Brest further admitted that he, with Logan, on September 10, 1936, robbed the Farmer’s State Bank of Spring Green, Plain Station, Plain, Wisconsin, where by the use of arms and threats to kill the Cashier, he obtained, a little over $300.00. Brest stated that the banker was “Scared to death, white as a sheet and almost dropped dead;” and that he, Brest, cocked his gun, ready to shoot the banker if he asserted himself, or resisted in any way; that but for the fact that Logan became uneasy, Brest stated he would more than likely have killed this banker.
In addition, thereto Brest admitted that he and Logan participated in so many robberies of drug stores, filling stations, and the like in the states of Pennsylvania, Ohio, Illinois, Michigan, Wisconsin, and Minnesota, that it would be impossible for him to recall all of them. On being informed by an... B.I. Agent that he, Brest, entered the Volant National Bank but fifteen minutes prior to Pennsylvania State Policeman and that he probably would have been killed had they met there, Brest boldly said: “That all depends on who would have got the first shots in”.
On or about July 25, 1936, Logan and Brest while seated in an auto at a point near Zeeland, Michigan, they were observed by an officer, who gave chase, and caught up with them in Holland Michigan. While the officer drove up beside the car, Brest drew fourth his gun and shot the officer in the mouth. This officer, for a time, was not expected to live. However, the bullet was removed from the base of the officer’s skull and he is on the way to recovery. In conversing with the... B.I. Agent, Brest readily stated that he would shoot it out with any officer who attempted to apprehend him, and that had it not been for the fact that he was unarmed at the time of his arrest, which, incidentally, was the only time he went unarmed, in Boise, Idaho, he would have probably have shot and killed both policeman who apprehended him. During the conversation Brest at one time expressed regret that the shooting of the Police Officer did not result fatally.
Following transfer to Alcatraz, where he was sent for safer custody, he received three disciplinary reports; one on May 23, 1937 for creating confusion at the mess table; and two on September 20, 1937, for participating in a strike and refusing to go to work, and for agitating, creating a disturbance, and insolence to an officer and also for threatening an officer, agitating and causing a disturbance. On this date, after being placed in solitary, inmate told the Deputy Warden: “If I am ever turned out of solitary, I am going to kill you the first time you turn your back. I have killed men before and I would enjoy killing you.” It is clear from subject’s past criminal record and adjustment that notwithstanding his age, he is a confirmed criminal type with vicious and dangerous traits, impulsive and apparently devoid of any moral or social restraints.
Floyd Garland Hamilton
Floyd Garland Hamilton
The third accomplice in the 1943 escape attempt was one of the most famous inmates ever to inhabit a small five-by-nine-foot cell at Alcatraz. He had reached the top of the FBI’s most wanted list, and had chauffeured one of the most well known crime couples of the 1930’s, Bonnie and Clyde. His brother Raymond had been a member of the Barrow-Parker Gang and later met his death by electrocution for his role in an escape from a Huntsville prison, which had ultimately resulted in an officer’s death. Floyd and his brother Ray had grown up with Bonnie and Clyde in a small town near Dallas, Texas. Newspapers of the era characterized Floyd Hamilton as a suspect in almost every act of violence that occurred in the Dallas area during the 1930’s.
Floyd Hamilton was born on June 30, 1908 in Henrietta, Okalahoma. He was the second in a family of six children, and his parents were divorced. Records indicate that he was raised in a normal family setting, attended Sunday school, and left home at the age of nineteen to marry a young woman named Mildred Stract. During the early years of his marriage, Floyd worked as a pipe fitter in an oil refinery, but he later lost his employment when the plant closed down.
Floyd then began a crime spree that would eventually place him at the top of the FBI’s Ten Most Wanted List. He worked as a getaway driver for Bonnie and Clyde, and later teamed up with Alcatraz alumnus Ted Huron Walters, who would himself attempt to escape from The Rock in another incident. Both men would engage in several other robberies, with targets including a Coca-Cola Bottling Company. This was the heist that would ultimately lead to Hamilton’s arrest in Dallas on August 21, 1938.
Hamilton was incarcerated at Leavenworth, and would be recommended for transfer to Alcatraz in January of 1940, after attempting to enlist a released inmate to smuggle weapons and hacksaw blades into the institution. His Leavenworth report also stated that he and a few other inmates had attempted to have a shotgun and shells fabricated in the machine shop for use in an escape. He arrived at Alcatraz several months later on June 9, 1940, as inmate #AZ-523.
Floyd Hamilton’s conduct reports from Alcatraz.
Fred Hunter
Fred Hunter
Fred Hunter, another “public enemy” and former member of the Karpis-Barker Gang, was also an accomplice to the planned escape. Hunter was serving twenty-five years for his involvement in the kidnapping of William A. Hamm Jr., the president of Hamm’s Brewing Company, and Edward G. Bremer, a prominent community leader and the President of the Commercial State Bank in Minnesota. His criminal history is covered in the chapter describing the Barker Escape of January 1939. There were rumors from Hunter that the group of inmates had been prepared for an escape attempt nearly two weeks earlier, but Boarman had allegedly insisted that they wait for the right fog conditions so that they could enter the bay without being seen.
The Escape
The Model Industries Building.
At approximately 10:00 a.m. on April 13, 1943, conditions seemed ideal for the escape, with densely layered fog enveloping the island. It was later speculated that the inmates had cut through one of the steel-mesh window guards in the old Mat Shop during the previous weeks, hiding their work by using grease mixed with other agents to fill in the tiny sawed gaps. Custodial Officer George Smith was busy supervising the inmates who were mixing concrete. He was called to the yard gate to escort four other inmates who were reporting to their work assignments. When Smith returned only a short time later, he noticed that Hunter was the only prisoner at his position near the entrance to the Mat Shop. Officer Smith was quickly intercepted by Hamilton, who forcefully grabbed him by the arm, while Boarman stepped into his path gesturing deadly threats with a knife and hammer. When Smith resisted, he was beaten into submission by all four of the inmates and then bound and gagged.
Captain of the Guards, Henry Weinhold, known to many of the inmates as “Bullethead,” was a tough former Marine making his routine rounds. Not suspecting any trouble, he entered the Mat Shop and was quickly captured by the inmates who by were now stripped down to their underwear. Weinhold resisted and nearly managed to grasp one of Boarman’s weapons when the other inmates tackled him, dealing several painful blows using a carpenter’s hammer to his extremities. He too was incapacitated, then tightly bound and gagged and laid beside Officer Smith.