Harpswell Anchor Article June, 2008 Nelson Barter Shootout at Lands End There are stories that become buried by time. Occasionally they re-emerge through the memories of a participant or a long forgotten newspaper clipping. In this case, both have come to light and they reveal an interesting story of crime and a running gunfight at the end of Bailey Island. The time was July, 1949. Back then Lands End did not have the large gift shop that stands there now. The current building is an enlarged replacement for a much smaller one that washed away in a winter storm in 1978. This smaller one existed in 1949 along with an eatery and rooming house known as The Jaquish Inn. The small seaside resort also included rental cottages, a Quonset hut in which the male employees slept and a lobster pound for the restaurant. The business was owned and operated by Percy Allen and his son, Thurl, who slept in the loft above the gift shop. The story comes to us from an employee at the time, Raymond Fischer of Clinton, Maine. Also working there and sharing the male sleeping quarters in the Quonset hut were Bob Littlefield, Willis Gould and Neil Elliot. Along with the written account of the occurrence provided to the Anchor by Mr. Fischer are a clipping of the story from a Portland newspaper and an original letter from Mr. Fischer to his family telling of the strange events. The letter is written on stationary with the heading Jaquish Inn and Cabins. On the night of July 31, 1949 there were strong thunderstorms around 2:00 AM that woke the residents of the Jaquish Inn with their severity. At 5:00 AM the employees were again awakened, this time by Thurl’s shouting “The gift shop has been robbed!” It seems that Thurl was awakened by the sound of breaking glass in the shop below his loft. Armed with a revolver, he looked down the stairs toward the cash register, which incidentally contained all of one quarter, and straight into the eyes of and an intruder armed with a .45 caliber handgun. When he spoke, the intruder aimed his handgun at Thurl. Apparently deciding that this was no time for further discussion, Thurl fired two shots, one of which struck the intruder in the lift wrist. The robber made a break for it and ran out of the shop and down the shore and dove overboard, swimming out toward a ledge with Thurl running after him. By now the others were up and running from Thurl’s shouts. Thurl and Percy, finding no humor in the robber’s actions, began taking pot shots at him from shore with their .32 revolvers. They scored no further hits and the robber returned no fire either, having dropped a box containing his weapon into the water when he started swimming. In a fine example of no get away plan whatsoever, the crook swam to the ledges across the gut from Lands End. He then decided to make for Jaquish Island but Thurl fired a .38-55 rifle round over his head and he sat down on the ledge, giving up. “Go ahead and shoot me, you’ve got all the guns!” he yelled at Thurl and Percy from the ledge. Surprisingly, they didn’t. Thurl saw the robber drop the box when he entered the water and Percy instructed Raymond Fischer to retrieve it. Inside it was a .45 service pistol containing four rounds and a copy of Death of a Salesman which had just come out that year. About this time, local fisherman and Harpswell Constable Laurence “Buster” Estes happened along in his boat on his way to check some mackerel nets that he had set out. Receiving the lowdown from Percy, he had them row him out to pick up the wounded, wet and dejected robber after first firing a warning blast from a shotgun that he kept on the boat. This concluded what was an astounding amount of gunfire for five in the morning in the middle of the summer. Buster took the robber into Mackerel Cove where custody was transferred to State Trooper Mortimer O’Connell. Trooper O’Connell took him to Brunswick Hospital for treatment of his gunshot wound by Dr. Maurice Dionne. He was given a dry change of clothing and taken in for questioning which revealed an extensive criminal past. Like most criminals, he had some issues with the truth. The man first identified himself as one John Norris and said that he was 36 years old. When informed that his fingerprints would be sent to the FBI to be cross checked, he then identified himself as 30 year old Walter Everett Stafford. He first listed his address as 1128 State St., Portland. When this was found to be false he admitted to staying at the Portland YMCA where he had left a bag of spare clothes. According to him, he had taken a bus to Brunswick and then walked the 19 miles to the end of Bailey Island. In January of 1949, he had been released from New Mexico State Prison after serving Three years for breaking, entering and larceny. He was then turned over to authorities in Arizona and did about a month for passing bad checks. At the time of his arrest, he was wanted by the FBI for transporting a stolen car across state lines. Well, there you have it. The story does nothing to explain why a petty crook from the southwest would take a bus to Brunswick, walk all the way to Bailey Island and then bungle a robbery with no getaway plan at all. He chose a hornets’ nest of well armed and willing defenders. There was no apparent plan at all as evidenced by his waterborne escape attempt to the ledges across the gut. The whole thing leaves you wondering just what was going through his head.
Posted on: Sun, 03 Aug 2014 15:59:02 +0000
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