Sudden Death Ends Long Friendship

Hunters in eastern Oregon had just a week to bag their one allowed bull elk for the season, starting on November 5, 1934. Long-time friends Fred Lampkin and Dan Bowman were among the eager nimrods. Along with several others, they had set up a base camp on a ranch in the Blue Mountains, 15 to 20 miles southwest of La Grande. Bowman carried his older .35-caliber Remington. He liked the potent stopping power of the rifle’s big slug, but could not know the tragedy that was about to unfold.

Elk Habitat Southwest of La Grange.

Daniel C. Bowman was born July 12, 1879 in a small town about 15 miles south of Eureka, California. The family moved to Umatilla County, Oregon, some time before 1886. Daniel served  with the Oregon National Guard in the Spanish-American War. In 1902, he married Effie Neil, who had also been born in California. She was about three years older than Daniel. Her family had moved to the area before 1880. In 1910, Dan had a job as a traveling salesman for the Pendleton Woolen Mills.

By then, Dan probably knew Frederick W. Lampkin, who had been a classmate of Effie’s. Fred had been born about eight months before Dan, in Kansas. The family was in Oregon by about 1895. In 1910, Fred was manager of the Eastern Oregonian newspaper in Pendleton. Dan and Fred became close friends who hunted, fished, and played golf together.

Both Dan and Fred registered for the World War I draft, but were not called up. At that time, Fred was still with the newspaper. Dan had opened an “agency store” about five miles east of Pendleton, on the Umatilla Indian Reservation. He still had that outlet ten years later.

In 1922, Fred Lampkin married Inez Hall, who had come to Pendleton a few years earlier. He continued to expand the general publishing company that had grown around the newspaper. By 1930, he and his firm were well known all over the region. Like Dan and Effie, Fred and his wife had no children. Then, some time in late 1930 or early 1931, Fred and Inez separated and were soon divorced.

When the two friends headed into the mountains to hunt elk in November 1934, the weather was both bad, and good. They were plagued by occasional rain showers, making for muddy and slippery footing. But fresh hoof prints would have shown up clearly and temperatures were quite nice for the season, rising into the 60-degree range during the day.

Still, up to the 9th, neither of the two had claimed an elk. As they returned from their morning search, they came to a fence that blocked their way back to the ranch yard. To save time, one member of the party vaulted the obstacle. Dan thought that was a great idea. But he was ten years older and a good deal heavier than his companion. Dan landed awkwardly and hurt a knee. At first, however, it didn’t seem like his injury was that bad, and Dan took some playful ribbing about it. In the same spirit of fun, another member of the hunting party snapped four photos while Bowman was being helped along to the ranch house.

After some rest, the party climbed into Bowman’s car to ride back to the campsite they shared with at least one other band of hunters. Lampkin got out on the passenger side, apparently still engaged in some banter with his old friend. Bowman replied in a raised voice because he knew Fred was hard of hearing. Meanwhile, Fred circled behind the car, perhaps to come around and help Dan out.

Bowman retrieved his rifle and then slid out to stand beside the car. But as soon as he put weight on his gimpy knee, it gave way. Dan desperately tried to catch himself, grasping the barrel of the rifle as a cane … and the weapon fired! He caught his breath on the ground and then rolled over to a horrifying sight: The heavy .35-caliber slug had hit his friend in the face and killed him instantly.

The day after the tragedy, newspapers reported that officials considered the death an accident and expected to quickly close their investigation. But then a member of the other hunting party – we’ll call him “Wayne” – offered damning testimony. He claimed that the loud voices he had heard were part of a verbal dispute. According to him, the two were arguing about the photographs taken of Bowman’s plight after his injury. This seems odd, since – this being 1934 – neither man could know what the images might show. Hurriedly snapped out in the field by an amateur, they might be unreadable.

Even so, Wayne claimed that not only had they argued with each other, but Bowman had told him “roughly” to keep out of it. Dan did not want Wayne driving his car, so there might have been some personal distrust or animosity between the two. Still, members of the other party agreed about the loud voices. They also thought they’d heard argumentative remarks, although they couldn’t quite agree on exactly what was said.

To make a long story short, Dan Bowman was charged with first degree murder. He went on trial in January 1935 at the Union County seat in La Grande. Besides testimony about the alleged “argument,” the prosecution entered into evidence the now-developed photos taken right after Bowman hurt his knee. Reports of the trial do not suggest that the images were in any way embarrassing or compromising.

County Courthouse in La Grande.
Union County Sheriff’s Department.

Bowman’s defense countered with numerous witnesses who testified to the long-standing friendship between the two. In that context, the “argument” could be seen as a jocular, and perhaps rueful, exchange between two aging buddies about the evils of growing old. As it happened, Bowman had suffered a compression fracture in his knee and spent several weeks in a cast. He was still on crutches at the trial, when X-ray images were entered into evidence to prove that he had been seriously injured.

The firearms assessment offered by criminologist Luke S. May supported the defense’s contention that the tragedy was an accident. The bullet had struck Lampkin’s face at a sharp upward angle and exited through the top of his skull. That finding was reinforced by the bullet hole punched in the victim’s hat. A deliberate shot would have surely had a more horizontal trajectory.

Moreover, May averred, the action of Bowman’s older Remington rifle had a crucial design defect. It could go off without anyone pulling the trigger, even with the safety engaged. By this time, May was famous throughout the Pacific Northwest for his scientific investigations. Nevertheless, to bolster the point, the defense brought in a local witness: a professional gunsmith from La Grande. He agreed that early versions of the firearm had a faulty design, which the company had soon modified.

They did not, however, recall guns that had already been sold. Nor, apparently, did they warn owners about the potential problem. On the witness stand, a distraught Bowman said, “I did not know my gun would go off without pulling the trigger. I did not know the gun was dangerous.”

In the end, the jury sided with the defense and acquitted Bowman on the murder charge.

Dan and Effie continued to operate the agency general store until about 1946-1948. Some time after that, they moved to Smith River, California, a small town near the coast about five miles south of the Oregon border. Daniel C. Bowman died July 10, 1953, at the veterans’ hospital in San Francisco. He was buried at the Golden Gate National Cemetery in San Bruno. Effie died about nine years later and was buried beside her husband.
                                                                                

References: “[Bowman-Lampkin Background],” Oregon Journal, Portland, East Oregonian, Pendleton, Oregon (July 1902 – July 1906).

“[Bowman Trial],” Statesman-Journal, Salem, The Oregonian, Portland, La Grande Observer, Eugene Guard, Klamath News, Corvallis Gazette-Times, Oregon (January 9, 1935) (January 15, 1935).

“[Bowman Afterwards],” Coos Bay Times, Marshfield, La Grande Observer, Oregon; San Francisco Examiner, California (August 1940 – July 1953).

“[Lampkin Hunting Death],” The Oregonian, Portland, Bend Bulletin, Eugene Guard, La Grande Observer, Oregon (July 10 – December 29, 1934).

Luke S. May, Luke S. May Papers, Special Collections, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington (1969).

Elmer Smith, Big Game Rifles and Cartridges, Small-Arms Technical Publishing Company, Onslow County, North Carolina (1936).

William F. Willingham, “Pendleton Woolen Mills,” The Oregon Encyclopedia, https://oregonencyclopedia.org/articles/pendleton_woolen_mills/#.XfUIS-t7kt9. Accessed December 14, 2019.

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Death In The Line Of Duty

September 14, 1928 brought typical early fall weather to Seattle, with showers moving through during the day. Police patrolman Emery Ray Sherard had the University District as his evening beat. The many neon business signs and more subdued street lamps brightened the main areas, but otherwise it was quite dark.

On University Way, the Egyptian Theater featured The Mysterious Lady, a silent film starring Greta Garbo. A few doors down, the popular Manning’s Coffee offered their “luxury blend” in a hot cup of fresh brew, or as a bag of ground roast to take home. Further north, on the corner of The Way and 50th Street, the Jamieson Drug Company store was busy with late customers.

Officer Sherard. Family Archives.

Sherard had seen combat in the Great War, but he cannot have expected the firefight that was about to erupt. As 9 o’clock approached, a lady rushed up to him. She and her husband thought that two men were robbing Jamieson’s. With no time to call for backup, the officer hurried by the store front. To enter there would put the victims, held in the back, in his possible line of fire. He continued around the corner, hoping to catch the robbers by surprise from a side entrance.

Sherard started inside, but the two bandits fled out the front. He dashed outside and around the corner. The crooks claimed the officer shot at them first, and Sherard may well have fired a warning round into the air. He also surely ordered them to “Halt.” They don’t mention that at all. In any case, the two, along with the driver of their getaway car, met Sherard with a hail of bullets. It’s unclear how many times, or even if, the patrolman fired at them before he went down from a bullet in the head.

Despite police efforts all around the city, the crooks actually managed to pull off several more robberies before they vanished. Meanwhile, the downed patrolman lay in a hospital, dying and unable to talk. Officer Sherard succumbed shortly after midnight, his wife at his side. Once again, Mary Frances – she usually went by just “Frances” – had lost a husband in the line of duty.

Mary Frances Vanderdasson was born in 1895 in Emmett, Idaho, about 23 miles northwest of Boise. She married 26-year-old William Henry Kuckku of Emmett on July 27, 1917. However, her new husband enlisted shortly after their marriage, and his infantry regiment departed for France on December 12 of that year. With him in “A” Company was his good buddy, Emery Sherard.

Sherard was born in Wyoming in 1887 and the family moved to Idaho while he was in his teens. When he registered for the draft in 1917, Emery had a farm about 25 miles north of Boise. (It’s unclear if he owned or leased the acreage.) He met Frances shortly before he and William shipped out. In late May 1918, they took part in the first major offensive operation for American forces in Europe, the Battle of Cantigny. Sadly, Will Kuckku was killed in action, making the ultimate sacrifice for his country. Sherard survived, as he did the later storied battles of the American army on the Western Front.

Mustered out and back in Idaho, Emery’s acquaintance with the widow blossomed into friendship and then love. They were married November 4, 1919, and moved to Seattle within a month or so. Emery worked as a mechanic for several years and spent a short period as a salesman. He joined the Seattle Police Department in November of 1926. Now he too had been killed in the line of duty. Frances was left alone to raise their three children: Dorothy, age 8, James, 5, and Theodore, 4.

The two bandits inside the drug store had both shown signs of being drunk, or at least tipsy. One had waved his gun around and boasted about shooting someone just to show they were serious. The victims provided police with reasonable descriptions of the two, and officers soon rounded up over sixty suspects.

Around noon on Monday, witnesses picked Knute Lindberg, a 22-year-old immigrant, out of a lineup based on his appearance and distinct accent. The Swede had entered the U.S. five years earlier. He listed his destination as Aberdeen, Washington, and claimed to be an orphan.

Under intense interrogation, Lindberg named his accomplices: 20-year-old Leo Burns and 21-year-old James McCourt. Born in Pierce County, Washington, Burns was known to the police and described as a “hard-boiled egg” in news reports. McCourt had been born in Kitsap County and worked briefly as a plumber. His police record was said to match that “of a hardened criminal of fifty years.”

Lindberg and Burns had indeed “fortified” themselves with a bottle of moonshine before going on their robbery spree. McCourt, the getaway driver, was apparently sober. Told that a .38-caliber slug had killed Sherard, Lindberg admitted that he might have fired it – he or McCourt. Burns had carried a .32-caliber automatic pistol. Police arrested Leo Burns within a day or so. His claim to have not fired at the officer was disproven by .32-caliber slugs collected at the crime scene. Meanwhile, McCourt had fled the area and would remain on the run for about four months.

Oddly enough, criminologist Luke S. May logged this case in mid-January 1929, just two days before the trials of Lindberg and Burns. The prosecuting attorney sent him a .38-caliber Colt double-action revolver and a .32-caliber Colt automatic pistol, plus several bullets. May’s files contain no information on when police had collected this evidence, but it’s highly likely that Luke had already inspected the exhibits. A full firearms and bullet assessment can be quite time-consuming, so this late interaction seems almost pro forma.

In court, May testified that, although many slugs from the two Colts had been collected at the crime scene, neither had been the murder weapon. Even so, for their participation in a felony where a death occurred, Lindberg and Burns were convicted of first degree murder and sentenced to life in prison.

Three weeks after they were sentenced, James McCourt was arrested for a robbery in Butte, Montana. Shown a “wanted” poster, he admitted that he had indeed participated in the drug store robbery. He seemed to recall firing his gun twice, but implied he’d only meant to make the patrolman duck while they made their escape. He had sold the weapon to a known bootlegger after his escape to Montana. McCourt waived extradition and was quickly returned to Seattle.

Police were unable to retrieve the suspected murder weapon. Yet authorities somehow learned a great deal about it. In his opening statement to the jury, the prosecutor said they knew enough “to convince you it was his gun that fired the fatal bullet.”

James McCourt.
Montana Standard.

Given that confident assertion, we must engage in a bit of conjecture. We first assume that Montana police grilled the gun buyer, who had perhaps re-sold it (or ditched it, but he’d probably not admit to that). He would have echoed McCourt’s description of the “.38 caliber long-barreled Colt revolver.” May had surely identified the make and model of the weapon that fired the fatal bullet. Thus, the buyer’s statement sealed that link, since McCourt had already admitted that he had fired that gun at Sherard.

We can, in fact, stretch our hypothesis a bit further. McCourt or the buyer would have almost certainly test fired the gun, just to prove that it was in good working order. Officers might have been able to recover a slug from whatever target they used, and that could have been compared to the death bullet. Unfortunately, May’s file for this old case only had the inventory of the first evidence received, not the reports. Whatever the exact sequence, newspapers noted that expert testimony stated “that the bullet which killed the officer came from McCourt’s gun.”

The jury issued a guilty verdict, and McCourt was sentenced to life in prison, joining his partners in crime. As it happened, Leo Burns died less than six months after he arrived at the state penitentiary. Cause of death was listed as tuberculosis, although he had shown no apparent symptoms through the period of his trial. McCourt and Lindberg were enumerated at the penitentiary for the 1940 census, but it is unknown what became of Lindberg after that.

McCourt was paroled in early 1943, apparently as part of a program to ease the strain on the under-funded and under-manned prison. He eventually moved to California, where records show he spent time in prison (San Quentin and then Folsom) for burglary. He died in San Francisco at the age of sixty.

Mary Frances Sherard never remarried. After her husband’s murder, groups in Seattle sponsored at least two benefit events to provide a “nest egg” for the family. She received small pensions from the U. S. government and from the city of Seattle, and added to that with occasional work cleaning homes.

For the 1940 Census, daughter Dorothy listed her occupation as Comptometer operator, a highly skilled position. (The Comptometer was a brand of mechanical calculator.) She perhaps married during the war because it is not possible to trace her after that.

James and Theodore went to work for Boeing Aircraft when they were old enough. Then, in the summer of 1943, Theodore enlisted in the army. One can imagine the mother’s fears, but he survived the war. Theodore married in 1947 and became a commercial artist. James stayed in the aircraft industry and eventually learned to fly himself. He moved to California and married there in 1950.

Mary Frances Sherard died in January 1954.
                                                                                

References: H. W. Crocker III, The Yanks Are Coming!: A Military History of the United States in World War I, Regnery Publishing, Washington, D.C. (2014).

Luke S. May, Luke S. May Papers, Special Collections, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington (1969).

“[Sherard Murder: Background and Investigation],” Seattle Star, Seattle Times, Post-Intelligencer, Seattle, Spokesman-Review, Spokane, Washington; Emmett Index, Idaho (January 1919 – October 1928).

“[Sherard Murder: Trials and Afterwards],” Post-Intelligencer, Seattle, Spokesman-Review, Spokane, Olympian, Olympia, Bellingham Herald, Seattle Times, Spokane Chronicle, Washington; Montana Standard, Butte, Montana; The Oregonian, Portland, Oregon (January 14, 1929 – January 1943).

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