurried call through to the island and was told that the riot began when a felon seized a Thompson submachine gun from a guard boom of a shotgun, the crack of tried in Federal court here for Cline's murder. SHOT FRANKLIN. of Folsom.

a rifle, the rat-tat-tat of a machine Considered one of the Nation's gun. Stites, the principal witness outstanding authorities on penol That may be the machine gun the convicts are supposed to have, against the convicts, told of shooting Franklin in the shoul. ogy, he abolished the straight and started shooting. one Doctor Is I rapped but at our distance we cannot ders and killing a third convict. jacket, trussing up of prisoners tell who is doing the shooting and launch loaded to the.

gunwales with police sharpshooters, and a Navy PBY plane responded. They circled endlessly as the battle went on in the big cellhouse atop the island. Apparently it was in the first exchange of fire that H. P. Stites, veteran guard who singlehandedly broke up a convict riot in 1938, was killed.

When his body arrived at the morgue attendants found that a row of machine gun bullets had ripped up his back. Other guards wounded and brought to Marine Hospital were Harry Cochrane, Fred Richberger, R. E. Sutter, Elmus Besk and Herschel R. Oldham.

Dozens of guards' wives, many of them crying, waited at the Fort Mason dock through the afternoon and night for word of husbands still unaccounted for. As the battle went on into the night searchlights of the watchful boats and searchlights on the island played along 'Prison officials immediately pulled the switches that we can see no one at' the 'rwuv Thomas Limerick, when the three prisoners climbed a wire fence and tried to attack Stites gun tower. dows into which the guards are automatically locked buildings all over the island in which firing. convicts were working. This nas been going on now Telling how he killed Limerick.

This precaution locked in the hospital the only doctor on for more than three hours. When and other practices considered inhuman at the time. CAUSED REFORMS In November, 1913, he was appointed warden of San Quentin, succeeding John E. Doyle. During his twelve years at the Marin County prison, 'he continued a Stites testified: we arrived the sun was shining, the island, making it impossible for him to reach the cell house and tend the wounded.

and the battle scene was clear. tance I could not tell'whether he drew A half hour ago a guard fired a smoke or gas bomb which bounced off the bars of the window at which he was aiming and landed in the ice plant. A patch of the plant perhaps 100 feet square was set afire. Flames blazed up briefly, followed- by smoke that obscured our sight of the battle. When we arrived I saw, off to my left, three convicts who had taken shelter behind a small greenhouse in a garden.

They lay motionless under blankets with a guard standing watch. Now the guard is1 taking them away to lock them up somewhere before complete darkness arrives. Where they are there is no danger of a stray bullet striking them, but they bend over unconsciously as they walk along. Fifty yards west of the cell-house, around a corner of the building, 100 prisoners are being marched out of one of the buildings to be placed in some other building for the night. MORE GUARDS Above and beyond them is another catwalk, and I can see several guards creeping along it on a course that will take them to the center of the fighting.

From here it appears that NIGHT CLOSES IN Now the sun has gone down "Well, I took my .43 and I took aim and I fired a shot at him and I got him over the right eye. He dropped and he never moved WIDOW AT PIER. He is survived by his widow. Harry Cochrane, one of th shores and rooftops to prevent other convicts from making reiorm program considered one behind a cloud bank beyond the Golden Gate, and dusk is set tling over the embattled island. of the most effective in the Nation.

His penology career was interrupted in 1925, when he re Warden Johnston's first telegram to newspapers said: ''Serious trouble. Convict has machine gun in cell house. Have issued riot call. "Placed armed guards at strategic locations. "Most of our officers are imprisoned in cell house.

"Cannot tell extent of injuries suffered by our officers or amount of damage done. "Will give you more information latr in the day when we get control." His telegram was sent at 3:23 p. m. Sergeant Hanlon's squad of eight police aboard the Directly across the water from us rises the sharp cliff of the island shore, green and lavender with ice plants. We look above wounded Alcatraz guards, has a wife, Elizabeth, and two children, Phyllis, 16, and Joann, 18.

The family lives on Alcatraz but Mrs. signed the wardenship to become a vice president of the American Bank of San Francisco. and beyond that to see the cell house atop the island, long and low, apparently two stories high at one end and three at the other. Cochrane, who works in a store here, was in the city at the time of the rioting and the two daugh ters were attending hieh school police boat were heavily armed with rifles and machine guns. Chief Dullea gave them instructions to stand by on the west side of the island and go ashore only if summoned by the BATTLE AREA The fighting is confined to a here.

a break while the siege went on. Marines Guard Prisoners One hundred and fifty felons could not be returned to their cells because those cells were the battleground; were instead herded into a secluded part of the yard under a searchlight and marines with automatic rifles stood over them. The marines were part of a detachment of thirty in full battle regalia that was dispatched to Alcatraz from Treasure Island at 6:30 p. m. The latest of five telegrams received by newspapers from Warden Johnston said that guards, after gradually reducing the area held by the revolting convicts, were trying to man a gun in a cellblock gallery held by the felons.

At that time Johnston informed the police department the situation had "eased somewhat," but he asked that the police launch with its squad of twelve crack shots continue to stand by. Also standing by were doctors at two of San Francisco's emergency hospitals. They hurried to Marine Hos warden. They were instructed to place themselves com pital upon learning that Cochrane fifty foot section in the northwest corner of the west wing of the main cell block. pletely at the warden's disposal in that event.

nad been wounded seriously. rea J. Kichbcrger. another of The crouching guards are di rectly beneath the convicts. They I the wounded guards, is an over-seas veteran of World War II.

He had gone on duty for the day at many of the guard towers no longer are manned because they are exposed to the fire of the felons, -V, fire up at a very sharp angle into the row of windows, ap p. scarcely more than a half. parently hoping their bullets will ricochet dewn and score a hit. But guards are standing motionless behind buildings, hour after the rioting broke out. His wife lives on Parker Avenue .0" YAWfeV- I They go from window to win in San Francisco.

along walkways out of the convicts' sight, on hidden rooftops dow with their bullets, keeping up a steady drum fire that keeps the convicts back out of sight. in fact at every vantage place on the island that Warden James It is just like those pictures marksmanship and courage, are on this launch with me waiting to get Into the fight if their help is asked. In is Cap. An Examiner reporter who approached to within fifty yards of the island aboard the police launch said the fighting A. Johnston could place them.

From time to time they change you have, seen by the hundreds of American GI's creeping along the walls of ruined buildings in German cities looking for snipers. tain of Inspectors Bernard Mc ojjvaivu iu lc vamiuicu a xuiy loot Bccuon at xne norm west corner of the cell house's west station, or two or three of them creep out on that cell house catwalk to take fresh ammunition to the firing guards. When they come to an exposed spot they For several hours he watched as six guards, crouched along a catwalk, fired into a row of windows above their Donald. We have aboard tommy guns, tear gas guns, three automata shotguns, rifles and pistols. And from neighboring hills DRAW FIRE A few minutes ago I saw one beads.

make a sudden dash. of the guards stick his hat on the end of his rifle and lean it out Hugging the wall to load, the guards would step quickly ironically flashed the bright sign: A dozen of San Francisco's finest policemen, chosen for their Public service won him again In 1929, when Governor C. C. Young appointed him State director of penology, a post eld until November 24, 1933 when the United States Government appointed him warden of the new Federal prison on Alcatraz Island. The island housed an old Army disciplinary barrack's at the time, and It was not until the summer of 1934 that some of the Nation's most notorious criminals finally were moved onto, the island and Alcatraz actually started to function.

Johnston has been warden ever since. HEADED GROUP In recognition of his exceptional work In the penology line, Johnston In 1940 was elected president of the American Prison Congress, succeeding the director of United States prisons In the post. Over the years, there have been many disturbances at Alcatraz, the latest being the futile attempt of four desperadoes to escape from the Island in April, 1943. -A mutiny was quelled In January, 1936, while In July, 1940, more than 200 Inmates staged an unsuccessful hunger strike. Warden Johnston and his wife both reside on Alcatraz.

LONG IN S. F. Johnston, who is 72, came to San Francisco from Brooklyn in 1886. He worked here as a cash boy, In advertising, as a salesman and did credit work. For ten years he was a department store manager.

He entered public life as a city supervisor, and became president of the State board of control In 1911. While at San Quentin he studied law, and was admitted to the bar in 1919. over the catwalk. From this dis "Welrome Home Well Done. Crowds Pack S.

F. Hills to See Battle From vantage points atop Tele graph Hill and Russian Hill, along the Presidio, Marina and North Beach waterfronts, thousands of San Franciscans crowded each f. hi'-f 'A I lW 1 (- -i Tr Aj' I 7 's io uie outer eage oi tne catwalK, lean far back and fire into the windows. ft appeared that they were trying to make their bullets ricochet off the metal cell house ceilings to hit the convicts. Once a smoke or gas shell bounced off a barred window into a patch of ice plant on the island's slope, causing a fire that blazed up briefly.

uards at Key Points The Examiner reporter could see guards creeping along the sides of buildings all over the island, manning strategic points and keeping other convicts under control while keeping out of sight of the besieged convicts weapons. In the heat of the battle, no prison official could find time to explain how the felon got the machine gun. It was a ma jor mystery, because no machine gun is ever allowed in the cell house even in possession of a guard. In fact, guards bearing arms of any kind are not allowed inside the grounds. AH tower guards and catwalk guards reach their posts from outside stairways.

other to get a ringside scat to the rioting on Alcatraz. Police struggled to cope with traffic jams on the hills as hundreds of cars rushed to jockey for choice positions. Traffic was moving only by inches along the to Alcatraz and Angel Island. Hundreds of cars were massed at the Hyde Street pier and at the foot of Van Ness Avenue. Tearful wives of guards on the island were in the crowd.

For a while, spectators could see clearly flames which broke out on the island. Up Hyde and Van Ness, and on nearby streets, thousands of persons struggled for positions from which they could watch the the news event which suddenly had gripped the attention of an entire city, On Telegraph Hill, spectators could get a good on the moonlight night They watched Navy, Coast Guard and police boats circling the island, and crowded around "10-cents-a-look binoculars through which tourists get a view of Alcatraz on a sunny day. "If you'd see a movie of that, you'd never believe it was real," commented one woman spectator on Telegraph Hill. Another spectator, Robert Acree, of 312-A Lombard Street said he hoard the firing from the island in the afternoon. He quick-ly staked out a claim to a good view and remained there throughout the When lights went out on ona portion of Alcatraz, one of tha children in the crowd cried excitedly: "Gee, this is the renl thing; thosA had men are coming this way now." Hundreds of per sons hung over the rails of the Golden Gate Bridge to focus hastily gathered binoculars on the B0- island.

Among the largest of the crowds was that at the foot of Jama A. Johnston, warden of Alcatraa prison, where the deadliest battle in the fought yesterday, -rtioio by Ban I'randsco Exiimlruf WARDEN- "Rock'." history was Hyde Street, from where the Warden Johnston, who flashed the word of the insur- Army maintains a boat service.