December 1, 2023 • 10 mins
On this episode of Our American Stories, The History Guy shares the story about an escape attempt in the infamous Alcatraz Federal penitentiary in San Francisco, California, that led to a standoff. The penitentiary the inmates called "the Rock,” was supposed to be escape-proof, but that did not keep some prisoners from trying.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:11):
And we continue with our American stories, and up next
comes a man who's simply known as the History Guy.
His videos are watched by hundreds of thousands of people
of all ages on YouTube. The History Guy has also
heard here at our American Story Today, the History Guy
shares the story about an escape attempt in the infamous
(00:32):
Alcatraz Federal Penitentiary in San Francisco, California that led to
a standoff. The penitentiary, the inmates called the Rock, was
supposed to be escape proof, but that did not keep
some prisoners from trying. Here's the History Guy with the
story of the nineteen forty six Battle of Alcatraz.
Speaker 2 (00:52):
Alcatraz Federal Penitentiary, built on an island in San Francisco Bay,
was open in nineteen thirty four to house America's most
dangerous criminals. Built literally on an island surrounded by shark
infested waters, the prison was considered to be escape proof,
with that to keep the prisoners from attempting to escape
from the infamous prison that was most softly called simply
(01:14):
the Rock.
Speaker 1 (01:16):
Welcome to the Rock.
Speaker 2 (01:18):
There were fourteen escape attempts in the twenty nine years
that the prison was in operation, and among those, one
was particularly notable, both for its daring and for its violence.
The nineteen forty six Battle of Alcatraz deserves to be remembered.
Forty six year old Bernard Barney Coy had been convicted
by a federal jury for robbing the bank of New Haven, Kentucky,
(01:39):
in March of nineteen thirty seven. He and a cousin
held a bank teller at gunpoint with a sad off shaka,
made off of two thousand, one hundred and seventy five dollars.
Sentenced to twenty five years, he was transferred from Atlanta
to Alcatraz in nineteen thirty eight. Nonetheless, Coy had by
nineteen forty six earned the position of cell House Orderly
Prison janitor, position that allowed him relative access around the prison.
(02:01):
From that position, he had observed lapses in the security
of the notoriously strict prison that he thought he could exploit,
and he became the ring leader of a group determined
to escape the escape proof prison. Cooi had a plan
to overwhelm one guard and gain access to a weapons locker,
but he needed help to overwhelm another guard, whom he
thought would have the keys that he needed to escape.
(02:22):
It was a daring plan, and it required more men.
His list of accomplices started with thirty three year old
Marvin Franklin Hubbard at Alcatraz. He was a kitchen orderly
and late cleanup in the prison kitchen made him a
crucial part of Koi's plan. But Coi figured that he
would also need some muscle for his plan to work,
(02:43):
and so he recruited some other prisoners to his plan.
Twenty nine year old mire and Buddy Thompson was an
arm robber who showed skill at both getting caught and
at escaping. In March of nineteen forty five, he was
arrested by an Amarillo, Texas police detective. Thompson had hidden
a gun and shot the detective. Clarence Carnes was just
nineteen years old, the youngest man in Alcatraz. A Choctaw
(03:05):
from Oklahoma, he was known as the Choctaw Kid. He
had been given a life sentence at just the age
of sixteen after killing a garage attendant during an attempted
hold up. Thirty five year old Dutch Kretcher had done
his first stint in prison at the age of sixteen
in the nineteen thirties. It had been part of a
gang of West Coast bank robbers called the Kretzer Kyle
Gang that had earned him a spot as number four
on the FBI Most Wanted list. Kretzer then demanded that
(03:28):
another prisoner, a friend of his, be included. Thirty seven
year old Sam Shockley had been sentenced to life imprisonment
for bank robbery and kidnapping. Sent to the Federal Penitentiary
a Levenworth. He was found to have an IQ just
fifty four and be prone to violent outbursts and an
unstable personality. Cooy's plan started with guard Burt Birch. Birch
patrolled an elevated gun platform that overlooked the C and
(03:49):
D blocks, which was armed with a Springfield rifle and
forty five caliber pistol. But Birch had a routine so
precise it could be timed. He would leave the Sea
block for a few minutes as Pacific times and then
go look over D block. That meant that there were
a few minutes when Sea block was not observed. Cooi
had fabricated a bar spreader, a device that would push
two bars apart by turning his screw with a pair
(04:10):
of flyers. His plan was to use the time when
Birch went to D Block to strip off his clothes,
shimmy up the bars, used the barspredder to make a
gap big enough to slip through and waylay Birch as
he came back in, taking his guns and getting access
to D Block to release his co conspirators. Koi had
been starving himself for weeks in order to make it
easier to slip through the gap in the bars, but
(04:30):
he also needed to waylay guard William Miller to watch
the Sea Block door. Because Miller had a key to
the prison yard. By prison rules, he wasn't supposed to
keep the key, but pass it to the guard in
the gun cage every time he used it. That was
intended to make it impossible for the prisoners to take
the key that would let them out into the yard,
exactly what COI hoped to do, but COI noticed that
(04:51):
Miller often did not follow the rule because keeping the
key allowed him to let out the kitchen staff without
disturbing the gallery guard during lunch. As Hubbard worked in
the cake kitchen, he would have to overpower Miller when
he let him out of the kitchen, thus getting the
key that Koy hoped would allow them to escape the
yard and get to the prison dock, where, using the
guns from the locker, they would hijack the boat that
carried supplies to the prison and make their escape. It
(05:14):
was a convoluted plan and much could go wrong, but
men serving life sentences are desperate men. They made their
move on May second, nineteen forty six. Koi was in
the main block sweeping up when Miller opened the door
to let Hubbard out, having finished his kitchen duties. He
and Koy jumped Miller, clubbing him over the head. Miller
had no gun, but he did have a gas billy,
(05:36):
a billy club that could also dispense tear gas. They
threw Miller in a cell. They then hurried to where
they had stashed the Barspetter and Plyers. When Birch made
his normal trip to D block, Coy managed to strip down,
shimmy up the bars, and use the barspeeder to make
a GAF wide enough to slip into the gun gallery.
Koy attacked Birch immediately he opened the door. Caught by surprise,
Birch was quickly subdued. Koy yanked the rifle from his
(05:57):
hands and beat him unconscious with it. The plan was
working so far. Koy went along to the gun gallery
to D Block and threatened Guard Cecil Corwin with his rifle.
He forced Corwin to open the door to the main block,
letting in Carnes, Hubbard and Kretzerr. They then opened the
D block doors and fraid Thompson and Shockley. Other DE
Block prisoners were also released, but they wisely decided to
(06:18):
say in their cells. The prisoners were convinced their desperate
plan was working, but in fact it was already doomed.
Guard Miller had figured out what they wanted and had
managed to slip the key to the Saillard off the
ring and hide it. The gang had no way to
get out of the cell block. The escape attempt had failed.
Now it was a hostage situation. The group slowly waylaid
(06:39):
other guards as they came in for regular duties or
was sent to check on the other missing guards. Eventually
they had nine guards stashed in two sails, but prison
authorities were now well aware of what was going on.
The group decided that if there was no means for escape,
they would go down fighting. The groups started arguing with
the guards that they had waylaid. When one of the
officers told them they had no chance of escape and
(06:59):
would die if they tried. Kretzer told him that the
guards would die as well. He shot into the cell.
Then Shockley yelled to kill all the hostages, saying they
wouldn't have anyone to testify against them. Krets Are emptied
the forty five into the two cells. Six of the
officers were injured. Officer Bill Miller later died of his wounds.
The guards, playing dead were terrified that Kretzer would come
(07:19):
in and finish the job, but he walked away Desperately.
One of the guards managed to write the names of
the six prisoners involved on a cell wall. Warden James
Johnson sent it a large and heavily armed force in
the afternoon. He managed to drive the prisoners back and
rescue the hostages, but a second guard, Harold's Styles, was
killed and three more wounded in the melee. The warden
now shut off the power and watered to the block,
(07:40):
which was surrounded with floodlights and wailing sirens. Guard shot
teargas of the windows to keep them in Pinned down, Carnes, Shockley,
and Thompson decided the jig was up and went back
to their cells, hoping their involvement would be missed, but Koy, Hubbard,
and Kretzer decided to fight to the death. Then Johnston
took it up a notch and called into the United
States Corps. The Marines used tactics developed to the Pacific
(08:03):
against Japanese soldiers and bunkers, drilling holes in the roof
and dropping in hand grenades to drive the prisoners to
a spot where they could be captured. Three boxes of
rifle grenades and one hundred and fifty hand grenades later,
the three prisoners found a phone and called, asking about
terms for surrender. Johnston told them that the only terms
would be to throw out their guns and give up.
When a guard peeked into sea block, they shot at him.
(08:26):
That was their answer to the warden's demand for surrender.
Guards moved in and fired a dozen shots into the
utility corridor where the three were thought to be hiding.
In response, they heard three shots. They were the last
shots of the Battle of Alcatraz. Coy, Hubbard, and Kretzer
had chosen suicide over capture. In an odd twist, Marvin
(08:48):
Hubbard had filed an appeal to his conviction, and the
hearing for that appeal was held the monday after he
had committed suicide. A prosecute in the case said that
Hubbard had a fair chance that his conviction would be overturned.
Clarence Karnes, Mirn Thompson, and Sam Shockley had gone back
to their cells hoping to remain anonymous. Their hope was
(09:08):
that Kretzer had killed the hostages who could identify them
as being part of the attempt, but all but one
of the hostages had survived. Thompson and Shockley were executed
in the gas chamber of nearby San Quentin Prison December third,
nineteen forty eight. A judge found sympathy for Clarence Carnes,
owing to his age and the fact that the hostages
reported that at one point he had refused an order
(09:29):
by Kretzer to shoot them. His death sentence was commuted,
but another life sentence was added to his term. Despite that.
He did manage to eventually earn release in nineteen seventy three,
but he couldn't make it on the outside and violated
the terms of his parole. He died in nineteen eighty
eight in the Federal penitentiary in Springfield, Missouri. Alcatraz Prison
(09:51):
would see several more escape attempts, including the famous incident
in June of nineteen sixty two where prisoners Frank Morris
and brothers John and Clarence Anglin escaped were never found.
Alcatraz Federal Penitentiary closed March twenty first, nineteen sixty three.
The buildings were simply rotting due to all the exposure
to the salt air and was too expensive to repair,
but was already the most expensive prison in the federal
(10:13):
system to operate. The former prison was turned into a
tourist attraction and today attracts more than one and a
half million visitors a year.
Speaker 1 (10:22):
And great job as always by Greg Hangler, and again
thanks to the History Guy for being a regular and
featured contributor here on our American Stories. The story of
the nineteen forty six Battle of Alcatraz here on our
American Stories
And we continue with our American stories, and up next
comes a man who's simply known as the History Guy.
His videos are watched by hundreds of thousands of people
of all ages on YouTube. The History Guy has also
heard here at our American Story Today, the History Guy
shares the story about an escape attempt in the infamous
(00:32):
Alcatraz Federal Penitentiary in San Francisco, California that led to
a standoff. The penitentiary, the inmates called the Rock, was
supposed to be escape proof, but that did not keep
some prisoners from trying. Here's the History Guy with the
story of the nineteen forty six Battle of Alcatraz.
Speaker 2 (00:52):
Alcatraz Federal Penitentiary, built on an island in San Francisco Bay,
was open in nineteen thirty four to house America's most
dangerous criminals. Built literally on an island surrounded by shark
infested waters, the prison was considered to be escape proof,
with that to keep the prisoners from attempting to escape
from the infamous prison that was most softly called simply
(01:14):
the Rock.
Speaker 1 (01:16):
Welcome to the Rock.
Speaker 2 (01:18):
There were fourteen escape attempts in the twenty nine years
that the prison was in operation, and among those, one
was particularly notable, both for its daring and for its violence.
The nineteen forty six Battle of Alcatraz deserves to be remembered.
Forty six year old Bernard Barney Coy had been convicted
by a federal jury for robbing the bank of New Haven, Kentucky,
(01:39):
in March of nineteen thirty seven. He and a cousin
held a bank teller at gunpoint with a sad off shaka,
made off of two thousand, one hundred and seventy five dollars.
Sentenced to twenty five years, he was transferred from Atlanta
to Alcatraz in nineteen thirty eight. Nonetheless, Coy had by
nineteen forty six earned the position of cell House Orderly
Prison janitor, position that allowed him relative access around the prison.
(02:01):
From that position, he had observed lapses in the security
of the notoriously strict prison that he thought he could exploit,
and he became the ring leader of a group determined
to escape the escape proof prison. Cooi had a plan
to overwhelm one guard and gain access to a weapons locker,
but he needed help to overwhelm another guard, whom he
thought would have the keys that he needed to escape.
(02:22):
It was a daring plan, and it required more men.
His list of accomplices started with thirty three year old
Marvin Franklin Hubbard at Alcatraz. He was a kitchen orderly
and late cleanup in the prison kitchen made him a
crucial part of Koi's plan. But Coi figured that he
would also need some muscle for his plan to work,
(02:43):
and so he recruited some other prisoners to his plan.
Twenty nine year old mire and Buddy Thompson was an
arm robber who showed skill at both getting caught and
at escaping. In March of nineteen forty five, he was
arrested by an Amarillo, Texas police detective. Thompson had hidden
a gun and shot the detective. Clarence Carnes was just
nineteen years old, the youngest man in Alcatraz. A Choctaw
(03:05):
from Oklahoma, he was known as the Choctaw Kid. He
had been given a life sentence at just the age
of sixteen after killing a garage attendant during an attempted
hold up. Thirty five year old Dutch Kretcher had done
his first stint in prison at the age of sixteen
in the nineteen thirties. It had been part of a
gang of West Coast bank robbers called the Kretzer Kyle
Gang that had earned him a spot as number four
on the FBI Most Wanted list. Kretzer then demanded that
(03:28):
another prisoner, a friend of his, be included. Thirty seven
year old Sam Shockley had been sentenced to life imprisonment
for bank robbery and kidnapping. Sent to the Federal Penitentiary
a Levenworth. He was found to have an IQ just
fifty four and be prone to violent outbursts and an
unstable personality. Cooy's plan started with guard Burt Birch. Birch
patrolled an elevated gun platform that overlooked the C and
(03:49):
D blocks, which was armed with a Springfield rifle and
forty five caliber pistol. But Birch had a routine so
precise it could be timed. He would leave the Sea
block for a few minutes as Pacific times and then
go look over D block. That meant that there were
a few minutes when Sea block was not observed. Cooi
had fabricated a bar spreader, a device that would push
two bars apart by turning his screw with a pair
(04:10):
of flyers. His plan was to use the time when
Birch went to D Block to strip off his clothes,
shimmy up the bars, used the barspredder to make a
gap big enough to slip through and waylay Birch as
he came back in, taking his guns and getting access
to D Block to release his co conspirators. Koi had
been starving himself for weeks in order to make it
easier to slip through the gap in the bars, but
(04:30):
he also needed to waylay guard William Miller to watch
the Sea Block door. Because Miller had a key to
the prison yard. By prison rules, he wasn't supposed to
keep the key, but pass it to the guard in
the gun cage every time he used it. That was
intended to make it impossible for the prisoners to take
the key that would let them out into the yard,
exactly what COI hoped to do, but COI noticed that
(04:51):
Miller often did not follow the rule because keeping the
key allowed him to let out the kitchen staff without
disturbing the gallery guard during lunch. As Hubbard worked in
the cake kitchen, he would have to overpower Miller when
he let him out of the kitchen, thus getting the
key that Koy hoped would allow them to escape the
yard and get to the prison dock, where, using the
guns from the locker, they would hijack the boat that
carried supplies to the prison and make their escape. It
(05:14):
was a convoluted plan and much could go wrong, but
men serving life sentences are desperate men. They made their
move on May second, nineteen forty six. Koi was in
the main block sweeping up when Miller opened the door
to let Hubbard out, having finished his kitchen duties. He
and Koy jumped Miller, clubbing him over the head. Miller
had no gun, but he did have a gas billy,
(05:36):
a billy club that could also dispense tear gas. They
threw Miller in a cell. They then hurried to where
they had stashed the Barspetter and Plyers. When Birch made
his normal trip to D block, Coy managed to strip down,
shimmy up the bars, and use the barspeeder to make
a GAF wide enough to slip into the gun gallery.
Koy attacked Birch immediately he opened the door. Caught by surprise,
Birch was quickly subdued. Koy yanked the rifle from his
(05:57):
hands and beat him unconscious with it. The plan was
working so far. Koy went along to the gun gallery
to D Block and threatened Guard Cecil Corwin with his rifle.
He forced Corwin to open the door to the main block,
letting in Carnes, Hubbard and Kretzerr. They then opened the
D block doors and fraid Thompson and Shockley. Other DE
Block prisoners were also released, but they wisely decided to
(06:18):
say in their cells. The prisoners were convinced their desperate
plan was working, but in fact it was already doomed.
Guard Miller had figured out what they wanted and had
managed to slip the key to the Saillard off the
ring and hide it. The gang had no way to
get out of the cell block. The escape attempt had failed.
Now it was a hostage situation. The group slowly waylaid
(06:39):
other guards as they came in for regular duties or
was sent to check on the other missing guards. Eventually
they had nine guards stashed in two sails, but prison
authorities were now well aware of what was going on.
The group decided that if there was no means for escape,
they would go down fighting. The groups started arguing with
the guards that they had waylaid. When one of the
officers told them they had no chance of escape and
(06:59):
would die if they tried. Kretzer told him that the
guards would die as well. He shot into the cell.
Then Shockley yelled to kill all the hostages, saying they
wouldn't have anyone to testify against them. Krets Are emptied
the forty five into the two cells. Six of the
officers were injured. Officer Bill Miller later died of his wounds.
The guards, playing dead were terrified that Kretzer would come
(07:19):
in and finish the job, but he walked away Desperately.
One of the guards managed to write the names of
the six prisoners involved on a cell wall. Warden James
Johnson sent it a large and heavily armed force in
the afternoon. He managed to drive the prisoners back and
rescue the hostages, but a second guard, Harold's Styles, was
killed and three more wounded in the melee. The warden
now shut off the power and watered to the block,
(07:40):
which was surrounded with floodlights and wailing sirens. Guard shot
teargas of the windows to keep them in Pinned down, Carnes, Shockley,
and Thompson decided the jig was up and went back
to their cells, hoping their involvement would be missed, but Koy, Hubbard,
and Kretzer decided to fight to the death. Then Johnston
took it up a notch and called into the United
States Corps. The Marines used tactics developed to the Pacific
(08:03):
against Japanese soldiers and bunkers, drilling holes in the roof
and dropping in hand grenades to drive the prisoners to
a spot where they could be captured. Three boxes of
rifle grenades and one hundred and fifty hand grenades later,
the three prisoners found a phone and called, asking about
terms for surrender. Johnston told them that the only terms
would be to throw out their guns and give up.
When a guard peeked into sea block, they shot at him.
(08:26):
That was their answer to the warden's demand for surrender.
Guards moved in and fired a dozen shots into the
utility corridor where the three were thought to be hiding.
In response, they heard three shots. They were the last
shots of the Battle of Alcatraz. Coy, Hubbard, and Kretzer
had chosen suicide over capture. In an odd twist, Marvin
(08:48):
Hubbard had filed an appeal to his conviction, and the
hearing for that appeal was held the monday after he
had committed suicide. A prosecute in the case said that
Hubbard had a fair chance that his conviction would be overturned.
Clarence Karnes, Mirn Thompson, and Sam Shockley had gone back
to their cells hoping to remain anonymous. Their hope was
(09:08):
that Kretzer had killed the hostages who could identify them
as being part of the attempt, but all but one
of the hostages had survived. Thompson and Shockley were executed
in the gas chamber of nearby San Quentin Prison December third,
nineteen forty eight. A judge found sympathy for Clarence Carnes,
owing to his age and the fact that the hostages
reported that at one point he had refused an order
(09:29):
by Kretzer to shoot them. His death sentence was commuted,
but another life sentence was added to his term. Despite that.
He did manage to eventually earn release in nineteen seventy three,
but he couldn't make it on the outside and violated
the terms of his parole. He died in nineteen eighty
eight in the Federal penitentiary in Springfield, Missouri. Alcatraz Prison
(09:51):
would see several more escape attempts, including the famous incident
in June of nineteen sixty two where prisoners Frank Morris
and brothers John and Clarence Anglin escaped were never found.
Alcatraz Federal Penitentiary closed March twenty first, nineteen sixty three.
The buildings were simply rotting due to all the exposure
to the salt air and was too expensive to repair,
but was already the most expensive prison in the federal
(10:13):
system to operate. The former prison was turned into a
tourist attraction and today attracts more than one and a
half million visitors a year.
Speaker 1 (10:22):
And great job as always by Greg Hangler, and again
thanks to the History Guy for being a regular and
featured contributor here on our American Stories. The story of
the nineteen forty six Battle of Alcatraz here on our
American Stories
Host
Lee Habeeb
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