May 3, 1998

Who Shot Marshal Bowman? An Historical Who-Done-It

The evening calm of Punta Gorda on January 29, 1903, was shattered by a shotgun blast, then a scream!

City Marshal John H. Bowman, 45, was dead --- murdered by an assassin firing through the screened front window of Bowman's home on Taylor Street where the Court House now stands. His wife rushed to her husband. His four children begged their Daddy to speak to them. The family had gathered in their front parlor fitting new hats on the kids. They were preparing to visit Bowman's relatives in Wauchula next morning.

Bowman was holding his youngest child, 2-year-old Betty, on his lap when a "ring shot" crashed into the back of his head. Blood and brains spattered everyone's clothing. Miraculously no one else was hurt. First on the scene was State Representative Albert Gilchrist, the town's most distinguished citizen who later became governor. A bachelor, he lived at the Dade Hotel just a half-block away on West Marion Street. Strangely, years later he would play a major role in the incident.

Bowman's wound was filled with a cluster of buck-shot, created when the fiber-casing of a shot-gun shell is scored. It is a trick used by hunters to increase killing power when shooting large animals. The marshal died instantly.

Though three men were tried for the crime, and one convicted to hang, evidence was not conclusive. Identity of the killer remains a mystery, but the trial became an early test of Florida's capital punishment law.

Bowman had been elected to his fourth term as city marshal just two months before, defeating J.P. Johns by a vote of 149 to 66. The job paid $50 a month -- a decent salary for those days.

The marshal was well liked and an imposing figure with his handle-bar mustache, black frock coat, big badge and helmet. The long "billy" club he carried was more a symbol of authority than a weapon. Punta Gorda was not the peaceful village that folks today imagine. It was patronized by rough fishermen, cowboys, farm hands, and construction workers -- white and black. In the 18 years since the town was founded by Col. Isaac Trabue, there had been more than 40 murders. Fighting was so common no one paid much attention to it. Bootleggers, gamblers and prostitutes catered to this brawling clientele. City Council the year previously had adopted tough ordinances against "lewd characters, blind tigers, skin games, and vagrants."

Blind tigers were places where illegal whiskey was sold. Bootleggers were called tiger men. Skin games were any form of cards or dice played for money. Bowman had won re-election on the basis of success in arresting these lawbreakers.

Prisoners were locked in the "calaboose" -- a shed with a strap-iron cage built by a blacksmith and paid for by Trabue. It was located on an alley (now Herald Court) and behind Bowman's house. Any one of the men thrown into the cage would have motive to kill the crusading marshal.

On the evening of the murder, several boys were playing around a stable being built across from Bowman's house. Jimmy Cooper, son of County Assessor F.M. Cooper was on the stable roof in plain view of the Bowman residence.

Reported the Punta Gorda Herald:

"He saw the flash of the gun, heard the report and saw the murderer run through the stable to Sullivan Street and go straight (south) in the direction where he was met by Johnnie Matthews and seen by Pope Henderson -- running from the scene of the murder while everybody else was running towards it."

Jimmy did not recognize the assailant. However, Matthews and Henderson declared the fleeing person was Isaiah E. Cooper (no relation to Jimmy.) Isaiah was a carpenter from Fort Ogden who boarded in Punta Gorda while helping build a fish fertilizer factory near the city dock -- present site of the Punta Gorda Boat Club.

Henderson was emphatic in his identification, stating Cooper "ran past the Jess Sandlin home from which a light shone full into his upturned face and enabled me to see him clearly."

A large crowd gathered. Someone covered footprints in the stable with a box. Sheriff T.E. Fiedler was summoned from Arcadia, then the county seat. He brought bloodhounds to try and follow a trail left by the person who made the footprints.

The dogs led a search party to the railroad dock at the foot of King Street ( Tamiami Trail, U.S. 41 north) -- a direction opposite that said to have been taken by Cooper. The dogs gave up the chase there. It was not until 3 a.m. that Punta Gorda Mayor A. C. Freeman -- who operated an undertaking parlor in the back room of his hardware store -- strapped Bowman's body to a board and carried it away.

The marshal was buried next day at Indian Springs Cemetery in a ceremony attended by most of Punta Gorda. Mrs. Bowman moved to her mother's home at Charlotte Harbor Town and died two years later. The children were placed in the Arcadia Orphanage where they were eventually adopted.

Cooper denied the slaying. He asserted he was at George Alderman's boarding house on Sullivan Street at the time. His landlord corroborated Cooper's story. Cooper also stated he had not owned a gun for several months prior to the slaying. A search of his room failed to find a gun.

Several months after the assassination, a 12-gauge shot- gun, believed to be the murder weapon, was dredged from the harbor near the railroad dock. However, it could not be traced.

The townspeople raised $l,000 to hire a Tampa private detective named Clark to investigate the murder. A reward purse of $700 was subscribed by the Town Council, DeSoto County Commission and Governor W.B. Jennings.

Clark compiled two pages of "evidence" against two men with records of bootlegging arrests -- George Battersby and Dick Windham. They were taken into custody, but County Judge A. E. Pooser "repudiated the evidence as trash." He discharged the defendants who were represented by Attorney H. B. Phillips of Tampa. Thirteen days after the murder, Cooper was arrested. Ten people had come forward to state he had in their presence "made distinct and violent threats against Bowman" for falsely arresting him as a tiger man.

In the free-wheeling style of journalism at that time the Herald wrote: "Previous to the Bowman murder, Cooper was known as a bad man, a man with a violent temper and a dangerous disposition."

By this time, the townspeople had formed emotional opinions that Cooper was guilty. At his subsequent trial -- ironically prosecuted by Phillips, the attorney who had defended Battersby and Windham -- 30 witnesses demolished Cooper's alibis.

Among the hostile witnesses were three neighbors who swore that Cooper did have a gun. J. W. Booth, agent at Punta Gorda for the Atlantic Coast Line Railroad, testified that he had borrowed Cooper's 12-gauge shot-gun recently, "and found it heavily loaded with buck-shot."

Frank Ridgeway testified that he saw Cooper "standing with his gun at Bowman's gate a few weeks before the murder." Alderman was not allowed to testify to Cooper's presence at the boarding house at the time of the shooting.

When Mrs. Bowman was called to testify, she took her four children to the witness stand also. She described the agony the family had endured upon seeing their husband and father killed before their eyes. She dramatically identified little Betty's blood-stained dress.

The Herald declared, "There was not a dry eye in the court room." The jury of 12 DeSoto County men -- no Punta Gorda man was allowed to be seated -- declared Cooper guilty and sentenced him to be hung at high noon at the county jail on August 5, l904.

Cooper watched from his prison window as carpenters constructed the gallows on which he was to hang.

He shouted to the workers, "I'll never hang! The Whitecaps killed the marshal. Don't build a gallows for me. Use the lumber to build a bridge. I'm innocent. I never killed the marshal."

Whitecaps was the common name for "vigilance committees" such as the Ku Klux Klan which were active at that time.

Cooper had some reason for bravado. He had strenuously maintained innocence throughout a hearing before County Judge A. E. Pooser, the trial at Arcadia conducted by Tampa Circuit Judge J. B. Wall, a review by the Florida Supreme Court, and many petitions to the State Pardoning Board. Cooper became the focus of opposition to capital punishment. At Arcadia, then the county seat, activists called the Mourning Club led by Rev. B. F. Mason demonstrated outside the county jail. They had whipped up sentiment throughout the state to spare Cooper -- charging he had been "railroaded" on circumstantial evidence.

Cooper's attorney, Col. J. W. Brady of Bartow, worked hard to earn his $300 fee. He took Detective Clark's 20 pages of investigation to Governor W. B. Jennings at Tallahassee the night before the hanging in a last ditch effort to stay execution.

Cooper had several attorneys during the judicial process. His first lawyer was Martin L. Williams of Arcadia who was disbarred over the case, as the Herald noted in uninhabited fashion:

"Cooper was defended by one of the most brilliant and unscrupulous lawyers in Florida -- one who would hesitate at nothing to gain his purpose. Indeed, this lawyer, for his client's sake, falsified the court records and forged to them the judge's name. He evidently regarded the case as so desperate that he must sacrifice his own honor to save his client from the doom deserved."

As the day of execution drew near, sentiment for commutation of Cooper's sentence increased. Outspoken citizens of Punta Gorda grew angry.

Said the Herald,

"When the information (about a last commutation effort) became generally known, a mass meeting of citizens was held in the council room. Discussion ended in unanimous adoption of the following resolution to be sent to the Pardoning Board:

"We, representative citizens, of Punta Gorda, in mass meeting assembled, being fully convinced of the guilt of I. E. Cooper, and realizing the great atrocity of his crime, do emphatically protest with all the earnestness in our power against any interference by the Pardoning Board in behalf of this justly condemned murderer. In the name of law and justice and of this outraged community, we demand that I. E. Cooper suffer the just penalty of his crime by expiating it on the gallows in accordance with the sentence of the court."

The telegraphed resolution was signed by Mayor A. C. Freeman, Herald Editor A. P. Jordan, Capt. Charles G. Davis, R. K. Seward, Albert F. Dewey, Joshua Mizell, and G. W. McLane. All were prominent civic leaders. Then they took the night train to Arcadia to monitor the board's response.

Early the following morning -- August 5, the day set for Cooper's execution -- Sheriff Fiedler escorted Jordan, DeSoto News Editor Graham, and C. C. Chollar, an Arcadia banker to Cooper's cell as witness to an interview. It was hoped the condemned man would confess in the face of impending death. The Herald reported Cooper's "last statement:"

"I am not guilty. I have never connived at, aided or abetted such a thing in my life. I am nearly 40 years old. In that time, I have never drawn blood from a man with a weapon of any description, not even a stick. Nor have I ever had a fight with a man without its being forced on me.

"To hang me would be to commit a worse murder than has already been committed, for I will hold up my right hand to God and tell you that I did not kill Mr. Bowman. Nor did I have anything to do with it.

"I do not know anything about it -- except what I have been told. I was standing in George Alderman's back yard, for I had left old man Alderman's fire(side) and gone into the dark to keep from being killed by the same mob that killed Mr. Bowman.

"My life is being stolen from me and from my wife and little children -- wrongfully, forethoughtedly, willfully and without cause. I am guilty only of attending to my own business.

"I have not asked for anything but justice, and it is generally known that I have not had justice. I have not asked for mercy for I have not done anything to ask mercy for. I only ask for justice and trust that the people of DeSoto County will see that I get it. The matter lies in their hands."

Fifty Punta Gorda men went to Arcadia on the freight train that morning, arriving at 10 o'clock, to see Cooper "swing." A crowd of approximately 300 persons -- including the Arcadia Mourning Club -- had already gathered.

A few minutes after their arrival, Sheriff Fiedler came to the jail house steps and read a telegram he had just received from Gov. Jennings:

"DEATH WARRANT FOR EXECUTION OF PRISONER I. E. COOPER, NOW IN YOUR HANDS, IS HEREBY REVOKED AND DECLARED OF NO EFFECT. YOU ARE DIRECTED TO REPLY THEREON ACCORDINGLY AND RETURN THE SAME, NOTED 'NO EXECUTION,' TO MY OFFICE. RETURN THE PRISONER TO JAIL TO AWAIT FURTHER ORDERS FROM THE EXECUTIVE OFFICE.

The Punta Gorda men shouted protests and discussed briefly how they might get hold of Cooper to lynch him. However, the 10:30 a.m. mail train to Punta Gorda was preparing to leave so the men rushed to catch it.

On the trip home, they composed a telegram to Gov. Jennings asking his reason for calling off the execution. The message was sent off upon arrival. Within an hour the Governor's answer came, addressed to R. K. Seward:

"I DO NOT FEEL CALLED UPON TO MAKE AN EXPLANATION OF THE PERFORMANCE OF PUBLIC DUTY BUT DO NOT OBJECT TO SAYING THE PARDONING BOARD HEARD COUNSEL FOR COOPER UNTIL A LATE HOUR YESTERDAY EVENING, AND THAT I GAVE FURTHER HEARING UNTIL 11 O'CLOCK LAST NIGHT. NEW MATTERS PRESENTED AT 9:45 THIS MORNING WERE DEEMED PROPER FOR THE PARDONING BOARD TO CONSIDER. THEREFORE, IT BECAME NECESSARY TO ANNUL THE WARRANT."

Neither Jennings nor the Pardoning Board ever disclosed what the "other matters" were.

In closing its Arcadia dispatch, the Herald declared:

"Many believe that Cooper will never be hung, and they do not hesitate to advocate the policy of ignoring the courts hereafter and administrating justice themselves!"

Cooper's execution was re-scheduled for September l, l905, but again stayed until February 23, l906. This date also was postponed. Cooper's supporters prevented his death by endless appeals.

Albert Gilchrist, who had been the first to reach the Bowman murder scene and vowed to hang the assassin, was elected governor of Florida in 1908. One of his first acts was to commute Cooper's sentence to life imprisonment.

With this, Cooper was transferred to the state prison at Deland where he was leased to a heavily guarded turpentine camp as a laborer -- a common practice in those days.

On September 2, l913, Cooper was sent to work in a flooded area of the pine woods. His guard disdained to follow into the mire.

Once out of sight, Cooper kept walking and was never seen again.

By Lindsey Williams, columnist for Sun Coast Media Group newspapers

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Photo courtesy of Charlotte Harbor Area Historical Society

MARSHAL JOHN H. BOWMAN

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HERO POLICE REMEMBERED

Marshal John H. Bowman will be among 150 Florida law enforcement officers killed in the line of duty who will be remembered at a ceremony by Charlotte County Lodge, Fraternal Order of Police, dedicating a memorial at its local headquarters, 11 a.m. Friday May 8. Nine Florida officers were killed last year. A remembrance wall in Washington, D.C. lists the names of 14,500 officers who have made the "supreme sacrifice."