On
May 26, 1934, volunteer Special Police Officer Peter Erath died as the
results from injuries received while trying to quell riots at the truck
drivers’ strike. Peter was an unemployed laborer who volunteered for
the job. He was on duty when the worst riots of the drivers’ strike
broke out. A group of sluggers, believed to have been communists from
out of the city cornered Officer Erath in a stall and slug him
mercilessly. He suffered a fractured skull and the doctors at General
Hospital were unable to save him.

Peter Erath was not listed on the plaque in
the Chief’s office, probably because he was a Special Police Officer.
He is listed on the Memorial in Washington and we thought the readers
might be interested in the story.

Aroused
by the death of a Minneapolis policeman by an automobile, on May 3,
1936, Mayor Thomas E. Latimer called a conference of city officials to
seek mandatory workhouse sentences for all convicted drunken drivers.

Police
continued to investigate the story of Otto J. Nelson, 38 years old,
2102 Second Avenue No., whose automobile killed Patrolman Benjamin J.
LEHMANN, 60 years old, 2651 Queen Avenue North.

Held in
jail without charge, Nelson said his car was going only 25 or 30 miles
an hour when Officer LEHMANN “ran in front of the car” at Glenwood and
Irving Avenues North.

Witnesses told police Nelson was
traveling at least 50 miles an hour, and that he did not get out of his
car after the accident. They said he halted his machine, waited for a
time and then went home without reporting the accident to police.
Patrolmen later picked him up at his home.

Nelson admitted having “a few beers,” police said.

As
a phase of Mayor Latimer’s conference, he began investigation of a
report by the dead patrolman’s wife and son that they had been denied
permission to see Officer LEHMANN when he had been brought to General
Hospital because the injuries “were not serious.”

He died while they waited for a chance to see him.

Funeral
services for Officer LEHMANN were conducted on May 6th in St. Anne’s
church, Twenty-sixth and Russell Avenues North. Surviving were his
wife, a son and a daughter. Interment at St. Mary’s cemetery.

Officer LEHMANN had been on the police department for 27 years.

On
the day Officer LEHMANN was laid to rest, the driver that struck and
killed him plead guilty and was sentenced to serve 90 days in the
Hennepin County workhouse on reckless driving charges.

On May 13th Otto Nelson was indicted for second degree manslaughter by the Hennepin County Grand Jury.

On
Sunday, January 31, 1937, Policewoman Georgiana L. SHARROT was crossing
the street at Lyndale and Franklin Avenues So., when she was run down
by a taxicab. The cab driver said he was turning left onto Lyndale
Avenue at the time of the mishap.

Policewoman SHARROT suffered a broken left leg and internal injuries. She was taken to General Hospital for treatment.

During the course of a lengthy hospitalization, she suffered a stroke.

Policewoman SHARROT died in the hospital on June 14, 1937 of
complications from her injuries. She was 67 years old at the time of
her death, and had been on the police department for 23 years.

Before becoming a policewoman, Mrs. SHARROT was a special officer for the Juvenile Protection League.

Policewoman
SHARROT was buried in Lakewood Cemetery on June 16, 1937. She had
resided at 5309 Columbus Avenue South, and was divorced and the time of
her death.

Two
police patrolmen and a bootlegger were shot when police raided a
cabaret, the Cotton Club, 718 Sixth Avenue North, to investigate a fist
fight at 4 a.m. on February 3, 1928.

Wounded in the cabaret gunplay were:

Patrolman
James H. TREPANIER, 32 years old, 4214 Nicollet Avenue South, near
death at General Hospital, with a bullet wound in his abdomen and one
in his left shoulder. A dozen policemen volunteered to give him their
blood in an attempt to save his life.

Patrolman Bernard
Wynne, 39 years old, 3823 Bryant Avenue North, World War hero, was
wounded in a gunfight two years ago in which Minneapolis Police
Sergeant Michael Lawrence was killed, and Wynne was shot three times in
the legs. In this latest pistol battle at the cabaret, Officer Wynne
was again shot in the leg.

Harry Bloom, also known as “Kid Cann”, a bootlegger and notorious North Minneapolis character, also shot in the leg.

Police gave the following account of the early morning shooting:

At
3:30 a.m., two men guests at the Cotton Club attempted to flirt with a
woman entertainer. A friend of the woman objected, pistols were drawn
and a fist fight followed, police were told by witnesses.

Cafe
patrons closed in on the fighters and quieted them. Meanwhile someone
had called the police and informed them a pistol had been drawn at the
cafe. Patrolmen TREPANIER and Wynne walked into the cabaret, drew their
pistols and commanded patrons of the cafe to line up to be searched for
pistols.

“Call the wagon while I search them,” Officer TREPANIER told Officer Wynne.

As
TREPANIER started to search the first patron in line and Wynne walked
to the telephone, a table was overturned in one end of the cabaret.
Five men were standing around the overturned table.

There
was a tense moment while the two police and five men glared at each
other. Then, with a sudden movement, one of the men drew a pistol and
opened fire on the officers. In a second several other pistols were
drawn in the crowd.

At the first shot, Officer
TREPANIER fell to the floor, severely wounded, and after two or three
more shots, Office Wynne staggered when a bullet struck his leg. Both
patrolmen returned the fire.

For a moment Pandemonium
reigned. Pistols barked and filled the small hall with their roar.
Bullets thudded into the walls, splintered chairs and tables and broke
out windows.

Women and men alike screamed, dodging,
scurrying and fighting to cover. Patrons turned over tables and cowered
behind them, fear in their eyes.

Officer TREPANIER,
stretched on the floor, groaning from his wounds, braced his right arm
with his left hand and emptied his pistol at armed men in the place.

Officer
Wynne only staggered when a bullet struck his leg. He emptied his
pistol at the crowd and, despite the pain of his wound, brought them to
order. Waving his empty pistol at the disordered mob, he commanded:

“Now
all of you line up here and be quiet.” He called the patrol wagon and
loaded the thirty remaining patrons of the cabaret into it, directing
that they be taken to police headquarters.

At
headquarters, all but eight were released. These eight were lodged in
jail and questioned after three pistols were seized from them.

Detectives
and gun squads were sent out through the city seeking other persons
believed to have escaped during the gunfight. On a tip from a man whose
car was found standing in front of the cabaret, detectives were sent to
St. Paul in search of three men believed to have been companions of the
man said to have started the shooting.

Bloom, who was
taken to General Hospital under guard after he had been questioned by
police, is said to be the same Harry Bloom who gave himself up May 1,
1924, and was charged with first degree murder in connection with the
shooting of a man in a loop cafe. Bloom told police he had shot the man
accidentally. He was never prosecuted on the charge.

The
condition of officer TREPANIER remained unchanged at General Hospital,
as two patrolmen submitted to blood transfusion operations in an
attempt to save his life. Office Wynne and Harry Bloom, both shot in
the leg, were reported out of danger.

Superintendent of
Police Frank Brunskill ordered the Cotton Club establishment closed and
declared his intentions to close every similar place in Minneapolis.
Meanwhile, every cabaret in the city was under police observation. A
week later, the license of the Cotton Club was revoked by the city
council for violating city ordinances.

The Hennepin
County grand jury indicted four men on first degree assault charges in
connection with the shooting of the two patrolmen at the cabaret.

One
of the four was Harry Bloom, who was charged with the shooting and
wounding of Patrolman Wynne. Bloom went into court and pleaded not
guilty to the charge, and was released on $2,500 bond.

The
other three indicted men, who are all charged with shooting Patrolman
Trepanier, are still at large. Of these three men sought by police, one
is a former South Dakota sheriff who had served a term in the South
Dakota penitentiary, a second is a Sioux Falls South Dakota fight
manager and the third is a former St. Paul barkeeper.

Officer
TREPANIER never recovered from the injuries he suffered in the gun
battle. One bullet struck him in the spine, paralyzing him from the
waist down.

Since the shooting, TREPANIER had been in
the hospital numerous times. Once, after he had partially recovered, he
opened a jewelry store at Lake Street and Chicago Avenue South, but
soon afterward went back to the hospital. Later, he moved his jewelry
repair bench to Veterans’ Hospital where he designed and made jewelry
and repaired watches when able to sit up.

Officer
TREPANIER waged a ten year long fight against his paralysis, but he had
grown worse steadily for more than a year, and finally succumbed on
September 20, 1938, at the U.S. Veterans’ Hospital. He was 42 years old
when he died.

TREPANIER had been a patrolman for 5
years at the time of his injury. He had been cited for bravery in the
capture of a bandit in 1924. He had served as a motorcycle policemen
prior to his transfer to the North Side precinct.

Officer TREPANIER was survived by his wife and two daughters.

On July 10, 1939, a special force of 120 Minneapolis policemen were on strike duty to maintain law and order at a Work Progress Administration (WPA) members strike.

This special detail included 76 day men at their regular posts, 40 night men, 60 traffic officers including motorcycle patrolmen, and 20 detectives.

A disturbance occurred at the sewing project headquarters at Second Avenue and Second Street North.

Officer John B. GEARTY was accompanying two other patrolmen while they were escorting a non-striker, who had been knocked down in a struggle, to police headquarters for safety.

When a picket struck one of the patrolmen, officer GEARTY pursued the picket between two automobiles, where the picket turned upon him.

Officer GEARTY suffered a blow on the temple on the scuffle. There were reports that five or six men aimed punches at GEARTY, but these could not be verified.

Officer GEARTY managed walk on to police headquarters, where other patrolmen persuaded him to go to the hospital. One policeman drove him to General Hospital over his protests.

Officer GEARTY didn’t say much; his face was flushed and he was weak. He was assisted into the hospital where he told a nurse:

“I was hurt by one of those WPA strikers.” She understood him to say either he was kicked or hit in the head.

“I was out for a few minutes,” she quoted him as saying.

Officer GEARTY told a physician he had an “awful headache”. He asked for some pills. He was taken into a ward, protesting he would rest for a little while and then go home. But shortly afterward, attendants found him unconscious. He died an hour after he had entered the hospital.

Inquiry by members of the WPA division of investigation into the cause of death of Officer GEARTY was asked immediately by the State WPA administrator of the assistant WPA commissioner in Washington, D.C.

The official report of the deputy Hennepin County coroner said:

“The autopsy revealed that death was due to coronary disease. There is a history of his having been beaten over the head. In fact, the deceased made such a statement before he died, but the autopsy did not reveal any injury which could have caused death or that they were sufficient to be contributary. On the other hand, there was a definite and severe heart condition.

The grief stricken widow said at her home at 3451 Bryant Avenue North that GEARTY had never complained of a heart ailment or any other internal disease, and that he had taken no sick leaves in recent years.

Chief of Police Frank Forestall said of Officer GEARTY’S death:

“Regardless of how he died, he died in the line of duty. If he died as they say he did of a heart attack, that attack was induced by the exertion imposed on Officer GEARTY as a result of strike activities. He was a good officer.

Officer GEARTY was 46 years old. He had been a member of the police department for 12 years. He was known to hundreds
as the traffic officer at Fifth Street and Hennepin Avenue.

He had served with a squad car out of the Bryant Avenue station before being transferred to traffic duty. Officer GEARTY was survived by his wife, a son and a daughter.

Funeral services were being held on July 13, 1939 at the family home and St. Bridget’s Church, Dowling and Emerson Avenue’s North, with burial in St. Mary’s Cemetery.

He was taken to Fairview Hospital, but released several days later.

Officer KARPINSKI was readmitted to the hospital on May 19th, due to complications. He died two days later on May 21, 1941.

A microscopic examination of the spine of Patrolman KARPINSKI was conducted at the University of Minnesota on order of the Hennepin County Coroner.

The examination was to determine whether death was caused by his injured spine, which doctors said had mended.

Officer KARPINSKI had been a police officer for 11 years, and was a veteran of the World War.

He had lived at 1906 Quincy Street Northeast with his wife. KARPINSKI was buried at Hillside Cemetery on May 23, 1941.

After the accident, Officer Olson gave police a complete description of the car he was chasing, saying it was traveling about 65 miles an hour at Forty-Sixth and Lyndale Avenue North.

Officer OLSON’S motorcycle was going about 55 miles an hour when he struck the truck. He was catapulted through the air by the impact and suffered head injuries and a broken shoulder and
a broken right leg.

Officer OLSON struck the truck of a driver who made a left turn off Lyndale Avenue into a driveway which police said was unauthorized and which had been ordered closed July 21st by the City Engineer’s office.

The driver of the truck said he made the turn after the speeder passed him, but he did not see the motorcycle officer. Officer OLSON struck the rear of the truck. Police said the driver would not be prosecuted.

Officer OLSON was 32 years old and had been on the police force only 10 months. He resided at 3443 Twenty-Fifth Avenue South with his wife.

Funeral services were held at Bethel Lutheran Church, Seventeenth Avenue South and Thirty-Second Street, with burial in Lakewood Cemetery on August 11, 1941.

One of the victims, who was home on leave from the Navy, had successfully negotiated the falls two days earlier. Higher water and a heavier current in the river, however, turned the second attempt to disaster.

Minneapolis police and the Coast Guard immediately began a search for the two missing boys without success, and they continued into the next day, June 7th, in an effort to locate their bodies.

This relentless search cost the life of Minneapolis Police Sergeant John W. O’NEIL, 47 years old, who fell from a sluiceway at the west end of the falls and drowned while attempting to recover the victim’s canoe.

Sergeant O’NEIL was a twenty-one year veteran of the police department. He lived with his wife and children at 4219 Twentieth Avenue South.

A police honor guard escorted Sergeant O’NEIL’S body when funeral services were held on June 10th at St. Helena’s Church, Forty-Third Street and Thirty-Third Avenue South. Burial was at Sunset Memorial Park.

A memorial fund for the family of Sergeant O’NEIL was set up by the Minneapolis Civic & Commerce Association.

“Sergeant O’NEIL lost his life because he was serving the city beyond requirements of duty,” the president of the association said in announcing the fund. “Although this officer was entitled to retirement with a life income, he chose to remain during the manpower shortage resulting from the inroads of war,” he said.

“We know there are a number of firms and citizens who desire to bring this man’s family some measure of relief and we have agreed to receive donations to this memorial fund. This is a voluntary movement and no drive is contemplated. Donors should make their checks payable to the fund and present them to the association.

The association president, who made a donation of $100 on behalf of the Coca Cola Bottling Company, said the association has acted in this capacity of similar occasions and any sum is acceptable.

Wicklund joined the Police Department a little over a year after the U.S. entry into World War II. Because he was married with three children and because being a police officer was considered a vital occupation during war time, Wicklund was unsuccessful in his first three attempts to enlist. Finally, on Aug. 1, 1944, he was accepted into the U.S. Marine Corps.

Following basic and advanced infantry training, he was assigned to Company H, Third Battalion of the 29th Marines of the Sixth Division which was sent in as part of the invasion of Okinawa.

He was with his machine gun squad in action against the Japanese forces on June 6, 1945. Wicklund had personally accounted for several enemy killed when he was hit in the head by a sniper’s bullet. He died instantly.

Wicklund, 30, who lived at 3923 Upton Ave. N. in Minneapolis with his wife and children, was buried at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific in Honolulu.

He was posthumously awarded the Purple Heart, Asiatic-Pacific Campaign Medal, Victory Medal World War 11 and a Presidential Unit Citation with ribbon bar and star for “extra ordinary heroism in action.”

One of the youths, 18, surrendered to police at 1 a.m., and three others, whom
he named as his companions, were picked up within two hours.

The 18 year-old and his 17 year-old companion admitted having engaged in a running fight with two men between Seventh and Eighteenth Avenues on East Lake Street early Sunday, March 25th.

It was near there that Officer MCHALE, 36 years old, was found bleeding from the wounds in his legs that led to his death in General Hospital two hours later.He apparently had been knocked through the plate glass window of Nolander’s department store at the corner of Lake Street and Seventeenth Avenue South.

Jagged fragments of glass had severed the main arteries of his legs and he died from loss of blood, despite several transfusions.

Police began the hunt for Officer MCHALE’S assailants on the story of Mason W. Wolke, operator of a service station at 5419 Lyndale Avenue South, who had been MCHALE’S companion that evening.

Wolke said the two of them left the Bee Hive Tavern, 1721 East Lake Street, shortly after 1 a.m. and crossed the street to a parking lot.

As he started to get into his car, Wolke said, he was knocked unconscious by two men.

Officer MCHALE ran around his side of the car and gave chase as the men fled. He caught up with them near Nolander’s and another fight ensued.

During the exchange of blows. Officer MCHALE apparently fell through the window and the men fled.

Exactly how long MCHALE lay bleeding near the scene of the fight is now known. But police got their first call at 1:37 a.m.

It was relayed from Blue and White taxi garage, which said that one of its drivers had radioed in a report of a man “down and bleeding” at that point.

When police and an ambulance arrived, Officer MCHALE was found about 200 feet from the corner, headed back toward Wolke’s car. Wolke’s billfold, still containing $90, was found near him.

The two youths who admitted being in the fight near the corner said they encountered two men in a car on Lake Street.
They said words led to blows and then they left the scene when one of the men went down.

The other man followed, they said, and a new fight started on the corner of Seventeenth. They recalled that a window was smashed and that they got “the other fellow” down; but they couldn’t; remember that their opponent had fallen through the
window.

The Hennepin County grand jury heard the evidence and refused to indict the four teenage youths held in the death of Officer MCHALE. Seventeen witnesses appeared before the jury which, according to County Attorney Michael Dillon, failed to find sufficient evidence of gross or criminal negligence to warrant an indictment.

Officer MCHALE lived at 5836 Bryant Avenue South with his wife and five children, ranging in age from 9 years to 8 months. He had been a member of the police force for 3 years, and was attached to the traffic squad.

He was a veteran of World War II and had attended De La Salle High School and St. John’s College.

Funeral services for Officer MCHALE were held on March 28, 1951 at Annunciation Church, with burial in Fort Snelling National Cemetery.