Friday, April 29, 2016

OUTLAW TO LAWMAN, LAWMAN TO OUTLAW - HENRY NEWTON BROWN

4/30/1884 - Tales many times told, the saga of the opening of the American West is rife with stories of outlaws becoming lawmen, and lawmen becoming outlaws, but only one in which an outlaw becomes a highly successful lawman, but then goes back to his bandit ways, with disastrous results ... a story that is the actual life of Henry Newton Brown.
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Brown

Born in Phelps County, Missouri in 1857, Brown is orphaned at a young age, and with his sister, grows up near the town of Rollo, on the farm of his Uncle Jasper and Aunt Aldamira ... and like many boys of the period, decides to head west to make his fortune when he turns 17.  Landing in eastern Colorado, Brown becomes a cowboy, spends a season hunting buffalo, and eventually drifts south into the panhandle of Texas.  Cowboying there, he gets into a beef with another man that Brown ends by putting three bullets in his opponent's chest.  Not waiting for murder charges to be filed, he flees to New Mexico ... and is soon up to his eyeballs in what will come to be known as The Lincoln County War.
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Cowboying!

In 1876, Brown begins working as a cowboy and rustler for L. G. Murphy & Co., an organization that is called "The House," is based in the town of Lincoln, and controls much of the state.  At least that is the side he is on before he quits over believing he has been shorted wages, and joins up with the group opposing "The House," the "Tunstall-McSween Faction" that includes local rancher John Chisum.  Sent by Chisum to help his friend John Tunstall work his ranch, and serve as a bodyguard if need be, Brown just misses the assassination of his new boss, but has his gun out and firing as a Lincoln County Regulator (along with his pal, William H. Bonney, aka, Billy the Kid) for the murders of Lincoln County Sheriff William Brady and Deputy George Hindman, the Blazer's Mill gunfight with Buckshot Roberts in which Roberts, and Regulator leader Dick Brewer, are killed, and the five day gunfight that becomes known as The Battle of Lincoln in which seven men are killed and over a dozen wounded.  On a direct path to becoming a victim himself of the conflict, Brown is granted a reprieve when he leaves New Mexico (with fellow Regulators, Billy the Kid, Tom O'Folliard, Fred Waite, and John Middleton), taking a herd of rustled horses to Tascosa, Texas, and decides not to return (two murder indictments await back in New Mexico).
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Tunstall's Murder
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Billy The Kid
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Blazer's Mill

Lincoln, New Mexico

Cowboying for George Littlefield in Texas, Brown does such a good job hunting down rustlers (an occupation he has just retired from) that he is soon hired as the deputy sheriff of Oldham County ... and then let go when he is too agressive in dealing with the region's miscreants (there are many busted skulls) ... so its back to Littlefield's ranch ... who soon gives Brown his walking papers too for the same reason.  His next job is working for Barney O'Connor, the foreman of a ranch in Woods County, Oklahoma.  It is there that he hears the city marshal of nearby Caldwell, Kansas, 28-year-old George Brown (no relation), has been killed trying to disarm three cowboys, so he rides into town, finds the mayor, and applies for the job ... the only party seemingly interested in trying to bring law and order to the wild area, and is instantly hired (with the classic line, "It's your funeral").

Caldwell - 1880s

A wild town like Abilene, Dodge City (the Chisholm trail meets the tracks of the Santa Fe railroad at Caldwell), and Tombstone, Brown hires a outlaw friend from Texas named Ben Robertson (while in Caldwell he will use the alias, Ben Wheeler) to be his deputy, and in almost no time at all, with a couple of shooting here (Brown kills a drunken Indian causing trouble named Spotted Horse, and when the man draws on him instead of giving up his weapon, fatally holes gambler Newt Boyce) and a few beatings there (Brown is a smallish man and leaves the fisticuffs to Robertson), peace descends on the community ... and the town loves it (in 1882 the town will give Brown a special engraved Winchester rifle with a silver medallion on the stock that reads, "Presented to City Marshal H. N. Brown For Valuable Service rendered on behalf of the Citizens of Caldwell Kas A. N. Colson Mayor Dec 1882).  And loves Brown too when it discovers its tough marshal is a regular attendee of the local Methodist Church that doesn't smoke, gamble, drink, swear, or chew tobacco ... traits that allow Brown to woe and then marry the daughter of a wealthy local brick maker, 22-year-old school teacher Alice Maude Levagood (rich, good looking, and the possessor of a college degree, a rarity for women of the period).

Brown & Robertson

The Browns

A dream job, either because he needs extra cash to start a family (he has recently bought a house for his new bride) or hang with the wealthier members of town, or just loves and misses the adrenaline rush of his criminal days, Brown pisses everything away in April of 1884.  Telling the mayor that they need to leave town to travel into Indian Territory to track down a murderer, Brown and Robertson leave town and meet up with two Cherokee Strip bandits named William Smith and John Wesley, and then head for the Kansas town of Medicine Lodge (a short 70 miles or so from Caldwell), where they intend to rob the Medicine Valley bank in what should be a quick and easy holdup.

Brown

Arriving in town as a spring rainstorm turns the streets to mud on a Wednesday morning, the men rein up at a coal shed behind the bank and take up their positions for the robbery ... Smith watches the horses, Robertson and Wesley enter the bank through a side door, and with his prize Winchester at the ready, Brown walks through the front door ... and the job instantly goes wrong.  No customers inside, Brown tells cashier George Geppert and bank President E. W. Payne to throw up their hands.  Geppert complies, but Payne doesn't and reaches for a pistol ... the wrong move, Brown mortally wounds the banker with a bullet through the man's shoulder.  Wrong moves contagious, Geppert reacts to the death of his boss by slamming the door to the bank's vault shut and engaging the combination lock ... which gets him fatally shot too by both Robertson and Wesley!  Money out of reach in the closed vault, two dead at their feet, citizens beginning to react to the robbery (one is O'Connor, the man Brown had worked for before moving on to Caldwell), the gunmen mount their horses and gallop south out of town ... with a posse right on their tail.

Robbery - By Bob Boze Bell

Right across from the bank, ten cowboys waiting out the storm in a livery stable before joining a cattle roundup, change plans for their day when they hear gunfire and see the outlaws riding down Kansas Avenue, and become an instant posse.  Exchanging lead on horseback, the outlaws ride for the fresh mounts they have stashed in a canyon in the Gypsum Hills, but turn into the wrong canyon and trap themselves in a dead end only 40 to 30 feet deep.  Making a stand there, the bandits put up a fight for two hours, but then cold and wet and almost out of ammo, the foursome surrenders ... and the citizens of Medicine Lodge discover they know all four of the desperadoes.

Some Of The Posse

Locale Of The Wrong Canyon

Brought back to Medicine Lodge as citizens line the streets yelling "HANG THEM" (it doesn't help matters either that in the escape from town, one of the bandits has shot dead a dog that was barking as the killers rode by), the four are served a meal in a local cafe, then are secured with one set of leg irons and one pair of handcuffs in a guarded log cabin.  When it stops raining, they are brought outside and posed for a postcard.  That done, they are given another meal and when returned to the cabin, given paper to write down any last words (Brown writes his wife, asking forgiveness and that she keep his prized Winchester, says goodbye ... and lies in telling Alice he didn't shoot anyone) ... then they wait for what all the men know is coming (and in the case of Brown and Robertson, prepare to escape, slipping out of the leg irons which have been improperly placed around the men's boots).

Posed - L to R - Wesley, Brown, Smith, and Robertson

At 9:00 in the evening, three shots ring out ... the signal for all revenge-minded citizens to meet at the cabin ... it is Lynch Party time.  Waiting to run, as soon as the door to the cabin opens, Brown bursts out and runs down the street, closely followed by Robertson ... the pair doesn't get very far.  In a miracle, though shot at at point blank range, Brown makes it through the crowd, only slightly wounded and makes for an open alley ... before he reaches it though, local farmer Billy Kelley unloads both barrels of his shotgun at the outlaw from only feet away, almost tearing Brown in two.  Behind Brown, Wheeler is hit by bullets fired at such close range that his vest catches on fire ... a bullet rips off two fingers on his left hand, a rifle round shatters his right arm, and yet the man makes it another 100 yards down the street before even more hits finally fell him.  Incredibly still alive, the mob grabs Robertson and he is taken to a nearby creek bed where a tough Elm tree awaits his, and the necks of Wesley and Smith. Asked if they have any last words, Robertson fruitless pleads for his life, Wesley requests his mother in Texas not be told of his fate, and Smith asks that his saddle be sold and the money sent to his mother, also in Texas. Goodbyes said, the three men are then hung from the Elm tree ... with Smith and Wesley sharing the same rope.  
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The End Of Brown & Robertson By Bob Boze Bell

After, a public auction is held for the belongings of the outlaws ... Smith's saddle goes for $10, but the others net $25 each, Wesley's grey horse nets $120 and Smith's mount reaps $123.50.  Widowed only as month into her marriage, Alice will teach school in Devil's Lake, North Dakota, before becoming a nurse and superintendent of an asylum in Franfort, Indiana.  In the short story she writes about her life, her only mention of Brown is that she married him in 1884, and that he "... passed away years ago."  At the time of his death, Brown is 27-years-old.

Thursday, April 28, 2016

THE PORT ARTHUR MASSACRE

4/28/1996 - Sadly, the fatal formula ... a bonkers individual + a deadly weapon = mayhem ... is proved to be true again, and international, as a demented 28-year-old named Martin John Bryant, shoots up Port Arthur, Tasmania, Australia, in the third-deadliest lone gunman rampage in criminal history (so far!).
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Sometimes It Doesn't Take A Shrink To Know!
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Before - 26 Months

Born in Hobart, Tasmania in 1967, there are many early signs that Bryant isn't playing with a full deck ... toys are constantly smashed to pieces, his own mother calls him "annoying" and "difficult," a child psychologist predicts he will never be able to hold down a job because he is constantly aggravating people, he pulls the snorkel out of a boy's mouth while diving, cuts down a neighbor's tree that he thinks is a bother, is described by his teachers as being distant from reality and disruptive in class, violently bullies and teases younger children, and tortures small animals when given the opportunity. Assessed by a psychiatrist as having the mind of an 11-year-old and an IQ of only 66, Bryant receives a disability pension because as the doctor states, "Cannot read or write.  Does a bit of gardening and watches TV ... Only his parents' efforts prevent further deterioration.  Could be schizophrenic and parents face a bleak future with him."  Indeed!
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Martin And His Mom
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The Menace Years Begin!

Making things worse, in 1987, while looking for new customers for the lawn mowing service he is allowed to run, 19-year-old Bryant hooks up with 54-year-old Tattersall's lottery fortune heiress and recluse, Helen Mary Elizabeth Harvey ... a nut herself, with fourteen dogs living in her mansion and forty cats residing in the garage.  Starting with odd jobs about the house, Bryant is soon a regular at Harvey's estate, and takes up residence there later in the year (and his father gets the contract to clean up the mansion when authorities crack down on the place being a health hazard).  As a "couple," in three years they buy over thirty new cars, shop and lunch almost every day, get in three car crashes (each caused by Bryant grabbing the steering wheel for "fun" ... Harvey tells friends that Bryant car antics are the reason she never drives over 60 mph), and buy a farm outside of Copping, Tasmania (while there, Bryant shows his madness has not abated ... he fires an air gun at folks that stop at a stall on the highway to buy freshly picked apples, and late at night, he wanders about on neighbors' properties, shooting at dogs when they bark at him ... people in the area that get to know him, give him a wide berth at all times).  For the most part out of everyone's hair on the farm, things change for the worse when, with Bryant in the car and Harvey at the wheel (the car also contains three dogs, two of which won't survive the day), driving on a straight road with good visibility on a late October afternoon, the pair veer across a road in their Mazada 121 and get into a head-on collison a Ford sedan that kills Harvey (her neck is broken in the crash), and sends Bryant to the hospital for seven months with neck and back injuries (police briefly investigate, but don't place any blame for the accident on Bryant).
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Martin, Father Maurice, And Sister Lindy

Whatever the cause, named sole beneficiary (with his father the document's trustee) in Harvey's will, Martin inherits a fortune with his lady friend's death ... with his dad appointed trustee to make sure the money is spent properly.  Making sure that is until in 1993, when Maurice Bryant goes to do some work on his son's Copping farm, and vanishes, apparently leaving behind a note pinned to the front door that just says, "CALL THE POLICE!"  Police called, two days later Bryant's father's body is found submerged in a dammed area behind the farmhouse with his diving weights wrapped around his neck, and eighteen 30mg doses of the anti-depressant drug Serepax missing from a strip of the medications. The death is ruled a suicide.  Whether it is that, or the younger Bryant removing his father to get at his assets, the death leaves the nutcase with no one to keep him in check and he starts manifesting the madness in his mind by wearing outlandish outfits (many notice him in an electric blue suit with flared trousers, a ruffled shirt, a Panama hat, and lizard skin shoes, carrying a fine leather briefcase ... and laugh!), traveling excessively (hating the countries, but enjoying the flights there and back, he goes overseas fourteen times, visiting Europe six times, the United States three times, southeast Asia three times, New Zealand once, and Japan once, takes one trip entirely around the world, and regularly jets up to Melbourne to visit the city's zoo), becoming a drunk (by the time of the massacre, he is drinking half a bottle of Sambuca, a bottle of Bailey's Irish Cream, port wine, and other sweet alcoholic liquors daily), and buying a large arsenal of weapons and ammunition. Growing worse daily, he also builds up a hatred of the Martin Family of Port Arthur, David and Noelene, believing their buying of a bed-and-breakfast property known as "The Seascape" that Maurice Byrant also wanted, drove his father to suicide. 
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The Seascape

Everything boils over on 4/28/1996.  Prepared for his day, Bryant leaves his home at 9:47 in the morning, hits the road, and is in Port Arthur by 11:00 ... his first stop is dealing with the Martins at The Seascape (both are stabbed and shot).  Martins murdered, Bryant then drives into town and has lunch on the deck at the Broad Arrow Cafe at the historic Port Arthur site (where prisoners from Europe were unloaded).  Meal done, he goes inside the cafe and returns his tray, holding the door for several people leaving the building, and then pulls a Colt AR-15 SP1 Carbine with Colt scope and a 30-round magazine from the bag he is carrying and goes to work again.  Pop ... pop ... pop ... pop ... pop, in approximately two minutes time, Bryant walks about the diner and attached souvenir store firing at tourists and locals enjoying a meal, waiting on tour buses, or with tickets for the next ferry ride ... twenty-nine rounds that kill 18 people and wound another 12.  Women, children, men, teenagers, seniors, black or white, locals or visitors from other countries, it doesn't matter (several men are killed placing themselves between Bryant and family members) ... on this day, the wrong place at the wrong time is all that counts.
Martin Bryant
Bryant
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AR-15

The Broad Arrow Cafe Crime Scene
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Parking Lot Area (Cafe Is In Background)

Helicopter Ride For One Of The Wounded

Reloading, Bryant then goes outside and starts firing at people in the parking lot (in the slaughter that takes place outside, he changes weapons and begins shooting people with a FN FAL semi-automatic rifle) ... new carnage that kills four more people and wounds five others.  Done with the harbor tourist area, Bryant then gets in his car and drives away in search of more deaths ... which he quickly instigates.  Seeing Nanette Mikac and her two young daughters, Madeline (3) and Alannah (6), fleeing down the road and 300 yards away from the scene, Bryant slows down and approaches them as if offering the help of a ride ... then kills the trio (Shooting Nanette in the head after she pleads with the killer to not hurt her "babies," and killing Alannah after chasing the terrified girl around a tree ... three-year-old Madeline will be his youngest victim). Moving forward 200 yards to the toll booth that controls access to the area, Bryant murders four more people carjacking the gold BMW they had been driving.  Wounding a person that drives up to the toll booth, the maniac transfers his equipment from his yellow Volvo to the BMW, and then sets off again.
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FN FAL  
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The Abandoned Volvo

Further up the road, Bryant stops at a service station and attacks two people in a white Toyota Corolla ... killing Zoe Hall and kidnapping the girl's boyfriend, driver Glenn Pears (who he puts in the trunk of the BMW before driving off again, headed back to The Seascape).  On the drive to the bed-and breakfast, the maniac shoots out the front windshield of passing red Ford Falcon, then upon his arrival at The Seascape, enjoying this new past time, stands in the driveway and shoots up four more passing vehicles, wounding five more people in the process.  Done on the road, Bryant takes Pears out of the car and into the house, handcuffing him to the stairs to the second floor, sets the BMW on fire, and prepares to engage the police when they arrive.  It is roughly 2:00 in the afternoon. 
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Torched BMW

The first officers to arrive at The Seascape, Paul Hyland and Garry Whittle, are greeted by Bryant rifle fire that pins them in a nearby ditch (using shields and other protective equipment, they will eventually be rescues unhurt later that evening).  Inside, Bryant takes a call from an local ABC affiliate calling numbers randomly in the area to try to get reports on what is happening, and tells the woman on the other end that "lots of fun" is going on, and that he will kill Pears if she calls again (she does not call again).  Enjoying his short talk, he calls the local police station and talks to the dispatcher there, telling the woman her cop boyfriend is okay and that he wants a helicopter and then plane to take him to Adelaide, Australia ... or of course, he will kill his hostage.  Not going to happen, especially in light of all the murders, an 18-hour standoff ensues, during which Bryant kills his only real bargaining chip (unaware that the Martins have already been murdered, police do not fire on the home or storm it), shooting Pears in the head.
   
Special Operation Officers Approach

The next day, tiring of the game (like a bad James Cagney gangster movie, he repeatedly taunts the police to come in and get him), Bryant starts a fire in a guest cottage on the property, hoping that in chaos of the authorities trying to put it out, he can melt away and out of the area. Instead, the only thing that almost melts is Bryant himself ... blaze bigger and quicker than he thought due to his own ammo helping the conflagration, the murderer catches himself on fire and runs screaming from the burning building, tearing off his clothes before he becomes a human piece of charcoal!  Carnage complete with Bryant's arrest, 35 people have been murdered and another 23 wounded in what will be called The Port Arthur Massacre ... the 35 are Winifred Joyce Aplin (58), Walter John Bennett (66), Nicole Louise Burgess (17), Sou Leng Chung (32), Elva Rhonda Gaylard (48), Zoe Anne Hall (28), Elizabeth Jayne Howard (26), Mary Elizabeth Howard (57), Mervyn John Howard (55), Ronald Noel Jary (71), Tony Vadivelu Kistan (51), Leslie Dennis Lever (53), Sarah Kate Loughton (15), David Martin (72), Noelene Joyce Martin (69), Pauline Virjeana Masters (49), Alannah Louise Mikac (6), Madeline Grace Mikac (3), Andrew Bruce Mills (39), Peter Brenton Nash (32), Gwenda Joan Neander (67), Moh Yee William Ng (48), Anthony Nightingale (44), Mary Rose Nixon (60), Glenn Roy Pears (35), Russell James Pollard (72), Janette Kathleen Quin (50), Helene Maria Salzmann (50), Robert Graham Salzmann (57), Kate Elizabeth Scott (21), Kevin Vincent Sharp (68), Raymond John Sharp (67), Royce William Thompson (59), and Jason Bernard Winter (29).

Main House And Burnt Down Cottage
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The Mikac Family

Tried for his crimes, Bryant is found guilty on all counts, and for each of the people he kills, is sentenced 35 times to life in prison without the possibility of parole (experts will find he's nuts, but aware of right and wrong enough to not warrant an insanity plea), and an additional 1,035 years for all the woundings and other mayhem he caused ... a very long stay behind bars.  Currently, the monster talks to the walls (and an occasional guard now and then) at Hobart's Risdon Prison in a specially designed cell near the solitary confinement unit of the prison ... not allowed any visitors beyond his immediate family (his horribly embarrassed mother and sister).  Not happy with his accommodations, Bryant has tried to commit suicide eight different times (apparently not trying hard enough!), the last, slashing his throat with a razor blade in March of 2007 ... hopefully, his next attempt will be successful!
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2015 - Enjoy Your Stay!

4/28/1996 ... remembering the innocents ... rest in peace! 
Mourners Remembering The Lost

Memorial