Letters From Alcatraz - Michael Esslinger [168]
About 7:30 p.m. on August 14, 1942, subjects kidnapped Logan Stroud, traffic officer, Chattanooga P.D., when he attempted to arrest them for not having a safety sticker on their car and by threats of death at the point of a gun they forced him to accompany them from Hamilton County, Tennessee, to Catoosa County, Georgia. Subjects took refuge at the home of Henry Christian, tied Stroud, and locked him in a milk shed at the rear of the house. Stroud escaped about 4:30 a.m. August 15, 1942. Hubbard and Matthews were apprehended at 5:30 a.m. August 15, 1942, by FBI agents, and Georgia and Tennessee police officers after a gun battle in which Kenneth Jackson was killed. Hubbard and Matthews waived removal to Chattanooga. Authorized complaint was filed August 15, 1942, at Chattanooga, Tennessee, charging Hubbard and Matthews with violation of the kidnapping statute. Both subjects entered a plea of guilty before Commissioner Morgan on August 17, 1942, and in default of $25,000 bond each was remanded to the Knox County jail, Knoxville Tennessee.
On September 11, 1942, while being held at the Knox County Jail Marvin Franklin Hubbard, together with others, escaped from said jail by overpowering the turn key and the elevator operator who were locking up the prisoners in their cells for the night. Hubbard was apprehended by the Sheriff's Office, Knoxville, Tennessee, at Concord, Tennessee, on the night of September 14.1942. When arraigned before the Commissioner on September 15.1942, he entered a plea of guilty, and in default of $3000 bond was remanded to the custody of the US Marshal and incarcerated in the Knox County Jail, Knoxville, Tennessee.
On September 15, 1942, Marvin Franklin Hubbard addressed a letter to the United States Attorney at Chattanooga, Tennessee, requesting that he be indicted and arraigned at the next term of court at Greenville, Tennessee, on September 21, 1942, and expressed the desire to plead guilty to a charge of escaping from Federal custody.
In October of 1942, having been convicted of kidnapping and illegal transportation of firearms across state lines, Hubbard was sent to the Federal Penitentiary in Atlanta, where he reportedly participated in riot activities. Hubbard was deemed incorrigible and in 1944 he received his golden ticket to the Rock.
A request from Hubbard for a work assignment in the prison hospital. This request, dated April 10, 1946, suggests that Hubbard was probably recruited as an accomplice weeks or even days before the mass escape attempt.
Miran Edgar Thompson
Miran Edgar Thompson
Miran Edgar “Buddy” Thompson had been on Alcatraz only since October, a little over six months, but his criminal record seemed endless. At only twenty-nine years of age, Buddy was already a seasoned felon. Before even disembarking from the prison launch, he had accumulated no less than eight successful escapes on his inmate profile record.
Thompson left home at an early age and found himself in a reform school after being convicted of armed robbery before his eighteenth birthday. Reform school failed to curve his delinquency and when he set out to support himself, he immediately began a chain of violent burglaries, targeting almost any establishment that had a cash register. Thompson was arrested frequently, but he had an exceptional ability to escape from his captors. His early crimes included everything from forgery, to drunk and disorderly conduct,