Alcatraz: A Definitive History of the Penitentiary Years

by Michael Esslinger

  Hamilton was the first to climb through the window, and he managed to maintain a grip on the remaining security bars while the other inmates passed out a wooden filling guide to be used as a ramp from the window to the barbed wired security fencing. After maneuvering the makeshift plank properly into place, Hamilton was passed a large rolled section of canvas to drape over the barbed-wired fencing. Boarman and Brest now stripped to their underwear and belts (which they planned to secure to the canisters to keep them afloat) and smeared their bodies with engine grease as insulation.

  Boarman and Brest attempted to maneuver the float canisters through the window without success, so they were forced to leave them behind, along with the clothing they contained. One by one, the men climbed through the window, negotiated the wire fencing, and then hurried down to the rocky shore. Hunter had injured himself when dropping from the fence and he took refuge in a small island cave that was recessed under the industry buildings. The cave was dark and littered with discarded tires, and was flooded with varying levels of seawater depending on the tide levels. Boarman, Brest, and Hamilton each started their swim to freedom, partially obscured by the breaking fog.

  Meanwhile Officer Weinhold had succeeded in loosening his gag, and started yelling for help, but due to the noise of the loud machinery in the Industries, his cries went unheard. At about the same time, Officer Frank L. Johnson, who was assigned to the tower atop the Model Shop, was attempting to reach Smith and had already contacted Cliff Fish in the Armory. Fish, who was just being relieved from duty, responded to the Industries to investigate the problem, accompanied by Phil Bergen and Earl Long. Officer Johnson stepped outside of the tower booth, and immediately spotted several figures in the water, swimming away from the island. Smith, while unable to undo his gag, was able to move his body against Weinhold, who then managed to maneuver Smith’s whistle into his mouth. Weinhold started frantically blowing the shrill whistle, which was clearly audible from Johnson’s post.

  Lifting his rifle, Johnson strained to peer into the target site as several faint figures continued to advance away from the island in the foggy seascape. Watching the figures move in rhythm with the sea, he drew his grip tight, and squeezed the trigger until the pressure of the spring gave way to a ragging shot. He repeated the process, sighting each moving figure, then firing his Springfield .30-06. Each round released a caustic smell of burnt gunpowder mixed with the misty salt air. Brest and Boarman saw the geyser-like splash patterns in the water around them, accompanied by the distant sharp cracking sound of a high-powered rifle. After each round was fired, silence would drape the water until the next blast racked the air. As Brest and Boarman swam almost side-by-side a few hundred yards from shore, the sounds of Boarman’s thrashing suddenly stopped. As Brest reached out to examine the now silent form of his fellow inmate, the water surrounding them started to turn an eerie red.

  Boarman’s eyes were open, but glazed over by the seawater as Brest tried to maintain his grip on his accomplice’s limp body. Boarman was bleeding profusely from what appeared to be a bullet wound behind his left ear. The Prison Launch McDowell pulled alongside the two inmates, with Officer Sutter aiming his muzzle at Brest’s head. Brest struggled to hang on to Boarman’s belt, but as the officers attempted to latch it with a boat hook, the belt broke, and Boarman slowly disappeared into the green murky depths. Brest was pulled into the launch and wrapped in blankets, then returned to the island. He was immediately taken to the prison hospital and examined. He had sustained only a minor bullet wound to his elbow.

  “Little Alcatraz” is seen just beyond the buoy.

  Hamilton had been able to swim to “Little Alcatraz” using the large wood plank as a float, but when he heard the bullets whizzing past his head he tried to keep himself submerged for as long as he could hold his breath. He apparently clung to the small rocks of “Little Alcatraz,” and then swam back towards the island, lifting his head out of the water only long enough to take a deep breath. Hamilton made his way back into the island cave where Hunter was hiding. Warden Johnston had already assembled a team of three officers to explore the rocky shoreline in an attempt to locate the stranded inmates. Associate Warden Ed Miller walked the island perimeter, while a boat with a powerful spotlight covered the officers from the water. Standing near the mouth of the cave, Miller noticed a blood smear on one of the rocks. He yelled into the small cavern, demanding that any hiding inmates surrender or be fired upon. When he received no response, he decided to fire a round from his colt .45 pistol into the dark void. Fred Hunter, who was hiding behind some tires and nearly neck deep in water, immediately raised his arms to surrender. Unknown to Miller, Hamilton was still in hiding under several tires.

  Officer Johnson had reported back to the Warden that he had fired upon at least three inmates and that Hamilton had probably met his death, as Boarman had. The prison launch patrolled the waters around the island for hours, but when there was no sign of Hamilton, Johnston started to feel confident that the inmate had perished in the downpour of gunfire alongside his accomplice. He was so convinced of this that he released a statement to the press reading in part: “Hamilton is dead. He was shot, and we saw him go under.”

  Hamilton would remain in hiding until April 16th barricaded far back into the cave area. After several days in hiding and many close calls where he was nearly discovered by officers searching inside the cave entrance, freezing and hungry, he decided to seek shelter in the old Electric Shop. Captain Weinhold, who had returned to reexamine the scene of the escape, found Hamilton curled in a fetal position, weak from hunger and exposure. He was admitted to the prison hospital and treated for a multitude of injuries. Hamilton was then moved into the D Block segregation unit, and would remain there until September 1, 1945. Hunter would be released back into general prison population on January 22, 1945. Brest remained in D Block segregation until May 21, 1944.

  A letter to the Warden from Harold Brest, asking that he be transferred from Alcatraz.

  Hamilton was released from Alcatraz in August of 1952, and was sent back to Leavenworth. He was eventually set free, and returned to Dallas on July 2, 1958. While at Leavenworth, he had enrolled in Otto Lang’s religious training program, designed to help participants become mentors for other inmates. Following his release he started an organization named ConAid, which was eventually credited with assisting over 1,200 inmates. On December 23, 1966, Hamilton received a full Presidential Pardon from Texas native President Lyndon B. Johnson. Hamilton died of natural causes in 1984, at his home in Dallas, Texas. During a lecture he gave on the anniversary of his Alcatraz escape in 1961, when asked what he had learned from his escapades in crime, he stated simply: ...“Happiness comes from within; not from without. Crime always leads to prison, and prison is a void of living bodies in a state of death. Lucky for me, Alcatraz became my birth place and not my grave.”

  A closing note on the jacket of Boarman’s inmate file.

  ESCAPE ATTEMPT #8

  Date:

  August 7, 1943

  Inmates:

  Huron Ted Walters

  Location:

  Prison Laundry

  In August of 1943, Alcatraz was suffering from personnel shortages as a result of the War efforts. The prison industries were overwhelmed with the sheer volume of military clothing being delivered for laundering, and there were barely enough officers to cover the critical posts. Many of the officers assigned to the industries were required to alternate their rounds, sometimes leaving certain posts unattended for brief periods. These circumstances would be contributing factors in a Saturday morning escape attempt by Huron Ted Walters.

  Huron Ted Walters

  Huron Ted Walters (known to many as “Terrible Ted”) was a habitual criminal and former crime partner of Floyd Hamilton, another Alcatraz inmate. Born on October 25, 1913 in Wylie, Texas, Walters was the youngest of three children. His father died when he was only two years old, and his mother remarried two years later with a gentleman employed a
s a machinist. Ted’s home life was considered fairly normal, and at seventeen years of age he left his parents’ forty-acre ranch to pursue a career as a truck driver. He immediately began getting involved in criminal activities, and was soon arrested for stealing automobiles. In 1936, after being sentenced to serve time for auto theft, he successfully escaped from a Texas jail, and continued his criminal escapades.

  Walters, Floyd Hamilton, and another accomplice named Jack Winn were involved in a series of robberies with targets ranging from banks, stores and beer taverns; to a Coca-Cola Bottling Company plant. Their crimes spanned several states, and involved several police chases, as well as other dire scenarios. On August 13, 1938, the day following the Coca-Cola Bottling Company robbery, the trio held up a salesman near Weldon, Arkansas, and stole his 1938 green Plymouth Sedan. They were spotted near DeQueen, Arkansas, and after an intense gun battle with Arkansas State Highway Patrolmen, they disappeared into the remote woods on foot. Both men were captured eight days later in Dallas, Texas, when Winn who had been arrested several days earlier, identified his accomplices to the police. Walters had suffered a minor gunshot wound to his right thigh, and Hamilton was also found to have sustained injuries.

  On November 3, 1938, both men were sentenced to thirty years in prison for their crimes. When Walters was later questioned by FBI Agents he would be quoted as saying that his only regret was that he had not killed a few of the officers before being apprehended. Walters and Hamilton were both sent to the Federal Penitentiary in Leavenworth, Kansas on November 5, 1938. Ever-true to their chosen lifestyle, they would remain outlaws within the prison walls. Associate Warden C. J. Shuttleworth, who had formerly held the same position at Alcatraz, documented an escape plot that would earn the two inmates a cross-country train ride to Alcatraz. He wrote in Walter’s conduct record:

  Information has come to my attention that this inmate, together with Floyd Hamilton, and inmate Reed were planning and plotting an escape from the institution by concealing themselves in an institutional sawdust truck driven by Lee Barker, No. 53385-L, a confessed conspirator with Steffler and Miles in a similar plot. While definite information is meager, regarding this particular conspiracy, it was upon this same information that the plot was of Steffler and Miles were finally discovered. The plot had also included the fabrication of homemade shotguns, shells, and sixteen bombs that were to be made in the prison factories. An inmate not connected with the plot furnished the information. In talking with Hamilton relative to this plot, Hamilton admits that Reed and Walters were his only trusted associates in the institution. Further, early in December, Walters was observed at about 3:30 PM sitting outside the Shoe Factory, “casing” the East Gate and the general truck shakedown. This at a time when he was supposed to have been at his work in the Clothing Factory. This inmate has a long dangerous record, and is one of the most vicious criminals in the Southwest, and co-partner of Hamilton’s. In view of his long sentence and the actually known conspiracies of his co-partner Hamilton, it is recommended that he be transferred to Alcatraz for safer custody.

  Walter and Hamilton arrived at Alcatraz on June 9, 1940. Here too, both men continued to receive negative conduct reports for numerous infringements of prison regulations. On April 14, 1943, as described in the preceding chapter, Hamilton and fellow inmates James Boarman, Harold Brest and Fred Hunter participated in a failed escape that would cost Boarman his life.

  On August 7, 1943, only months after Hamilton’s luckless escape attempt, Walters decided to try his fate against the Rock. He had been assigned to the laundry for nearly two years and in the spirit of Hamilton’s escape, he had been collecting military clothing stuffed in one-gallon containers, which he would attempt to use as floats. Even though the concept had been tried unsuccessfully on three previous attempts, it still seemed to be the most promising scheme. Walters had also been able to acquire $42, which he stuffed into one of the pant pockets for use once he made it to shore.

  On the day of the escape, sometime between 2:15 p.m. and 3:45 p.m., Walters quietly slipped away from sight. Because of staffing shortages, the number of officers posted in the Industries Building had been reduced. Clutching his two one-gallon containers and with no officer in direct view, Walters carefully made his way to the fence line. He had also acquired a pair of electrician’s wire cutters, which he intended to use to cut through the heavy security fencing. But no matter how hard he squeezed the small handles against the stiff galvanized wire, the cutters proved completely ineffective. Keeping a close eye on the towers, he carefully stacked some packing crates next to the perimeter fence, and then risked scaling it in view of the tower guards, who failed to spot the escapee. As he maneuvered over the skin-piercing barbed wire at the top, he lost his grip and fell. The fall proved to be treacherous and resulted in a serious back injury. In acute pain, Walters descended the steps that led to the water’s edge, and then contemplated his swim to the mainland.

  Inside the laundry building, a supervisor making his rounds noticed Walters was absent from his workstation and immediately contacted the Armory. The alarm was quickly sounded, as Walters stood by the water’s edge, now stripped to his underwear and facing the reality that his plan had failed. A Coast Guard cutter was quickly dispatched and found Walters standing stripped down on the bank. Captain of the Guards Henry Weinhold and Associate Warden E.J. Miller captured Walters without any resistance, and brought him to the hospital to be examined. Walters spent nearly ten days in the hospital before being taken to D Block.

  In a letter from Bureau of Prisons Director James V. Bennett to Warden Johnston dated August 12, 1943, it is clear that Bennett was unsatisfied with the performance of the officers. He also firmly made the point that Walters should have been spotted by the tower officers when he was climbing the fences. A telegram to Warden Johnston read:

  Have asked Captain Conner to check on the Ted Walters escape and confer with you as to what action if any should be taken with respect to the officers since I cannot understand how Walters could have climbed the fence in plain daylight without being noticed by tower offices unless they were inattentive to their duties in which case disciplinary action should be taken. Captain Conner will arrive August Sixteenth.

  After being released from the hospital, Walters was tried by a specially assembled disciplinary board. The following is a transcript from his hearing:

  In accordance with the regulations of the Bureau of Prisons governing the forfeiture of GOOD TIME, a special court was appointed by the Warden for the purpose of trying Huron Ted Walters, Reg. No. 536-AZ, and for his misconduct, specifically:

  Leaving place to which he was assigned in laundry, dropping from walk-way to get out of sight of road tower guard, carrying wire cutter and soldier clothing stolen from laundry, climbing over two wire fences, then hiding out at water’s edge in attempt to escape: All of the above occurred at about 2:15 P.M. to 3:45 P.M., on Saturday, August 7, 1943.

  The board met at approximately 10:40 a.m., Tuesday, August 17, 1943, and consisted of the following members:

  E.J. Miller, Associate Warden Chairman

  Isaac B. Faulk, Lieutenant Member

  Neal W. Mcrisson, Lieutenant Member

  Dr. Romney M. Ritchey, Chief Medical Officer Consultant

  The following transcript of the testimony, questions by E.J. Miller, Associate Warden and Chairman, except, where noted:

  Huron Ted Walters, Register No. 536-Az, you are called before the GOOD TIME BOARD to try you for the credits for the things done by you on August 7, 1943. (Mr. Miller then read the charges above.)

  Q: You heard the charges. How do you plead?

  A: Guilty.

  Q: Have you anything to say?

  A: No, sir.

  Q: Did you get the soldier’s clothing out of the laundry?

  A: Yes, sir.

  Q: Where did you get the wire cutters?

  A: I picked them up down there.

  Q: Did you try to cut the wire with them?

  A
: Yes, sir.

  Q: Wouldn’t they work?

  A: No, sir.

  Q: You then climbed over both fences?

  A: Yes, sir.

  Q: Where did you get the one-gallon buckets?

  A: Out of the laundry.

  Q: Did you have any money on you?

  A: No, sir.

  Q: Did anyone give you money?

  A: No, sir.

  Q: Did you use any boxes?

  A: There was a couple of packing cases that I used to climb over the first fence.

  Q: What did you use on the second fence?

  A: I climbed up the wire by the gate.

  Q: When you got over the fences where did you go?

  A: Down the steps to the bank.

  Q: Did you try the water?

  A: Yes, sir.

  Q: What was the reason you didn’t go in?

  A: I hurt my back and figured I couldn’t make it.

  Q: How did you hurt your back?

  A: I fell off the fence.

  Q: How long did you plan the escape?

  A: Two or three days previous.

  Q: Do you wish to say anything for yourself?

  A: No, sir.

  Mr. Miller: After question you, Walters, I recommend that you forfeit 3100 days Statutory Good Time.

  Walter was immediately brought to D Block and placed into the strip-cell, where he remained until August 28, 1943, when he was placed in segregation. He would again be placed in an isolation cell in May of 1944, after officers found a six-inch hacksaw blade hidden beneath the linoleum flooring of his D-Block cell (#23). He would ultimately remain in segregation until May 10, 1945, and then as surprising as it may seem, he was released back into the general population and given a work assignment back in the prison laundry.