Killers of the Flower Moon

by David Grann

  On February 23, 1927, weeks after Paul Peace vowed to disinherit and divorce the wife he suspected of poisoning him, he was injured in a hit-and-run and left to bleed out on the road. Webb told me that the familiar forces had conspired to paper over his death. “Maybe you could look into it,” she said. I nodded, though I knew that in my own way I was as lost in the mist as Tom White or Mollie Burkhart had been.

  Webb walked me outside, onto the front porch. It was dusk, and the fringes of the sky had darkened. The town and the street were empty, and beyond them the prairie, too. “This land is saturated with blood,” Webb said. For a moment, she fell silent, and we could hear the leaves of the blackjacks rattling restlessly in the wind. Then she repeated what God told Cain after he killed Abel: “The blood cries out from the ground.”

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  I am grateful to all the people who contributed to this project, and none more so than the Osage who entrusted me with their stories and encouraged me to dig deeper. Over the years, many Osage shared with me not only their insights but also their friendship. I want to especially thank Margie Burkhart, Kathryn Red Corn, Charles Red Corn, Raymond Red Corn, Joe Conner, Dolores Goodeagle, Dennis McAuliffe, Elise Paschen, Marvin Stepson, Mary Jo Webb, and the late Jozi Tall Chief.

  My research odyssey led me to many other generous individuals. The late Martha Vaughan and her cousin Melville shed light on their grandfather W. W. Vaughan. Tom White’s relatives—including James M. White, Jean White, John Sheehan White, and Tom White III—were invaluable sources. So was Tom White III’s spouse, Styrous, who dug up and developed archival photographs. Alexandra Sands relayed details about her grandfather James Alexander Street, who was one of the undercover operatives. Frank Parker Sr. sent me photographs and papers concerning his father, Eugene Parker—another undercover agent. Homer Fincannon and his brother, Bill, shared a wealth of information about their great-grandfather A. W. Comstock.

  A number of scholars and experts patiently answered my never-ending questions. Garrick Bailey, an anthropologist who specializes in Osage culture, went beyond any reasonable bounds of duty and read the entire manuscript before publication. He is not accountable for anything I wrote, but the book is infinitely better because of him.

  The FBI historian John F. Fox was a tremendous and invaluable resource. So was Dee Cordry, a former special agent with the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation who has spent years researching and writing about western lawmen. Garrett Hartness, Roger Hall Lloyd, and Arthur Shoemaker all shared some of their immense knowledge about the history of Osage County. David A. Ward, a professor emeritus of sociology at the University of Minnesota, provided me with a transcript of his interview with one of the prisoners who took Tom White hostage.

  Louise Red Corn, the publisher of the Bigheart Times and an indefatigable reporter, found photographs for me and along with her husband, Raymond, was a kind host whenever I visited Osage County. Joe Conner and his wife, Carol, opened their house to me and turned it into a central place to conduct interviews. Guy Nixon spoke to me about his Osage ancestors. And Archie L. Mason, a member of the Osage Nation Congress, sent me a copy of the astonishing panoramic photograph of William Hale and the Osage.

  There is no greater gift to an author than the Dorothy and Lewis B. Cullman Center for Scholars and Writers at the New York Public Library. The Cullman fellowship allowed me essential time for research and the opportunity to plumb the library’s miraculous archives. Everyone at the center—Jean Strouse, Marie d’Origny, and Paul Delaverdac, as well as the fellows—made for a year that was productive and fun.

  The fellowship also guided me to an unexpected source. One day, Kevin Winkler, then the director of library sites and services, informed me that he knew about the Osage murders. It turned out that he was a grandson of Horace Burkhart, who was a brother of Ernest and Bryan Burkhart. Horace was considered the good brother, because he was not involved in any of the crimes. Winkler helped me to get in touch with his mother, Jean Crouch, and two of his aunts, Martha Key and Rubyane Surritte. They knew Ernest, and Key, who has sadly since died, had known Mollie as well. The three women spoke candidly about the family’s history and shared with me a video recording of Ernest that was taken shortly before he died, in which he talked about Mollie and his past.

  Several research institutions were critical to this project, and I am indebted to them and their staffs. Particularly, I want to thank David S. Ferriero, the archivist of the United States, as well as Greg Bognich, Jake Ersland, Christina Jones, Amy Reytar, Rodney Ross, Barbara Rust, and others at the National Archives; everyone at the Osage Nation Museum, including Lou Brock, Paula Farid, and the former director Kathryn Red Corn; Debbie Neece at the Bartlesville Area History Museum; Mallory Covington, Jennifer Day, Rachel Mosman, and Debra Osborne Spindle at the Oklahoma Historical Society; Sara Keckeisen at the Kansas Historical Society; Rebecca Kohl at the Montana Historical Society; Jennifer Chavez at New Mexico State University Library; Joyce Lyons, Shirley Roberts, and Mary K. Warren at the Osage County Historical Society Museum; Carol Taylor at the Hunt County Historical Commission; Carol Guilliams at the Oklahoma State Archives; Amanda Crowley at the Texas Ranger Hall of Fame and Museum; Kera Newby at the National Cowboy and Western Heritage Museum; and Kristina Southwell and Jacquelyn D. Reese at the University of Oklahoma’s Western History Collections.

  Several talented researchers assisted me in locating documents in distant corners of the country: Rachel Craig, Ralph Elder, Jessica Loudis, and Amanda Waldroupe. I can never thank enough Susan Lee, an extraordinarily gifted journalist who was indispensable to this project, helping me to ferret out records and devoting hours to fact-checking.

  Aaron Tomlinson took exquisite photographs of Osage County and was a wonderful traveling companion. Warren Cohen, Elon Green, and David Greenberg are great journalists and even greater friends who provided wisdom and support throughout the process. And my friend Stephen Metcalf, who is one of the smartest writers, never tired of helping me to think through elements of the book.

  At The New Yorker, I’m blessed to be able to draw on the advice of so many people brighter than I am, including Henry Finder, Dorothy Wickenden, Leo Carey, Virginia Cannon, Ann Goldstein, and Mary Norris. Eric Lach was a relentless fact-checker and provided keen editorial suggestions. I asked far too much of Burkhard Bilger, Tad Friend, Raffi Khatchadourian, Larissa MacFarquhar, Nick Paumgarten, and Elizabeth Pearson-Griffiths. They pored over portions of the manuscript, and in some cases all of it, and helped me to see it more clearly. Daniel Zalewski has taught me more about writing than anyone, and he spread his magical dust over the manuscript. And David Remnick has been a champion since the day I arrived at The New Yorker, enabling me to pursue my passions and develop as a writer.

  To call Kathy Robbins and David Halpern, at the Robbins Office, and Matthew Snyder, at CAA, the best agents would not do them justice. They are so much more than that: they are allies, confidants, and friends.

  As an author, I have found the perfect home at Doubleday. This book would not have been possible without my brilliant editor and publisher, Bill Thomas. He is the one who first encouraged me to pursue this subject, who guided me through the highs and lows, and who has edited and published this book with grace and wisdom. Nor would this book have been possible without the unfailing support of Sonny Mehta, the chairman of the Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group. Nor would it have been possible without the remarkable team at Doubleday, including Todd Doughty, Suzanne Herz, John Fontana, Maria Carella, Lorraine Hyland, Maria Massey, Rose Courteau, and Margo Shickmanter.

  My family has been the greatest blessing of all. John and Nina Darnton, my in-laws, read the manuscript not once, but twice, and gave me the courage to keep going. My sister, Alison, and my brother, Edward, have been an unbreakable ballast. So have my mother, Phyllis, who offered the kinds of perfect touches to the manuscript that only she can, and my father, Victor, who has always encouraged me; my only wish is that he were well enough to read
this book now that it is done.

  Finally, there are those for whom my gratitude goes deeper than words can express: my children, Zachary and Ella, who have filled my house with the madness of pets and the beauty of music and the joyfulness of life, and my wife, Kyra, who has been my best reader, my greatest friend, and my eternal love.

  A NOTE ON THE SOURCES

  This book is based extensively on primary and unpublished materials. They include thousands of pages of FBI files, secret grand jury testimony, court transcripts, informants’ statements, logs from private eyes, pardon and parole records, private correspondence, an unpublished manuscript co-authored by one of the detectives, diary entries, Osage Tribal Council records, oral histories, field reports from the Bureau of Indian Affairs, congressional records, Justice Department memos and telegrams, crime scene photographs, wills and last testaments, guardian reports, and the murderers’ confessions. These materials were drawn from archives around the country. Some records were obtained through the Freedom of Information Act, while FBI documents that had been redacted by the government were provided to me, uncensored, by a former law-enforcement officer. Moreover, several private papers came directly from descendants, among them the relatives of the victims of the Reign of Terror; further information was often gleaned from my interviews with these family members.

  I also benefited from a number of contemporaneous newspaper dispatches and other published accounts. In reconstructing the history of the Osage, I would have been lost without the seminal works of two Osage writers: the historian Louis F. Burns and the prose poet John Joseph Mathews. In addition, I was greatly aided by the research of Terry Wilson, a former professor of Native American studies at the University of California, Berkeley, and Garrick Bailey, a leading anthropologist of the Osage.

  The writers Dennis McAuliffe, Lawrence Hogan, Dee Cordry, and the late Fred Grove had conducted their own research into the Osage murders, and their work was enormously helpful. So was Verdon R. Adams’s short biography Tom White: The Life of a Lawman. Finally, in detailing the history of J. Edgar Hoover and the formation of the FBI, I drew on several excellent books, particularly Curt Gentry’s J. Edgar Hoover, Sanford Ungar’s FBI, Richard Gid Powers’s Secrecy and Power, and Bryan Burrough’s Public Enemies.

  In the bibliography, I have delineated these and other important sources. If I was especially indebted to one, I tried to cite it in the notes as well. Anything that appears in the text between quotation marks comes from a court transcript, diary, letter, or some other account. These sources are cited in the notes, except in cases where it is clear that a person is speaking directly to me.

  ARCHIVAL AND UNPUBLISHED SOURCES

  Comstock Family Papers, private collection of Homer Fincannon

  FBI Federal Bureau of Investigation declassified files on the Osage Indian Murders

  FBI/FOIA Federal Bureau of Investigation records obtained under the Freedom of Information Act

  HSP Historical Society of Pennsylvania

  KHS Kansas Historical Society

  LOC Library of Congress

  NARA-CP National Archives and Records Administration, College Park, Md.

  Record Group 48, Records of the Office of the Secretary of the Interior

  Record Group 60, Records of the Department of Justice

  Record Group 65, Records of the Federal Bureau of Investigation

  Record Group 129, Records of the Bureau of Prisons

  Record Group 204, Records of the Office of the Pardon Attorney

  NARA-DC National Archives and Records Administration, Washington, D.C.

  Records of the Center for Legislative Archives

  NARA-FW National Archives and Records Administration, Fort Worth, Tex.

  Record Group 21, Records of District Court of the United States, U.S. District Court for the Western District

  Record Group 75, Records of the Bureau of Indian Affairs, Osage Indian Agency

  Record Group 118, Records of U.S. Attorneys, Western Judicial District of Oklahoma

  NMSUL New Mexico State University Library

  Fred Grove Papers, Rio Grande Historical Collections

  OHS Oklahoma Historical Society

  ONM Osage Nation Museum

  OSARM Oklahoma State Archives and Records Management

  PPL Pawhuska Public Library

  SDSUL San Diego State University Library

  TSLAC Texas State Library and Archives Commission

  UOWHC University of Oklahoma Western History Collections

  Vaughan Family Papers, private collection of Martha and Melville Vaughan

  NOTES

  1: THE VANISHING

  In April, millions: For more information on the Osage’s notion of the flower-killing moon, see Mathews’s Talking to the Moon.

  “gods had left”: Ibid., 61.

  On May 24: My description of Anna Brown’s disappearance and the last day she visited Mollie Burkhart’s house is drawn primarily from the testimony of witnesses who were present. Many of them spoke several times to different detectives, including FBI agents and private eyes. These witnesses also often testified at a number of court proceedings. For more information, see records at NARA-CP and NARA-FW.

  “peculiar wasting illness”: Quoted in Franks, Osage Oil Boom, 117.

  “Lo and behold”: Sherman Rogers, “Red Men in Gas Buggies,” Outlook, Aug. 22, 1923.

  “plutocratic Osage”: Estelle Aubrey Brown, “Our Plutocratic Osage Indians,” Travel, Oct. 1922.

  “red millionaires”: William G. Shepherd, “Lo, the Rich Indian!,” Harper’s Monthly, Nov. 1920.

  “une très jolie”: Brown, “Our Plutocratic Osage Indians.”

  “circle of expensive”: Elmer T. Peterson, “Miracle of Oil,” Independent (N.Y.), April 26, 1924.

  “outrivals the ability”: Quoted in Harmon, Rich Indians, 140.

  “That lament”: Ibid., 179.

  “even whites”: Brown, “Our Plutocratic Osage Indians.”

  “He was not the kind”: Oklahoma City Times, Oct. 26, 1959.

  Ernest’s brothers, Bryan: His birth name was Byron, but he went by Bryan. To avoid any confusion, I have simply used Bryan throughout the text.

  “All the forces”: Statement by H. S. Traylor, U.S. House Subcommittee on Indian Affairs, Indians of the United States: Investigation of the Field Service, 202.

  “very loose morals”: Report by Tom Weiss and John Burger, Jan. 10, 1924, FBI.

  “She was drinking”: Grand jury testimony of Martha Doughty, NARA-FW.

  “Do you know”: Grand jury testimony of Anna Sitterly, NARA-FW.

  “I thought the rain”: Ibid.

  Fueling the unease: Information concerning Whitehorn’s disappearance is drawn largely from local newspapers and from private detectives and FBI reports at the National Archives.

  Genial and witty: It should be noted that one newspaper account says that Whitehorn’s wife was part Cherokee. However, the FBI files refer to her as part Cheyenne.

  “popular among”: Pawhuska Daily Capital, May 30, 1921.

  “Oh Papa”: Quotations from the hunters come from their grand jury testimony, NARA-FW.

  “The body was”: Report by Weiss and Burger, Jan. 10, 1924, FBI.

  “It was as black”: Grand jury testimony of F. S. Turton, NARA-FW.

  “That is sure”: Grand jury testimony of Andy Smith, NARA-FW.

  2: AN ACT OF GOD OR MAN?

  A coroner’s inquest: My descriptions of the inquest were drawn primarily from eyewitness testimony, including that of the Shoun brothers. For more information, see records at NARA-CP and NARA-FW.

  “not faintly”: Quoted in A. L. Sainer, Law Is Justice: Notable Opinions of Mr. Justice Cardozo (New York: Ad Press, 1938), 209.

  “A medical man”: Quoted in Wagner, Science of Sherlock Holmes, 8.

  “She’s been shot”: Grand jury testimony of Andy Smith, NARA-FW.

  “An officer was”: Quoted in Cordry, Alive If Possible—Dead If Nec
essary, 238.

  “terror to evil”: Thoburn, Standard History of Oklahoma, 1833.

  “I had the assurance”: Grand jury testimony of Roy Sherrill, NARA-FW.

  “religion, law enforcement”: Shawnee News, May 11, 1911.

  “The brains”: Grand jury testimony of David Shoun, NARA-FW.

  “keep up the old”: Quoted in Wilson, “Osage Indian Women During a Century of Change,” 188.

  Mollie relied: My description of the funeral is drawn primarily from statements by witnesses, including the undertaker, and from my interviews with descendants.

  “devotion to his”: A. F. Moss to M. E. Trapp, Nov. 18, 1926, OSARM.

  “It was getting”: Statement by A. T. Woodward, U.S. House Committee on Indian Affairs, Modifying Osage Fund Restrictions, 103.

  The funeral: The Osage used to leave their dead aboveground, in cairns. When an Osage chief was buried underground, in the late nineteenth century, his wife said, “I said it will be alright if we paint face of my husband; if we wrap blanket around my husband. He wanted to be buried in white man’s grave. I said it will be all right. I said we will paint face of my husband and he will not be lost in heaven of Indian.”

  “It filled my little”: From introduction to Mathews, Osages.

  3: KING OF THE OSAGE HILLS