| Battle of Alcatraz | |||||||
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Alcatraz cellhouse shelled by mortars, May 3, 1946 |
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| Belligerents | |||||||
| Guards US Marines Coast Guard State Police |
Bernard Coy Joseph Cretzer Marvin Hubbard |
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| Casualties and losses | |||||||
| 2 killed 11 wounded |
3 killed 2 executed 1 non-participating inmate wounded |
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The Battle of Alcatraz, which lasted from May 2–4, 1946, was the result of an unsuccessful escape attempt at Alcatraz Island Federal Penitentiary. Two guards—William A. Miller and Harold Stites—were killed along with three of the inmates. Eleven guards and one convict were also injured. Two of the surviving convicts were later executed for their roles.[1]
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On May 2, 1946, while most convicts and guards were in outside workshops, Bernard Coy, a bank robber serving a 25-year sentence at Alcatraz, was in the C Block cell-house sweeping the floor when kitchen orderly Marvin Hubbard called on guard William Miller to let him in as he had just finished cleaning the kitchen. As Miller was frisking Hubbard for any stolen articles, Coy assaulted him from behind and the two men overpowered the officer. They then released Joseph Cretzer and Clarence Carnes from their cells.[2]
The cell block had an elevated gun gallery which was regularly patrolled by an armed guard. The guard, Bert Burch, had a set routine and the convicts had attacked Miller while he was away. Coy, as cell-house orderly, had over the years spotted a flaw in the bars protecting the gun gallery which allowed them to be widened using a bar-spreading device consisting of a nut and bolt with client metal sleeve which moved when the nut was turned by a small wrench. Coy thus managed to spread the bars and squeeze through the widened gap into the temporarily vacant gallery and to overpower and bind Burch on his return. Coy kept the Springfield rifle in the gallery and lowered an M1911 pistol, keys, a number of clubs and gas grenades to his accomplices below.[2]
Continuing along the gun gallery, Coy then entered D Block, which was separated from the main cell-house by a concrete wall and was used for prisoners kept in isolation. There he used the rifle to force guard Cecil Corwin to open the door to C Block and let the others in. They then released about a dozen convicts including Sam Shockley and Miran Thompson. Shockley and Thompson joined Coy, Carnes, Hubbard and Cretzer in C Block. The other prisoners prudently returned to their cells. Miller and Corwin were placed in a cell in C Block.[2]
The escapers now needed to secure the key to the yard door of the prison from which they expected to make their way to the island's dock to seize the prison's launch. The boat docked daily between 2:00 P.M. and 2:30 P.M., and the plan was to use the hostage guards as cover to make their way to the dock, then San Francisco and freedom.
Miller had held on to the yard door key, contrary to the prison's regulations, so that he could let out kitchen staff without having to disturb the gallery guard at lunch. Although they eventually found the key by searching the captive guards and the cell in which the prisoners had placed them, the door would not open because the lock had jammed as the prisoners had tried several other keys while searching for the correct one. The escape attempt was thus inadvertently foiled from the outset as the prisoners were trapped in the cell house.
Meanwhile other guards who entered the cell block as part of their routine were seized along with others sent to investigate when they failed to report in. The prisoners were soon holding nine guards in two separate cells, but with nowhere to go, despair set in among the would-be escapers. At 2:30 P.M., Coy took the rifle and fired at the guards in some neighboring watchtowers, wounding one of them. Associate warden Ed Miller went to the cell block to investigate, armed with a gas billy club. He came across Coy who shot at him. Miller retreated. By now the alarm had been raised.
Their plan having failed, Shockley and Thompson urged Cretzer, who had one of the guns, to kill the hostages in case they testified against them. Cretzer opened fire on the guards wounding five, three seriously including Bill Miller who later died of his wounds. Carnes, Shockley and Thompson then returned to their cells, but Coy, Hubbard and Cretzer decided they were not going to surrender.[3] Meanwhile, one of the hostages discreetly wrote down the names of the convicts involved, circling the names of the ringleaders.
At about 6:00 P.M. a squad of armed guards entered the gun cage but were fired upon by the convicts. One officer, Harold Stites, was killed and four other guards were wounded.[3] Prison officials then cut the electricity and put all further attempts on hold until darkness.
Warden James A. Johnston now called upon the expertise of two platoons of Marines under the direction of General "Vinegar Joe" Stilwell to guard the general population of convicts and to take the cell house from the outside.
After night fell, two squads of guards entered the prison to locate and rescue the captive officers. There was a long-standing rule at Alcatraz that no guns were allowed in the cell-house and the prison officials did not want to have further guards injured or killed. In addition, the convicts' position on the top of a cell block provided a nearly impregnable firing position as it was out of range of the guards in the gun cages.
Thus it was that at 7:00 P.M. unarmed guards undertook the rescue attempt, but they were provided with cover by guards in the two gun galleries overhead. They found their colleagues and sealed off D Block by locking the open door but one guard was wounded by a gunshot from the roof of one of the cell blocks during the rescue. When the last officer had reached safety, a massive gun barrage opened on the prison with D Block subjected to heavy fire from machine-guns, mortars and grenades as the authorities erroneously believed one of the armed convicts was stationed there. Eventually it was established that the mutineers were confined to the main cellhouse and there was another lull in the battle as tactics were worked out.
Security forces adopted a plan to drive the armed convicts into a corner with tactics perfected against entrenched Japanese resistance during the Pacific War. They drilled holes in the prison roof and dropped in grenades into areas where they believed the convicts were in an attempt to force them into a utility corridor where they could be cornered.
On May 3, at about 12:00 noon, the convicts phoned Johnston to try to discuss a deal. Johnston would only accept their surrender. Later that day a shot was fired at a guard as he checked out C Block's utility corridor.[2] That night, a constant fusillade was fired at the cell block until about 9:00 P.M. The following morning, squads of armed guards periodically rushed into the cell house firing repeatedly into the narrow corridor. At 9:40 A.M. on May 4, they finally entered the corridor and found the bodies of Cretzer, Coy, and Hubbard.
Prior to the escape attempt, Hubbard had petitioned for a writ of habeas corpus on the grounds that his confession had been beaten out of him and had produced hospital records to back up his claims. A federal hearing into the matter had been scheduled for the Monday that followed his death. The case was dismissed on a motion filed by prosecutor Joseph Karesh, who is quoted as saying that had it gone through Hubbard would have had "a fair chance" of being released.[2]
Miran Thompson and Sam Shockley were executed in the gas chamber at San Quentin on December 3, 1948 for their role in the Battle of Alcatraz. Carnes was given an (additional) life sentence but was eventually released from prison in 1973. The increased security measures ensured that there were no more escape attempts until 1956.
Several versions of the events of the Battle of Alcatraz have been depicted on film: