Today’s Well-Planned Yet Truly Morbid Fact!
Harry Pierpont, Charles Makley, and Russell Clark were members of John Dillinger’s notorious gang. They participated with Dillinger in bank robberies and shoot-outs with the police.
Gang of Four
In 1933, Dillinger was arrested in Allen County, Ohio, for robbery and taken to the county jail in Lima. Pierpont, Makley, and Clark broke him out of jail. During the break, Pierpont shot and killed the Allen County sheriff.
After the jailbreak, the Dillinger gang, including Pierpont, Makley and Clark went on a bank-robbing spree. In January 1934, in East Chicago, Indiana, during one of the robberies, a police officer was shot and killed. The gang fled to Arizona where they were arrested.
Dillinger was taken to Indiana to stand trial for the murder of the police officer, but once again escaped from jail. [They sure were bad at keeping people incarcerated back in the day! – DeSpair] Pierpont, Makley and Clark were returned to Ohio where they were tried for the murder of the Allen County sheriff and convicted. Clark was given a life sentence and was sent to the Ohio Penitentiary. Soon thereafter, Pierpon and Makley, who were sentenced to die in the electric chair, were also sent to the penitentiary.
Because it was feared that Dillinger would try to rescue his pals, Pierpont and Makley were transported to the penitentiary in a heavily armored 15-vehicle caravan, which included 50 armed National Guard soldiers. They arrived on March 27, 1934. Even after they were locked up in the penitentiary in Columbus, prison officials and the public feared that Dillinger, who had by then been proclaimed “Public Enemy Number One” and was considered sort of a miracle worker, would find a way to break them out. Additional security measures were taken at the prison. Public rumors ran wild concerning plans supposedly being made by Dillinger to free them. On July 23, 1934, while Pierpont and Makley were awaiting their ride on the “humming bird” (another name for the electric chair), their leader, Dillinger, was shot to death outside a movie theater in Chicago.
Dillinger’s cold dead corpse
In an attempt to avoid execution, Makley and Pierpont devised an escape plan. Copying a tactic used by Dillinger, they made fake guns and colored them with black shoe polish. They brandished the fake guns in their dash for freedom, which occurred on September 22, 1934, but were shot down by guards. Makley was killed. Pierpont was badly wounded, but lived to have his day sitting on “Old Sparky” on October 17, 1934.
Old Sparky
While they were preparing for their break, Pierpont and Makley invited Clark to join them in their attempt. He declined, and they told him he was a fool. They said they were getting out of that “hell hole, one way or another,” and he was going to have to spend 30 or 40 years there. Clark was released from prison 34 years later, on August 14, 1968.
Culled from: A Night of Horror
Post-Mortem Portrait Du Jour!
LITTLE GIRL WITH A RED NECKLACE AND CURLED HAIR
Daguerreotype 1/6 plate, tinted, circa 1850
This little girl is laid out and photographed wearing her best dress. Her hair is curled, as was popular in memorial photographs of children, indicating the loving care the family put into the body’s preparation. Unable to afford a full tinted picture, this family had her necklace colored a vivid red to add a distinctive touch. Coloring a dress, shirt, or jewelry red or pink was the minimal painted touch to a child’s postmortem daguerreotype.
Culled from: Sleeping Beauty II
Andersonville Prisoner Diary Entry Du Jour!
This is the continuation of the 1864 diary of Andersonville prisoner Private George A. Hitchcock (see the archived version for all entries up until now).
Here’s today’s entry:
June 27th. Two prisoners were brought in who tunneled out ten days ago and traveled over a hundred miles, living on sweet potatoes from plantations along their route. The blood-hounds overtook them near the Florida line, so they have returned to prison life, refreshed by pure air. Several shots were fired at men on the deadline.
Culled from: Andersonville: Giving Up the Ghost
I’m glad I sent you Sleeping Beauty. I remember the day I bought it from Dark Carnival in Berkeley. My job included driving all over the Bay Area fixing systems of one sort or the other. Good book stores, good restaurants and horrible audio books. Life was and is good! Thank you for all the gruesome stuff you do. Still love horrible books of all kinds. My library reflects your recommendations. Onward through the fog!
Thank you so much for gifting me that book! I think of you every time I grab it. 🙂