Gangsters: John Dillinger

John Herbert Dillinger (June 22, 1903 – July 22, 1934) was an American bank robber in the Depression-era United States. His gang robbed two dozen banks and four police stations.

Dillinger was the most notorious of all the Depression-era outlaws, standing out even among more violent criminals such as Baby Face Nelson, Pretty Boy Floyd, and Bonnie and Clyde.

Media reports in his time were spiced with exaggerated accounts of Dillinger’s bravado and daring, and his colorful personality.

In the 2009 film “Public Enemies”, John Dillinger was played by Johnny Depp.

Video comes courtesy of YouTube:

Hollywood saw things that way.

History has this, to tell us:

Dillinger’s Early life

John Herbert Dillinger was born on June 22, 1903, in the Oak Hill section of Indianapolis, Indiana, the younger of two children born to John Wilson Dillinger and Mary Ellen “Mollie” Lancaster. Dillinger’s father was a grocer by trade and, reportedly, a harsh disciplinarian.

Dillinger’s older sister, Audrey, was born March 6, 1889.

Their mother died in 1907 just before John’s fourth birthday.

Audrey married Emmett “Fred” Hancock that year and they had seven children together. She cared for her brother John for several years until their father remarried in 1912 to Elizabeth “Lizzie” Fields. They had three children, Hubert, Doris M. and Frances Dillinger.

A Rebellious Youth

As a teenager, Dillinger was frequently in trouble with the law for fighting and petty theft. He was also noted for his “bewildering personality” and bullying of smaller children. He quit school to work in an Indianapolis machine shop.

His father moved the family to Mooresville, Indiana, in about 1920.

Dillinger’s rebellious behavior continued, despite their new rural setting. He was arrested in 1922 for auto theft, and his relationship with his father deteriorated.

He enlisted in the United States Navy, where he was made a Fireman 3rd Class assigned to the battleship USS Utah. He deserted a few months later, when his ship was docked in Boston. He was eventually dishonorably discharged.

Dillinger returned to Mooresville, where he met Beryl Ethel Hovious. The two were married on April 12, 1924.
The marriage ended in divorce on June 20, 1929.

Dillinger was unable to find a job, and planned a robbery with his friend Ed Singleton. The two robbed a local grocery store, stealing $50.

Leaving the scene they were spotted by a minister who recognized the men, and reported them to the police. The two were arrested the next day. Singleton pleaded not guilty, but after Dillinger’s father (the local Mooresville Church deacon) discussed the matter with Morgan County prosecutor Omar O’Harrow, his father convinced John to confess to the crime and plead guilty without retaining a defense attorney.

Dillinger was convicted of assault and battery with intent to rob, and conspiracy to commit a felony. He expected a lenient probation sentence, but instead was sentenced to 10 to 20 years in prison for his crimes.

En route to Mooresville to testify against Singleton, Dillinger briefly escaped, but was apprehended within a few minutes.

School of Hard Knocks

Dillinger embraced the life behind bars in the Indiana State Prison in Michigan City. Upon being admitted, he is quoted as saying, “I will be the meanest bastard you ever saw when I get out of here.”

He soon befriended other criminals, such as seasoned bank robbers like Harry “Pete” Pierpont, Charles Makley, Russell Clark, and Homer Van Meter, who taught Dillinger how to be a successful criminal. The men planned heists that they would commit soon after they were released. Dillinger studied Herman Lamm’s meticulous bank-robbing system, and used it extensively throughout his criminal career.

Outside Moves

Dillinger’s father launched a campaign to have him released, and was able to get 188 signatures on a petition.

Dillinger was paroled on May 10, 1933, after serving nine and a half years.

Released at the height of the Great Depression, Dillinger had little prospect of finding employment. He immediately returned to crime.

On June 21, 1933, he robbed his first bank, taking $10,000 from the New Carlisle National Bank, in New Carlisle, Ohio.

On August 14, Dillinger robbed a bank in Bluffton, Ohio. Tracked by police from Dayton, Ohio, he was captured and later transferred to the Allen County jail in Lima to be indicted in connection to the Bluffton robbery.

After searching him before letting him into the prison, the police discovered a document which appeared to be a prison escape plan. They demanded Dillinger tell them what the document meant, but he refused.

Dillinger had helped conceive a plan for the escape of Pierpont, Clark and six others he had met in prison, most of whom worked in the prison laundry. Dillinger had friends smuggle guns into their prison cells, with which they escaped, four days after Dillinger’s capture.

The group, known as “the First Dillinger Gang,” comprised Pete Pierpont, Russell Clark, Charles Makley, Ed Shouse, Harry Copeland, and John “Red” Hamilton, a member of the Herman Lamm Gang.

Pierpont, Clark, and Makley arrived in Lima on October 12, where they impersonated Indiana State Police officers, claiming they had come to extradite Dillinger to Indiana. When the sheriff, Jess Sarber, asked for their credentials, Pierpont shot him dead, then released Dillinger from his cell.

The four men escaped back into Indiana.

Methods and Means

The Bureau of Investigation (BOI), a precursor to the Federal Bureau of Investigation, was brought in to help identify the fugitives – although the men had not violated any federal law. Using their superior fingerprint matching technology, they successfully identified all of the suspects, and issued nationwide bulletins offering rewards for their capture.

But the crooks had methods of their own.

Among Dillinger’s more celebrated exploits was his pretending to be a sales representative for a company that sold bank alarm systems – and then “testing” a bank’s security by carrying out an actual robbery.

He reportedly entered a number of Indiana and Ohio banks and used this ruse to assess security systems and bank vaults of prospective targets.

Another time (allegedly) the men pretended to be part of a film company that was scouting locations for a “bank robbery” scene. Bystanders stood and smiled as a real robbery ensued, and Dillinger’s gang fled.

Dillinger was believed to have been associated with gangs who robbed dozens of banks and accumulated a total of more than $300,000.

To obtain supplies, the gang attacked the state police arsenals in Auburn and Peru, stealing machine guns, rifles, revolvers, ammunition and bulletproof vests.

On October 23, 1933, the gang robbed the Central National Bank & Trust Company in Greencastle, Indiana. They then headed to Chicago to hide out.

The Shanley Case

On December 14, 1933, Chicago Police Department (CPD) Detective William Shanley was killed.

The police had been put on high alert and suspected the Dillinger gang of involvement in the robbery of the Unity Trust And Savings Bank of $8,700 the day before.

Shanley was following up on a tip that one of the gang’s cars was being serviced at a local garage. John “Red” Hamilton showed up at the garage that afternoon. When Shanley approached, Hamilton pulled a pistol and shot him twice, fatally, then escaped.

Shanley’s murder led the Chicago Police Department to establish a forty man “Dillinger Squad”.

As police began closing in, the men left Chicago to hide out first in Florida, later at the Gardner Hotel in El Paso, Texas (where a highly visible police presence dissuaded Dillinger from trying to cross the border at the Santa Fe Bridge in downtown El Paso to Ciudad Juárez, Mexico), and finally in Tucson, Arizona.

Capture

On January 21, 1934, a fire broke out at the Hotel Congress in Tucson, where members of the Dillinger gang were staying.

Forced to leave their luggage behind, they were evacuated through a window, and down a fire truck ladder.

Charles Makley and Russell Clark tipped a couple of firemen $12 to climb back up and retrieve their luggage.

One of the firefighters, William Benedict, later recognized Makley, Pierpont, and Ed Shouse while thumbing through a copy of True Detective and informed the police, who tracked Makley’s luggage to a second hideout.

Makley was the first to be arrested. Clark was next.

To arrest Pierpont, the police staged a routine traffic stop and lured him to the police station, where they took him by surprise.

Dillinger was the last to be arrested.

The police found the men in possession of over $25,000 in cash and several automatic weapons.

Tucson still celebrates the historic arrest with an annual “Dillinger Days” festival, the highlight of which is a reenactment of the events.

Extradition

The men were extradited to the Midwest after a debate between prosecutors as to where the gang would be prosecuted first.

The governor ordered that Dillinger should be extradited to the Lake County Jail in Crown Point for Officer O’Malley’s murder in the East Chicago bank robbery, while Pierpont, Makley and Clark were sent to Ohio to stand trial for Sheriff Sarber’s murder.

Shouse’s testimony at the March 1934 trials of Pierpont, Makley and Clark led to all three of the men being convicted.

Pierpont and Makley received the death penalty, while Clark received a life sentence.

Escape from Crown Point

The police boasted to area newspapers that the Crown Point jail was escape-proof – and posted extra guards, to make sure.

There is still some debate as to what happened on the day of Dillinger’s escape in early March.

Deputy Ernest Blunk claimed that Dillinger had escaped using a real pistol, but FBI files indicate that Dillinger carved a fake pistol from a piece of wood. How he acquired such a thing is still the subject of controversy. Sam Cahoon (the janitor that Dillinger first took hostage in the jail) believed that Dillinger had carved the gun with a razor and some shelving in his cell.

However, according to an unpublished interview with Dillinger’s attorney, Louis Piquett, and his investigator, Art O’Leary, it was later revealed that O’Leary claimed to have smuggled the gun in himself.

What is known is that Dillinger’s wooden pistol was modeled after a Colt .38.

He tricked a guard into opening his cell, took seventeen men hostage, used Deputy Blunk to lure the guards back to the cell block one at a time, locked them in his cell, and fled with another inmate (Herbert Youngblood).

Dillinger stole Sheriff Lillian Holley’s new Ford car (embarrassing her, and the town), and traveled to Chicago.

In so doing, he crossed the state line in a stolen car – breaking the federal Motor Vehicle Theft Act.

The crime was under the jurisdiction of the Bureau of Investigation, who immediately took over the Dillinger case after the car was found abandoned in Chicago.

Youngblood was killed in a police shootout two weeks later.

Dillinger was indicted by a local grand jury, and the BOI organized a nationwide manhunt for him.

On the Run

After escaping Crown Point, Dillinger began living with his girlfriend Evelyn “Billie” Frechette. They proceeded to Saint Paul, Minnesota, met up with Hamilton and a few others, and joined Baby Face Nelson’s gang, composed of Homer Van Meter, Tommy Carroll and Eddie Green.

Three days after Dillinger’s escape, the six men robbed the Security National Bank and Trust Company in Sioux Falls, South Dakota. During the robbery, a traffic cop, Hale Keith, was severely wounded when Nelson shot Keith, through a plate glass window.

A week later, on March 14, the new gang robbed the First National Bank in Mason City, Iowa, intending to get $250,000 but only making off with $50,000 due to the bank manager’s stalling tactics. Dillinger and Hamilton were both shot in their right shoulders and wounded.

The landlord of the apartment Dillinger rented in St. Paul became suspicious, and on March 30, 1934, reported his suspicions to a federal agent. The building was placed under surveillance by two agents, Rufus Coulter and Rusty Nalls.

The next day, Nalls remained with his car while Coulter and a local St. Paul Police detective, Henry Cummings, went up to the apartment. They came face to face with Billie, who alerted Dillinger to the police presence. Dillinger immediately started assembling his submachine gun while the two detectives were kept waiting at the door.

Van Meter showed up, and sensed trouble. After exchanging brief words with Coulter, he headed back downstairs to his car, which he had parked next to Nalls. Coulter followed him down to the ground floor, where Van Meter pulled out a pistol and opened fire on him.

Coulter ran for the car and fired several shots before Van Meter retreated inside.

Dillinger fired through the apartment door upstairs at Cummings, then fled out of a back entrance with Frechette and Van Meter, before back-up could arrive.

They commandeered a truck and drove to Eddie Green’s home. Dillinger was hit in the leg by a ricochet from his own gun and required medical attention.

Federal agents later closed in on the building, and the gang opened fire as they escaped and split up. Eddie Green was shot in the head when agents captured him. He lasted for a week, before dying on April 10.

Meanwhile, Dillinger and Frechette traveled to visit Dillinger’s father in Mooresville, where they remained until Dillinger’s wound healed.

When Frechette returned to Chicago to visit a friend, she was arrested, but refused to reveal Dillinger’s whereabouts. Unknown to the agents, Dillinger was waiting in his car outside the bar where Frechette was arrested, and drove off unnoticed.

Still Making Moves

Dillinger reportedly became despondent after Billie was arrested.

The other gang members tried to talk to him out of rescuing her, but Van Meter knew where they could find bulletproof vests.

That Friday morning, late at night, Dillinger and Van Meter took Warsaw, Indiana police officer Judd Pittenger hostage. They marched him at gunpoint to the police station, where they stole several more guns and bulletproof vests.

After separating, Dillinger picked up Hamilton, who was recovering from the Mason City robbery. The two then traveled to the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, where they visited Hamilton’s sister Anna Steve.

Upon his return to Chicago, Dillinger again ran into the police in Port Huron, Michigan following a tip that he was checking in on one of his bootlegging operations. Dillinger received a bullet to the left shoulder while avoiding capture.

Dillinger got a tip that federal agents were headed there, and left just days before they arrived.

Little Bohemia Lodge

In April, the Dillinger gang settled at a hideout called Little Bohemia Lodge, in the northern Wisconsin town of Manitowish Waters.

The gang assumed the owners, Emil Wanatka and his family, would give no trouble, but monitored them whenever they left or spoke on the phone.

Emil’s wife Nan and her brother managed to evade Baby Face Nelson, who was tailing them, and mailed a letter of warning to a U.S. Attorney’s office in Chicago, which later contacted the Division of Investigation.

Days later, a score of federal agents led by Hugh Clegg and Melvin Purvis approached the lodge in the early morning hours. Two barking watchdogs announced their arrival, but the gang was so used to Nan Wanatka’s dogs that they did not bother to inspect the disturbance.

It was only after the federal agents mistakenly shot a local resident and two innocent Civilian Conservation Corps workers as they were about to drive away in a car that the Dillinger gang was alerted to the presence of the BOI.

Gunfire between the groups lasted only moments, and the whole gang managed to escape in various ways despite the agents’ efforts to surround and storm the lodge. Agent W. Carter Baum was shot dead by Nelson during the gun battle.

Aftermath of Little Bohemia

The next day, Dillinger, Van Meter and Hamilton were confronted by authorities in Hastings, Minnesota, in a rolling gunfight. Hamilton was mortally wounded in the encounter. He died in Aurora, Illinois, three days after the shooting.

Dillinger, Van Meter, Arthur Barker, and Volney Davis (a member of the Barker-Karpis gang) buried him. Dillinger and Van Meter then met up with Carroll.

One week after Hamilton’s death, Dillinger, Van Meter, and Tommy Carroll robbed the First National Bank of Fostoria, Ohio. Van Meter wounded the local police chief, Frank Culp, during the robbery.

Dillinger and Van Meter spent most of May living out of a red panel truck with a mattress in the back.

On June 7, Tommy Carroll was shot and killed by police in Waterloo, Iowa.

Dillinger and Van Meter reunited with Nelson a week later, and went into hiding.

On June 30, Dillinger, Van Meter, Nelson, and an unidentified “fat man” robbed the Merchants National Bank in South Bend, Indiana. The identity of the “fat man” has never been confirmed, although it has been suggested (by Fatso Negri to the BOI) that it was Pretty Boy Floyd.

What is known is that in the robbery, Van Meter shot and killed police officer Howard Wagner as he walked towards the bank from a nearby intersection after being drawn by the sound of gunfire. Van Meter would be shot in the head during a shootout with police that followed the robbery.

The Elusive Mr. Lawrence

By July 1934, Dillinger had dropped completely out of sight, and federal agents had no solid leads to follow.

He had, in fact, drifted into Chicago and went under the alias of Jimmy Lawrence, a petty criminal from Wisconsin who bore a close resemblance to Dillinger’s real self.

What Dillinger did not realize was that the center of the federal agents’ dragnet happened to be in Chicago.

When the authorities found Dillinger’s blood spattered getaway car on a Chicago side street, they were positive that he was in the city.

The Woman in Red

Division of Investigations chief J. Edgar Hoover created a special task force headquartered in Chicago, to locate Dillinger.

On July 21, a madam from a brothel in Gary, Indiana – Ana Cumpănaş, also known as Anna Sage – contacted the police.
She was a Romanian immigrant threatened with deportation for “low moral character”, and offered the federal agency information on Dillinger in exchange for their help in preventing her deportation. The agency agreed to her terms, but she was later deported.

Cumpănaş told them that Dillinger was spending his time with another prostitute, Polly Hamilton, and that she and the couple would be going to see a movie together, the following day.

She agreed to wear an orange dress – which is believed to have appeared red in the artificial lights of the theater – so that police could easily identify her.

She was unsure which of two theaters they would be attending but told the agency their names: the Biograph and the Marbro.

A team of federal agents and officers from police forces outside Chicago was formed, along with a very few Chicago police officers (Federal officials felt that the Chicago police had been compromised and could not be trusted). Among them was Sergeant Martin Zarkovich, to whom Sage had informed on Dillinger.

Not wanting another embarrassing escape, the police were split into two teams.

On July 22, one team was sent to the Marbro Theater on the city’s west side, while another team surrounded the Biograph Theater at 2433 N. Lincoln Avenue on the north side.

During the stakeout, the Biograph’s manager thought the agents were criminals setting up a robbery. He called the Chicago police, who dutifully responded and had to be waved off by the federal agents, who told them that they were on a stakeout for an important target.

The Biograph Theater

Dillinger attended the film “Manhattan Melodrama” at the Biograph Theater in Chicago’s Lincoln Park neighborhood, with Polly Hamilton and Ana Cumpănaş.

Once they had determined that Dillinger was in the theater, the lead agent, Samuel P. Cowley, contacted J. Edgar Hoover for instructions.

Hoover recommended that they wait outside, rather than risk a gun battle in a crowded theater. He also told the agents not to put themselves in harm’s way, and that any man could open fire on Dillinger at the first sign of resistance.

When the film let out, Purvis stood by the front door and signaled Dillinger’s exit by lighting a cigar.

Both he and the other agents reported that Dillinger turned his head and looked directly at the agent as he walked by, glanced across the street, then moved ahead of his female companions.

Dillinger reached into his pocket but failed to extract his gun, then ran into a nearby alley.
Other accounts state that Dillinger ignored a command to surrender, whipped out his gun, then headed for the alley.

Agents already had the alley closed off, but Dillinger was determined to shoot it out.

Three men fired the fatal shots: Clarence Hurt fired twice, Charles Winstead fired three times, and Herman Hollis fired once.

Dillinger was hit from behind, and fell face first to the ground. He was struck three (or four, according to some historians) times, with two bullets entering the chest, one of them nicking his heart, and the fatal shot – which entered Dillinger through the back of his neck, severed his spinal cord and tore through his brain before exiting out the front of his head just under his right eye.

Although three agents shot Dillinger, Winstead was believed to be the man who fired the fatal round, and he received a personal letter of commendation from Director Hoover.

Two female bystanders took slight flesh wounds from flying bullet and brick fragments.

An ambulance was summoned, though it was clear that Dillinger had quickly died from his gunshot wounds.

At 10:50 p.m. on July 22, 1934, Dillinger was pronounced dead at Alexian Brothers Hospital. According to the investigators, Dillinger died without saying a word.

Dillinger’s body was displayed to the public at the Cook County morgue after his death.

He was buried at Crown Hill Cemetery (Section: 44, Lot: 94) in Indianapolis.

His gravestone has had to be replaced several times, because of vandalism by people chipping off pieces as souvenirs.

The Nash Theory of Dillinger’s Escape

In “The Dillinger Dossier”, author Jay Robert Nash maintains that Dillinger escaped death at the Biograph Theater simply by not being there. In his stead was “Jimmy Lawrence” – a local Chicago petty criminal whose appearance was similar to Dillinger’s.

Nash uses evidence to show that Chicago Police officer Martin Zarkovich was instrumental in this plot.

Nash theorizes that the plot unraveled when the body was found to have fingerprints that didn’t match Dillinger’s (the fingerprint card was missing from the Cook County Morgue for over three decades), the body was too tall, the eye color was wrong, and it possessed a rheumatic heart.

The F.B.I. – a relatively new agency whose agents were only recently permitted to carry guns or make arrests – would have fallen under heavy scrutiny, this being the third innocent man killed in pursuit of Dillinger. The Bureau would have gone to great lengths to ensure a cover up.

In shooting “Lawrence”, F.B.I. agents were stationed on the roof of the theater and fired downward, causing the open cuts on the face which were described through the media as “scars resulting from inept plastic surgery.”

The first words from Dillinger’s father upon identifying the body were “that’s not my boy.”

The body itself was buried under five feet of concrete and steel, making exhumation less likely.

Nash produced fingerprints and photos of Dillinger as he would appear in 1960, that were allegedly sent to Melvin Purvis just prior to his own 1960 alleged suicide.

Nash alleged that Dillinger was living and working in California as a machinist, under what would have been an early form of the witness protection program.

Just another aspect of Dillinger folklore?

Who knows?

In any event, this story ends, here.

Hope you’ll join me, for the next one.

Till then.

Peace.

Gangsters: Baby Face Nelson

Lester Joseph Gillis (December 6, 1908 – November 27, 1934), a.k.a. George Nelson, was a bank robber and murderer in the 1930s.

Gillis was better known as Baby Face Nelson – a name given to him due to his youthful appearance and small stature.

Usually referred to by criminal associates as “Jimmy”, Nelson entered into a partnership with John Dillinger, helping him escape from prison in the famed Crown Point, Indiana Jail escape, and was later labeled along with the remaining gang members as public enemy number one.

Nelson was responsible for the murders of several people, and has the dubious distinction of having killed more FBI agents in the line of duty than any other person.

In the 2009 movie “Public Enemies”, Baby Face Nelson was portrayed by Stephen Graham.

Video comes courtesy of YouTube:

That’s Hollywood.

This is history:

Nelson’s Early Criminal Life

On July 4, 1921, aged twelve, Nelson was arrested after accidentally shooting a fellow child in the jaw, with a pistol he had found. He served over a year in the state reformatory.

Arrested again for theft and joyriding at age 13, he was sent to a penal school for an additional 18 months.

By 1928, Nelson was working at a Standard Oil station in his neighborhood that was the headquarters of young tire thieves, known as “strippers”. Nelson became acquainted with many local criminals, including one who gave him a job driving bootleg alcohol throughout the Chicago suburbs.

It was through this job that Nelson became associated with members of the suburban-based Touhy Gang.

Within two years, Nelson and his gang had graduated to armed robbery.

On January 6, 1930, they invaded the home of magazine executive Charles M. Richter. After trussing him with adhesive tape and cutting the phone lines, they ransacked the house and made off with $25,000 worth of jewelry.

Two months later, they carried out a similar theft in the Sheridan Road bungalow of Lottie Brenner Von Buelow. This job netted $50,000 in jewels – including the wedding ring of the bank’s owner. Chicago newspapers nicknamed them “The Tape Bandits.”

On April 21, 1930, Nelson robbed his first bank, making off with $4,000. A month after that, Nelson and his gang pulled their home invasion scheme again, netting $25,000 worth of jewels.

On October 3 of that year, Nelson hit the Itasca State Bank for $4,600; a teller later identified Nelson as one of the robbers.

Three nights later, Nelson stole the jewelry of the wife of Chicago mayor Big Bill Thompson, valued at $18,000. She later described her attacker this way, “He had a baby face. He was good looking, hardly more than a boy, had dark hair and was wearing a gray topcoat and a brown felt hat, turned down brim.”

On November 26 1930, the Tape Bandits hit a Waukegan Road tavern, and Nelson ended up committing his first murder of note, when he killed stockbroker Edwin R. Thompson.

Heading West

Throughout the winter of 1931, most of the Tape Bandits were rounded up – including Nelson.
The Chicago Tribune referred to their leader as “George ‘Baby Face’ Nelson”, who received a sentence of one year to life in the state penitentiary at Joliet.

In February 1932, Nelson escaped during a prison transfer.

Through his contacts in the Touhy Gang, Nelson fled west and took shelter with Reno gambler/crime boss William Graham.

Using the alias “Jimmy Johnson”, Nelson eventually found himself in Sausalito, California, working for bootlegger Joe Parente.

It was during his time in the San Francisco Bay area that Nelson most probably met John Paul Chase and Fatso Negri – two men who were at his side during the latter half of his career.

While in Reno the next winter, Nelson first met the vacationing Alvin Karpis, who in turn introduced him to Midwestern bank robber Eddie Bentz.

Gang Leader

Teaming with Bentz, Nelson returned to the Midwest the next summer and committed his first major bank robbery in Grand Haven, Michigan on August 18, 1933. The robbery was a near-disaster, although most of those involved made a clean getaway.

Nonetheless, the Grand Haven bank job apparently convinced Nelson he was ready to lead his own gang.

Through connections in St. Paul’s Green Lantern Tavern, Nelson recruited Homer Van Meter, Tommy Carroll, and Eddie Green.

With these men (and two other local thieves), Nelson robbed the First National Bank of Brainerd, Minnesota of $32,000 on October 23, 1933. Witnesses reported that Nelson wildly sprayed sub-machine gun bullets at bystanders, as he made his getaway.

After collecting his wife Helen and four-year old son Ronald, Nelson left for San Antonio, Texas.

While there, Nelson and his gang bought several weapons from underworld gunsmith Hyman Lebman. One of those weapons was a .38 Colt automatic pistol that had been modified to fire fully automatic – a gun which was to feature prominently in Nelson’s later career.

By December 9, a local woman tipped San Antonio police to the nearby presence of “high powered Northern gangsters”.

Two days later, Tommy Carroll was cornered by two detectives and opened fire, killing Detective H.C. Perrin and wounding Detective Al Hartman.

All the Nelson gang, except for Nelson, fled San Antonio.

Nelson and his wife soon traveled west to the San Francisco Bay Area, where he recruited John Paul Chase and Fatso Negri for a new wave of bank robberies in the coming spring.

Partnership with John Dillinger

On March 3, 1934, John Dillinger made his famous “wooden pistol” escape from the jail in Crown Point, Indiana. Although the details remain in some dispute, the escape may have been arranged and financed by members of Nelson’s newly-formed gang, including Homer Van Meter, Tommy Carroll, Eddie Green, and John “Red” Hamilton, with the understanding that Dillinger would repay some part of the bribe money out of his share of the first robbery.

The night Dillinger arrived in the Twin Cities, Nelson and his friend John Paul Chase were driving, when they were cut off by a car driven by a local paint salesman named Theodore Kidder. Nelson lost his temper and gave chase, crowding Kidder to the curb. When the salesman got out to protest, Nelson fatally shot him.

Two days after this, the new gang (with Hamilton’s possible participation as the sixth man) struck the Security National Bank at Sioux Falls, South Dakota. In the robbery (which netted around $49,000), Nelson severely wounded motorcycle policeman Hale Keith with a burst of submachine gun fire as the officer was arriving at the scene.

The six men would soon be identified as “the second Dillinger gang”, due to Dillinger’s extreme notoriety, but the gang had no leader.

On March 13, the gang struck again at the First National Bank in Mason City, Iowa. Dillinger and Hamilton were shot and wounded in the robbery, where they made off with $52,000.

On April 3, federal agents ambushed and killed Eddie Green – though he was unarmed, and they were uncertain of his identity.

In the aftermath of the Mason City robbery, Nelson and John Paul Chase fled west to Reno, where their old bosses Bill Graham and Jim McKay were fighting a federal mail fraud case. Years later, the FBI determined that, on March 22, 1934, Nelson and Chase abducted the chief witness against the pair, Roy Fritsch, and killed him. Fritsch’s quartered body, while never found, was said to have been thrown down an abandoned mine shaft.

Little Bohemia

On the afternoon of April 20 1934, Nelson, Dillinger, Van Meter, Carroll, Hamilton, and gang associate (errand-runner) Pat Reilly, accompanied by Nelson’s wife Helen and three girlfriends of the other men, arrived at the secluded Little Bohemia Lodge in Manitowish Waters, Wisconsin, for a weekend of relaxation.

The gang’s connection to the resort apparently came from past dealings between Dillinger’s attorney, Louis Piquett, and lodge owner Emil Wanatka.

Though gang members greeted him by name, Wanatka maintained that he was unaware of their identities until some time on Friday night. According to Bryan Burrough’s book “Public Enemies: America’s Greatest Crime Wave and the Birth of the FBI, 1933–34”, this most likely happened when Wanatka was playing cards with Dillinger, Nelson, and Hamilton. When Dillinger won a round and raked in the pot, Wanatka caught a glimpse of Dillinger’s pistol concealed in his coat, and noticed that Nelson and the others also had shoulder holsters.

The following day, Wanatka’s wife informed a friend, Henry Voss, that the Dillinger gang was at the lodge, and the F.B.I. was subsequently given the tip early on April 22.

Melvin Purvis and a number of agents arrived by plane from Chicago, and with the gang’s departure imminent, attacked the lodge quickly and with little preparation – and without notifying or obtaining help from local authorities.

Wanatka offered a one-dollar dinner special on Sunday nights, and the last of a crowd estimated at 75 were leaving as the agents arrived in the front driveway.

A 1933 Chevrolet coupé was leaving at that moment with three lodge customers, John Hoffman, Eugene Boisneau and John Morris, who apparently did not hear an order to halt, because their car radio drowned out the agents yelling at them to stop. The agents quickly opened fire on them, instantly killing Boisneau and wounding the others, and alerting the gang members inside.

Adding to the chaos, Pat Reilly returned to the lodge at this moment after an out-of-town errand for Van Meter, accompanied by one of the gang’s girlfriends, Pat Cherrington. Accosted by the agents, Reilly and Cherrington backed out and escaped under fire.

Dillinger, Van Meter, Hamilton, and Carroll immediately escaped through the back of the lodge (which was unguarded; not enough agents), and made their way north on foot through woods and past a lake, to commandeer a car and a driver at a resort a mile away. Carroll was not far behind them. He made it to Manitowish and stole a car, making it uneventfully to St. Paul.

Nelson’s Conduct at Little Bohemia

Nelson (who had been outside the lodge in the adjacent cabin) attacked the F.B.I. raiding party head on, exchanging fire with Purvis, before retreating into the lodge under a return volley from other agents. From there he slipped out the back and fled in the opposite direction from the others.

Emerging from the woods ninety minutes later (but only a mile from Little Bohemia), Nelson kidnapped the Lange couple from their home and ordered them to drive him away. Apparently dissatisfied with the car’s speed, he quickly ordered them to pull up at a brightly lit house where switchboard operator, Alvin Koerner (who was aware of the ongoing events) phoned authorities at one of the nearby lodges, to report a suspicious vehicle in front of his home.

Shortly after Nelson had entered the house, taking the Koerners hostage, Emil Wanatka arrived with his brother-in-law George LaPorte and a lodge employee (a fourth man remained in the car), and were also taken prisoner.

Nelson ordered Koerner and Wanatka back into their vehicle, where the fourth man remained unnoticed in the back seat.

As they were preparing to leave, with Wanatka driving at gunpoint, another car arrived with two federal agents (W. Carter Baum and Jay Newman), and a local constable, Carl Christensen. Nelson took them by surprise, and ordered them out of their car.

As the driver Newman was getting out, Nelson opened fire with his custom-converted machine gun pistol, severely wounding Christensen and Newman and killing Baum – who was shot three times in the neck. Nelson was later quoted as having said that Baum had him “cold” and couldn’t understand why he hadn’t fired. It was found that the safety catch on Baum’s gun was on.

Nelson then stole the FBI car.

Less than 15 miles away, the car suffered a flat tire, and finally became mired in mud as Nelson attempted unsuccessfully to change it.

Back on foot, he wandered into the woods and took up residence with a Chippewa family in their secluded cabin for several days before making his final escape in another commandeered vehicle.

Three of the women who had accompanied the gang (including Nelson’s wife Helen Gillis), were captured inside the lodge. After grueling interrogation by the F.B.I., the three were ultimately convicted on harboring charges, and released on parole.

With an agent and an innocent bystander dead, four more severely wounded (including two more innocent bystanders), and the complete escape of the Dillinger gang, the F.B.I came under severe criticism, with calls for J. Edgar Hoover’s resignation and a widely circulated petition demanding Purvis’ suspension.

Catch Me, If You Can

A day after the Little Bohemia raid, Dillinger, Hamilton, and Van Meter ran through a police road block near Hastings, Minnesota, drawing fire from officers there. A ricocheting bullet struck Hamilton in the back, fatally wounding him.

On June 7, gang member Tommy Carroll was killed when trying to escape arrest in Waterloo, Iowa. Carroll and his girlfriend Jean Crompton had grown close to the Nelsons, and his death was a personal blow to them.

On June 27, former gang errand-runner and Little Bohemia fugitive Pat Reilly was surrounded as he slept, and was captured alive in St. Paul, Minnesota.

On the morning of June 30, Nelson, Dillinger, Van Meter, and one or more additional accomplices robbed the Merchants National Bank in South Bend, Indiana. One man involved in the robbery is believed to have been Pretty Boy Floyd, based on several eyewitness identifications as well as the later account of Joseph “Fatso” Negri, an old Nelson associate from California who was serving as a gofer to the gang at this time. Another rumored participant was Nelson’s childhood friend Jack Perkins, also an associate of the gang.

When the robbery began, a policeman named Howard Wagner had been directing traffic outside. Responding quickly to the scene and attempting to draw his gun, he was shot dead by Van Meter, who was stationed outside the bank.

Also outside the bank, Nelson exchanged fire with a local jeweler, Harry Berg, who shot him in the chest – ineffectively, because of Nelson’s bullet-proof vest.

As Berg retreated into his store under a return volley from Nelson, a man in a parked car was wounded. Nelson also grappled briefly with a teenage boy, Joseph Pawlowski, who tackled him until Nelson (or Van Meter) stunned Powlowski with a blow from his gun.

When Dillinger and the man identified as Floyd (not confirmed) emerged from the bank with sacks containing $28,000, they brought three hostages with them (including the bank president), to deter gunfire from three patrolmen on the scene.

The policemen fired nonetheless, wounding two of the hostages, before grazing Van Meter in the head.

The gang escaped, and Van Meter recovered.

In the constant and chaotic exchange of gunfire, several other bystanders were wounded by shots, ricochets, or flying broken glass.

This proved to be the last confirmed robbery for all of the known and suspected participants.

Hide and Seek

Following the killing of Baum, Nelson was made a priority target of the Bureau. The focus on him and the murdered agent also served to deflect some of the intense criticism directed at Hoover and Purvis, following the Little Bohemia debacle.

The couple went into hiding during the ensuing weeks. The Nelsons reportedly lived in various tourist camps, while continuing to secretly meet with family members whenever possible.

During the month of July, as the FBI manhunt for him continued, Nelson and his wife fled to California with associate John Paul Chase, who would remain with Nelson for the rest of his life.

Returning to Chicago on July 15, the gang held a reunion meeting, which was interrupted by two Illinois state troopers, Fred McAllister and Gilbert Cross.

Nelson fired on their vehicle with his converted “machine gun pistol”, wounding both men as the gangsters retreated. Cross was badly injured, but both men survived.

Public Enemy No.1

On July 22, 1934, John Dillinger was ambushed and killed by FBI agents outside the Biograph Theater in Lincoln Park, Chicago.

The next day the FBI announced that “Pretty Boy” Floyd was now Public Enemy No. 1.

On October 22, 1934, Floyd was killed in a shootout with agents including Melvin Purvis.

J. Edgar Hoover subsequently announced that “Baby Face” Nelson was now Public Enemy No. 1.

On August 23, Van Meter was ambushed and killed by police in St. Paul, Minnesota, leaving Nelson as the sole survivor of the so-called “Second Dillinger Gang”.

Nearing the End of the Line

Nelson and his wife, usually accompanied by Chase, drifted west to cities including Sacramento and San Francisco, California and Reno and Las Vegas, Nevada. They often stayed in auto camps, including Walley’s Hot Springs, outside of Genoa, Nevada, where they hid out from October 1 before returning to Chicago around November 1.

By the end of the month, FBI interest had settled on a former hideout of Nelson’s, the Lake Como Inn in Lake Geneva, Wisconsin, where it was believed that Nelson might return for the winter.

When the Nelsons and Chase did return to the inn on November 27, they briefly came face to face with surprised and unprepared FBI agents, who had staked it out. The fugitives sped away before any shots were fired.

Armed with a description of the car (a black Ford V8) and its license plate number (639-578), agents swarmed into the area.

The Battle of Barrington

The Barrington, Illinois gun battle erupted as Nelson, with Helen Gillis and John Paul Chase as passengers, drove a stolen V8 Ford south towards Chicago on State Highway 14.

Nelson caught sight of a sedan driven in the opposite direction by FBI agents Thomas McDade and William Ryan.

The agents and the outlaw recognized each other, and after several U-turns by both vehicles, Nelson wound up in pursuit of the agents’ car. Nelson and Chase fired at the agents and shattered their car’s windshield.

After swerving to avoid an oncoming milk truck, Ryan and McDade skidded into a field, and waited for Nelson and Chase – who had stopped pursuing. The agents did not know that a shot fired by Ryan had punctured the radiator of Nelson’s Ford, or that the Ford was being pursued by a Hudson automobile driven by two more agents: Herman Hollis and Samuel P. Cowley.

With his vehicle losing power and his pursuers attempting to pull alongside, Nelson swerved into the entrance of Barrington’s North Side Park and stopped opposite three gas stations.

Hollis and Cowley overshot them by over 100 feet (30 m), stopped at an angle, exited their vehicle’s passenger door under heavy gun fire from Nelson and Chase, and took cover behind the car.

The ensuing shootout was witnessed by more than 30 people.

Nelson’s wife, fleeing into an open field under instructions from Nelson, turned briefly in time to see Nelson mortally wounded.
He grasped his side and sat down on the running board as Chase continued to fire from behind their car.

Nelson, advancing toward the agents, fired so rapidly with a .351 rifle that bystanders mistook it for a machine gun.

Six bullets from Cowley’s submachine gun eventually struck Nelson in the chest and stomach, before Nelson mortally wounded Cowley with bullets to the chest and stomach. Pellets from Hollis’s shotgun struck Nelson in the legs and knocked him down.

As Nelson regained his feet, Hollis moved to better cover behind a utility pole while drawing his pistol, but was killed by a bullet to the head before he could return fire.

Nelson stood over Hollis’s body for a moment, then limped toward the agents’ car.
Nelson was too badly wounded to drive, so Chase got behind the wheel, and the two men and Nelson’s wife fled the scene.

Nelson had been shot seventeen times; seven of Cowley’s bullets had struck his torso and ten of Hollis’s shotgun pellets had hit his legs.

After telling his wife “I’m done for”, Nelson gave directions, as Chase drove them to a safe house on Walnut Street in Wilmette.

Nelson died in bed with his wife at his side, at 7:35 p.m.

Hollis was severely wounded in the head and was declared dead soon after arriving at the hospital.
At a different hospital, Cowley lived for long enough to confer briefly with Melvin Purvis and have surgery, before succumbing to a stomach wound similar to Nelson’s.

Following an anonymous telephone tip, Nelson’s body was discovered wrapped in a blanket, in front of St. Peter’s Catholic Cemetery, in Skokie. Helen Gillis later stated that she had placed the blanket around Nelson’s body because, “He always hated being cold…”

Gillis and Nelson are buried at Saint Joseph’s Cemetery in River Grove, Illinois.

And here ends our tale.

Hope you’ll join me, for the next one.

Till then.

Peace.