Alcatraz: The Hardest Years 1934-1938 Read online

  Born in a time of need, retained beyond usefulness, and abandoned to penal reforms and to plain old wear and tear, Alcatraz was unique among United States penitentiaries. Such an unforgiving yet politically untouchable federal jail could never again exist. That, many believe, is unfortunate.

  Are there better prisons now? Of course, and there are some tough facilities, but I believe that if you could measure and trust convict responses, none would choose Alcatraz over their current confinement.

  If any chose Alcatraz and could actually experience it, their never ending pleas to their warden would be, "Please, Warden, please transfer me anywhere else!"

  Chapter 2

  The late 1920's and early 1930's were times of internal national strife. Prohibition fostered a vast gangland underworld. Smuggling, murder, kidnapping, prostitution, and bootlegging appeared rampant. Bank and train robbing became common. Stringent, "lock 'em up and throw away the key" measures, like those taken during Alcatraz's early years, were needed.

  The development of the automobile gave legs to criminals, who fled quickly to distant sanctuaries. U.S. Marines were stationed aboard mail cars to help discourage the prevalent train robberies. Primitive radio and limited telephone networks made coordinated pursuits difficult and, once beyond a crime scene, lawbreakers were hard to capture.

  State prison systems were wracked by inefficiency and corruption, and escapes were common. Racketeering influences passed prison walls with little deterrence, and "big names" often endured incarceration amid almost regal splendors.

  Federal penitentiaries were better, but they too suffered political pressures and uneven disciplining and privilege.

  Solutions were needed. They were long overdue, but there is little that grinds more slowly than the mills of government.

  Reforms included the strengthening and arming of the FBI. Coordinated teams of agents and accountants began investigative audits of crime lords. Local and state police cooperated and improved communication. Record keeping became significant as files grew on known criminals, and fingerprinting blossomed into a practical tool.

  Crime's big boys began to fall; a gang smashed here, a boss convicted there. Some were carried to graveyards, but most went to prison.

  To prison? Well, maybe. Roy Gardner escaped so many times his incarcerators expected it. When Alcatraz opened, Roy was an early arrival. His number was – 110. He never escaped again.

  A classic horror tale of state prison inefficiency concerned Rufe Persful.

  To see the injustice written down makes the story almost as unbelievable as it really was. Could such things happen? Yes, and they did.

  Persful did not gain national attention but he should have. His criminal career exemplified the need for a prison like Alcatraz, a confinement where prisoners were not able to manipulate the system.

  This is Persful in his prime. Forgive the fading photograph. Most pictures in this book are more than seventy years old and the subjects are unable to pose for new ones.

  Persful looked like this when he was on Alcatraz. Handsome devil, wasn't he? Clever and ruthless, looking like the nice young man next door, maybe a good prospect to be your sister's boyfriend—Rufe Persful had abused society for the last time.

  But others like him were out there, savaging society and then the prison systems created to control them. Alcatraz took the starch out of more than a few.

  Here is Rufe Persful's history as E. F. Chandler remembered it.

  Before World War Two, the state of Arkansas had laws that allowed convicted felons in their prison system to become ARMED trustees (trustees who guarded fellow inmates). If such a trustee stopped an escaping prisoner he was granted a parole. Rufe Persful worked that system.

  In 1924, Persful was given fifteen years for murder. In 1927, as an armed trustee, Persful shot and killed a convict trying to escape. He was automatically paroled.

  In 1932, Persful shot a woman and was returned to prison. He was immediately made an armed trustee and just as quickly killed a second "escaping" prisoner. Persful was paroled for the second time. It was still 1932.

  A few months later, Rufe got five years for robbery. Surely you can guess what then happened. Again an armed trustee, Persful shot FOUR escaping convicts, killing one and wounding three. He was granted his third parole.

  But, Persful again violated parole and he was returned to prison—to become a trustee and to shoot and kill his fourth "escapee."

  Incredible, but true. In June of 1934, Rufe Persful was given his FOURTH parole. He had murdered once and legally killed four escaping convicts.

  Unfortunately for Persful, his next crime was federal. Convicted of kidnapping and robbery, he was sentenced to twenty years and sent to Atlanta.

  As a prison agitator, Persful was transferred to Alcatraz. There he was assigned to a detail that twice a day gathered and burned anything along the island's coasts that could float (no big logs, old hatch covers, or rubber tires for escapees to use as flotation).

  He also collected garbage. A personable sort, Rufe often carried this author from the garbage truck back to our apartment in the family garbage can.

  Later, Persful was transferred to the mat shop and then again to the dock detail. One day he seized a fire ax and chopped off the fingers of his left hand. Obviously his mind had cracked. Persful recovered his physical health and was later transferred to Lewisburg Penitentiary in Pennsylvania.

  Chapter 3

  Alcatraz was not established simply to better punish certain prisoners – although it was effective in that respect. The prison's intended function was to relieve ordinary federal prisons of their most troublesome convicts, which they were ill equipped to handle. Alcatraz, it is noted with pinpoint accuracy, did not attempt to rehabilitate. More accurately, it made good prisoners out of bad ones.

  Courts did not sentence men to Alcatraz. Those confined there usually earned their numbers by being uncooperative in other prisons. The island's reputation for being really hard time sifted through the federal prison system's inmate population and calmed the antics of many recalcitrant convicts who had no wish to end up there.

  If a prisoner was dangerous, Rufe Persful – number 284, Albert Bates – number 137, and Harvey Bailey – number 139 come to mind, he could go to Alcatraz. If a convict committed unacceptable acts, he could be shipped to the island. Most, however, were sent to Alcatraz because they were disciplinary problems or, like Roy Gardner – number 110, escape risks.

  Powerful men, whose influence bled through a common prison's walls (Alphonse Capone – number 85, probably the ultimate gangster, is the best example) arrived early on The Rock.

  Finally, convicts with big public reputations might be relocated to Alcatraz. It divorced them from our free but often irresponsible press and removed them from the public eye. George "Machine Gun" Kelly and Alvin "Old Creepy" Karpis were two with national reputations.

  The first shipment of convicts—the worst of the worse by some measures—arrived in August 1934 in three railroad cars. Fourteen convicts traveled separately and were processed before the first major shipment. A second trainload almost immediately left from the east with another assemblage of "bad ones."

  Thirty-two military prisoners had been kept on the island from the old army days to assist in the transition and were to be part of the inmate population, but the real stuff came from other federal prisons cross the country. They opened the place for business. Astonishingly, at first consideration, seven convicts from Leavenworth volunteered for Alcatraz. One could suppose that each was fleeing personal dangers within Leavenworth prison from other convicts or perhaps guards. One might wonder if they later regretted their request.

  E. F. Chandler was on duty in the prison and assisted in getting the new convicts settled in. Stripped, showered, and body orifices examined, the convicts kept nothing from their old prisons but their memories.

  An interesting collection of contraband accumulated in the receiving area. Socks and underwear hid letters and p
hotographs. A piece of saw blade fell from a shoe. A long wire was threaded into a pants waist. Assorted pills were dug from pockets, and a money stash of five dollar bills had been hammered into the inside of a shoe toe. One convict wore four sets of underwear. Another had a semi-precious stone stuffed in his ear. If anything was swallowed for later recovery, it was never discovered. The convicts went to their cells relatively clean.

  During the first years, even before improved metal detectors (called "the snitch" by convicts) were installed, very little was snuck into the cellblocks. Awareness of harsh penalties may account for the paucity of contraband. Or it may just have taken years for the convicts to work out the safest angles. In later periods, prohibited material of all sorts was discovered in cells.

  Of course convicts complained to the warden over the removal of their personal treasures. Al Capone objected politely, but most of the famous convicts were quiet. To a man, they settled in without incident. The message being sent was that the good times were over. Alcatraz would be hard time.

  Our apartment overlooked the island's docks, and my mother's old Kodak box camera took the following photo of the first convicts' arrival. We lived along the building's upper gallery, but we went down a level to be closer to the action that we had waited months to see.

  First prisoners marching from their train to the prison at the top of the island. The small boat pinched between the dock and the barge is the McDowell.

  Our binoculars located Al Capone, his face was familiar in those days. No others stood out.

  Clad in whatever their old prisons offered, the convicts shuffled ashore looking around as every newcomer did (and still does). Guards were everywhere, and the bunch waited until their leg irons were removed to clump through the dock tunnel and up the hill, making the turns, and rattling their way from society's view.

  Accounts differ on leg iron removal. One history claims the irons were taken off aboard the train, others describe removal as we saw it. Small details can be expected to vary writer to writer, and they do. However, I saw the leg irons removed on the dock, and so did my sister and my mother.

  It was exciting to see Alphonse Capone – number 85. The gangster was more famous than any movie star or even the president. Yet, his looks were nothing special. A bit short, overweight, olive complexioned, the famous scar on his cheek barely showing, Capone could have been anyone's relative. I saw him a few other times and spoke with him once. Seeing or addressing Capone was unusual since few dependents encountered convicts whose activities rarely extended beyond the cell complex, and Capone's never did.

  On rare occasions dependents entered the prison proper. I became a more familiar figure because Doctor Hess, or medical assistant Charles Ping, gave me adrenaline shots for asthma. Of course, my father escorted me to and from the prison hospital/dispensary. On the notable occasion, Capone was being treated, and my father's sense of history came through.

  He said, "Al, this is my boy, Roy."

  "Rollo," Dad's nickname for me, "This is Al Capone."

  Capone shook my hand and I said something, and I suppose, twitched around the way ten year olds do.

  Capone said, "Good-looking boy, Boss."

  That was a big moment for a boy, and I can still recall the warmth of Capone's hand around mine.

  I have asked my father about Capone calling him Boss. Dad said that only Capone called him that (a term not unusual in many prisons), and Capone called only him Boss. He did not know why. Dad allowed it, instead of the required, Mr. Chandler, which Capone used when higher authority was present.

  Al Capone has been dead more than sixty years but his name still rouses interest. A short rundown on his story would be handy.

  In his best year, 1927, Al Capone made one hundred and five million dollars. Even today that is a sum to be reckoned with.

  Capone had risen through the mobs until he ruled the Midwest underworld. Criminal profits funneled through his Chicago headquarters with percentages paid into Capone coffers. His enforcers saw to it, and Big Al barely had to direct. From common loan-sharking and small extortions, through gambling, kidnapping, prostitution, bank robbery, and execution, Capone took a cut.

  The real money, the steady dough, came from bootlegging. The country drank its way through prohibition, and Capone interests shipped the booze in by convoys.

  Of course, Al Capone did not handle bottles or guns. Those days (and Al had made his bones) were long behind. He owned almost nothing and listed his occupation as a used furniture dealer.

  Capone bought police, judges, and politicians. His friends were legion, and even his enemies were likely to describe his generosity. Capone was too big and too powerful for state government to defeat. The federal government concentrated on him, and for a long time, came up empty.

  Al Capone was convicted of little until they got him for income tax evasion. The federal government laboriously collected details until they could prove that Capone spent more than he reported making. Capone got ten years and went to Atlanta Federal Penitentiary.

  In Atlanta, Capone lived well. That prison's regulations allowed a continual flow of visitors, and Capone's lawyers were in and out and hard at work. Capone's vast wealth and influence were undermining. When Alcatraz opened, Big Al was high on the list. Capone's transfer to Alcatraz was a message to both the criminal world and the public.

  Capone received no notice of his imminent departure for Alcatraz. Federal authorities feared powerful influences could rise against his transfer or even an attempt to break him and other notables free while en route to The Rock.

  The prison train picked up other convicts on their way to California and did a lot of shunting about. Avoiding San Francisco and at least some of the horde of journalists, the three heavily barred cars were rolled aboard a barge at the Tiburon ferry slip.

  Tiburon was a small town directly north and across the bay from San Francisco. The village is on the tip of an obscure peninsula and was hidden from the big city and Alcatraz itself by Angel Island. There was no Golden Gate Bridge or Bay Bridge in those days, and traveling from San Francisco to Tiburon was by ferry—slow and inconvenient. Even then, reporters made the scene but were kept at telephoto distances. A few cameramen jockeyed about in boats, shooting with their long distance lenses as the prisoners unloaded at Alcatraz.

  Al Capone virtually disappeared when he entered Alcatraz. Almost nothing official came from The Rock to the public, and guards and their dependents were directed not to discuss the island or its criminals. Unlike the endless leaking of information we can now expect from any branch of government, few broke the rules, and a chronically frantic press resorted to wild speculations and fanciful embellishments through paid-for exposés by the few convicts released from the prison. It was not a good time for San Francisco journalists, but they made stories from rumors and kept Alcatraz in the news.

  Capone was allowed his single monthly visitation. A close family member or one lawyer could apply by letter for a visit. The warden decided yes or no, who and when. Capone was stunned and complained to Warden Johnston. He might as well have voiced his objections to the concrete lighthouse. Big Al was gone. Number 85 replaced him.

  Capone attempted other influence producing ploys. He offered to buy radios for each cell. He wished to purchase recreational equipment for everyone, guards included. He requested to purchase band instruments and on and on.

  Nothing was accepted. Capone did have a special personal musical instrument. Each convict was authorized to buy, at his own expense, one instrument. Capone's choice was a very expensive banjo/mandolin. Capone, as were all others, was allowed to play at certain times. Before his mental decline, – number 85 played in a small band that practiced in the washroom. Capone's was the most expensive instrument in the prison, but only a few chose to own or play anyway.

  Al Capone was unpopular in Alcatraz. The reasons were hard to pin down. Capone bragged about his importance and influence on the outside, which undoubtedly annoyed some. A few may hav
e harbored resentment from ill treatment by Capone's organizations. Others may have welcomed the opportunity to safely belittle a big shot.

  Early in his Alcatraz confinement Capone swapped blows with another convict in the prison laundry, William Collyer – number 185, murder, doing life. Both men did hole time and lost privileges. It was Capone's only slip. Otherwise, the once powerful gang lord obeyed prison routines and minded his own business.

  For a time Capone played first base on a pick-up convict softball team. He worked in the laundry, the library, and as cleanup man in the washroom. The washroom was where Jimmie Lucas tried for him.

  James Lucas hungered to appear "Big" to the prison population. The street-smart cons saw through him, and his reputation never got beyond sneaky and dangerous.

  James B. Lucas, Number 224

  Lucas' attack on Al Capone was intended to gain him prestige as the guy who got the big shot. If it sounds like a western movie with the young punk trying to bring down the old gunfighter, it was nonetheless real.

  Variations of the incident are told, but E. F. Chandler remembered it like this:

  "Capone was mopping around the washroom. Lucas snatched a pair of hair scissors from the barber's stand, broke the two blades apart, and lunged with one at Capone's back. Somebody yelled a warning, and Al got turned around enough to partly block Lucas' blow. The shears sliced a one-inch gash in Capone's back and cut his thumb but didn't stop Al from going to work on Lucas. In a few seconds, Lucas was in a ball on the floor hollering for someone to break it up, and Capone was punching anything on Lucas he could get a shot at.