<Archive Obituary> Robert Stroud (November 21st 1963)
Bill Schenley
Convicted: Murderer Became Expert on Bird Diseases -
In Solitary 42 Years
Photo:
http://www.mugshots.com/IMAGES/Mugshot__stroud.jpg
FROM: The New York Times (November 22nd 1963) ~
By The United Press International
SPRINGFIELD, Mo., Nov. 21
Robert Stroud, the convicted murderer who became
known as the "Birdman of Alcatraz," died in his sleep
today in a prison hospital. He was 73 years old.
Best-Known Convict
A summer storm tore a branch from a tree and catapulted
it into the prison yard at Leavenworth, Kan., 43 years ago.
Under the branch a prisoner found a crushed nest and four
baby sparrows, one with a broken leg. The prisoner took
the birds to his cell, made a splint from a matchstick and
nursed the fledgling back to health.
Thus began the transformation of Robert Stroud from an
ordinary prisoner into an authority on birds and their
diseases.
Probably America's most famous convict, Stroud served 54
years in prison for two murders, 42 of those years in solitary
confinement. He received so many special privileges,
however, that his status was probably better described by the
official term - "under administrative segregation."
Despite the sympathetic biography, "Birdman of Alcatraz,"
by Thomas E. Gaddis, published by Random House in 1955,
and the equally sympathetic motion picture of the same name
in 1962, with Burt Lancaster in the title role, the long fight of
the ailing, aged prisoner to obtain release ended in failure.
A tall, bald man, who wore steel-rimmed spectacles, Stroud
was an antisocial non-conformist who discovered too late that
he was by nature and talent a scholar and research scientist.
Stroud, who was born in Seattle, came from a broken home.
At 13 he ran away and turned hobo. By 18, he had made his
way to Alaska. In Juneau he lived with a dance-hall girl twice his
age. One night he returned to find her bruised and with eyes
blackened. She said that Charles Dahmer, a bartender, had
beaten her.
Stroud got a .38-caliber pistol and waited inside Dahmer's shack.
When Dahmer came home, Stroud shot him dead. Then he
walked to the United States marshal's office and surrendered
himself.
Gets 12-Year Sentence
On Aug. 23, 1909, he pleaded guilty to manslaughter.
Federal Judge E.E. Cushman sentenced him to 12 years in the
Federal prison on McNeill Island in Puget Sound, Washington.
Stroud had expected a light sentence but got the maximum term
allowed by statute. An embittered prisoner, he was hard to
handle. He broke rules and annoyed the guards.
After he had been confined for two years he stabbed a fellow
prisoner with a kitchen knife. Six months were added to his
sentence. As "a hard case," he was transferred to Leavenworth,
the "tough" jail on the Kansas prairie, in 1912.
There, he continued to ruffle guards and prisoners, but he
showed a capacity for study. Within three years, he had
diplomas in mechanical drawing, engineering, music, theology
and mathematics from the extension division of Kansas State
Agricultural College.
On March 25, 1916, he returned to his cell and found a basket
of fruit from his younger brother, Marcus, whom he had not seen
in seven years. Marcus left a note, saying the authorities would
not let him wait because of a weekend ban on visitors, but would
come again.
Stroud was furious that his brother had been turned away. That
night he whispered about the matter to the man next to him at
mess. Andrew F. Turner, a guard, warned Stroud that he was
breaking the silence rule.
Stroud brooded during the night. The next day at noon in the
mess hall he had words with the guard. Then, in front of 1,100
convicts, Stroud pulled a knife from his coat and stabbed Turner
in the chest, killing him.
After three trials, Stroud was found guilty with no recommendation
for mercy. On June 28, 1918, Federal Judge Robert E. Lewis
sentenced him to be hanged and a gallows was constructed in the
isolation courtyard at Leavenworth.
Commuted by Wilson
Letters and telegrams from hundreds of persons who opposed
capital punishment asked Gov. Henry Allen of Kansas to intercede
with President Woodrow Wilson. Stroud's mother, Elizabeth,
went to the Governor and pleaded for her son. She also visited
the President's wife.
On April 15, 1920, eight days before Stroud was to he hanged,
President Wilson commuted his sentence to life imprisonment.
Attorney General A. Mitchell Palmer recommended that Stroud
be kept in solitary confinement because of "his viciousness."
To keep busy, Stroud painted Christmas cards which were sold by
his mother, who was working in a coffin factory in Kansas City to
be near her son. Stroud also was allowed an hour's exercise daily
in the prison yard. Here he rescued the baby sparrows, which gave
him his life's interest.
He fed the birds bread crumbs and trained them to do tricks.
At his signal they would roll over on his cot and play dead.
He started raising canaries and, with his mother's help, sold them
on the outside. He worked and studied bird lore up to 20 hours a
day. Eventually he had 300 canaries in cages he built from cigar
boxes. Ultimately, he had a load of scientific equipment in his cell.
When the birds became sick, he struggled to cure them. If they
died, he dissected them - at the beginning with his fingernails. He
tried to find cures for the ailments that his books did not explain.
He studied pharmacology, chemistry, medicine, bacteriology. He
developed an internal bird antiseptic and other remedies, which his
mother marketed.
He wrote articles for bird journals and corresponded with 2,000
bird owners and breeders. By 1930 he was an authority on the
care and breeding of canaries and other caged birds.
But in 1931 a prison ruling was instituted stipulating that inmates
could not conduct outside business for profit. Stroud broke a "no
publicity" rule by having Mrs. Della Mae Jones, a Shelbyville (Ind.)
widow, who had been allowed to visit him, give his story to the
press.
Supported by Public
Petitions and letters from canary fanciers and others poured in to
the prison board, which decided that Stroud could keep his birds.
He received access to a second cell to house his birds and
laboratory equipment. But his article writing was stopped and his
outgoing mail was curtailed.
However, he smuggled out a 60,000-word manuscript on the
diseases of birds, which was published.
Later Stroud learned through the prison grapevine that he was to
be transferred without his birds to Alcatraz. He again won publicity
by having Mrs. Jones file a contract of marriage between them with
the United States District Court on Aug. 15, 1933. He and his
canaries received a stay in Leavenworth.
In 1935, when he was informed he would be eligible to apply for
parole in 1937, his mother, angered by his marriage contract, said,
"My son belongs where he is." The parole board agreed. They
found him anti-social and noncooperative.
In 1942, 'Stroud's Digest of the Diseases of Birds" was published.
It was regarded as a classic in its field.
Breach of Rules
In December, 1942, Stroud was removed to Alcatraz "because
of a serious breach of prison rules." He was again placed in
segregation, then in the prison hospital, where he had an entire
ward for his own use. There he turned out manuscript after
manuscript, but permission to publish was denied.
At Alcatraz Stroud became fluent in French, Spanish and Greek.
He studied law and penology and wrote a book on American
prisons, which the authorities confiscated.
In 1959, Stroud was transferred from Alcatraz to the Medical
Center for Federal Prisoners at Springfield, Mo., where his
isolation ended. He received a job in the center's print shop, and
was allowed to roam the grounds.
He continued his drive to get out of prison. In April, 1962,
Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy announced that he could
not recommend commutation of Stroud's sentence. On May
26, 1963, Stroud's last application for parole was denied without
comment by the Federal Board of Parole.
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Photos: http://www.alcatrazhistory.com/stroud004.jpg
http://www.legendsofamerica.com/photos-california/RobertStroud.jpg
http://library.thinkquest.org/04oct/00803/Murderer%20Pictures/Robert2.png
Stroud's Alcatraz cell
http://images.jupiterimages.com/common/detail/77/91/23119177.jpg
http://www.crimelibrary.com/graphics/photos/notorious_murders/famous/stroud/6-3Stroud-Digest-on-Diseases-of-Birds-(150).jpg
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<Note: All typos and misspellings in the following psychiatric summary are
attributed to Romney M. Ritchey.>
Psychiatric Summary
STROUD, ROBERT, 594-AZ.
January 7, 1943
Age 53. Male. White. Single.
Received at McNeil Island in 1909, to serve 12 years for
Manslaughter in Alaska. Transferred to Leavenworth in
1912. In 1916 was sentenced to DEATH for MURDER
of a Custodial Officer. This was later commuted to LIFE.
Transferred to Alcatraz December 19, 1942.
Prenatal:
Father died at 74. Mother died at 78, Ca Womb.
Natal:
Born in Seattle, Jan 28, 1890. Normal birth.
Preschool:
He was the third of four children. Raised by parents who
seperated when subject was 12. He stayed with mother.
School:
He attended school until 12, reached 3rd grade.
Occupational:
He left home at 13 and traveled about rather aimlessly until
age of 17 when he went to Alaska where he worked
irregularly for about a year when he killed a man who had
stayed all night with a woman for whom Stroud was
pimping, and the paid he on $2.00 of a usual $10.00 fee.
Stroud admits killing a man there but says it was a justifiable
homicide etc. He received a 12 year sentence at Mc Neil
Island and while there assaulted another Inmate for which
he received a sentence of 6 months to run consecutively.
Then he was transferred to Leavenworth where he killed an
Officer whom he claims was threatening him with a club etc.
Since that time he has been kept in segregation where he was
allowed to raise birds for sale and operate a laboratory for
the study of bird diseases etc. He claims ignorance of the
reasons for his transfer here.
Physical:
He is well nourished and looks well. Ht 6'3"[?] Wt 183#.
There is a history of an Appendectomy and Renal calcules.
He has Pneumonia two yars ago. Complains of constipation
and "sluggish kidneys". He has Defective Vision and defective
hearing. Has reading glasses. He denies use fo drugs and has
no needle scars. Heart action normal. Lungs clear. Wasserman
negative.
Mental:
He is properly oriented and in good contact. He is alert and
shows no memory defect of disturbance of consciousness.
His intellectual development is above the avrage inspite of
limited formal schooling. Has learned much about bird
diseases and the propogation of birds. Has written a book on
this subject. He blames Mr. Hunter and Mr. Shuttleworth for
his transfer here which he suspects was done to prevent
publication of his book etc. Denies he holds any resentment
however. Expresses no delusions and there is no evidence that
he has hallucinated. He is quite proud of his attainments and
the "good" he has done by his laboratory investigations. He is
rather introspective and gives much thought to his own body
functions. He is not psychotic.
Diagnosis:
Psychopathic personality of Superior Intelligence. IQ 112
Romney M. Ritchey [Surgeon?] USPHS
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Photo: http://www.filmski.net/slike/automatika/films/2080d.jpg