May Murdoch didn't want to believe the information she had recently received about her husband of 26 years.
She couldn't allow herself to believe it - the news was too heartbreaking.
Also, it did seem very out of character. May and Robert had hardly had a fight in all of the years they'd been married and surely she'd have some sense of trouble in her marriage ... if there was any.
However, according to May's reliable source, Robert was cheating on her with another woman ... a much younger woman named Anna Baker. Furthermore, Robert was planning to force their 18-year-old son Bruce to marry this woman to cover up his own infidelity and Anna's delicate condition.
The shame upon their family might be something she could eventually withstand but when 51-year-old May learned her 47-year-old husband had intended to murder her with an axe, Mrs. Murdoch felt she had no choice but to prepare for the worst and take precautions. And if May had any doubts about what the future held, she couldn't help but notice that Robert had just purchased of a large quantity of lime. Okay, so they were ranchers with substantial land but she had been told very specifically that Robert was going to kill her and bury her body in a manure pile.
And so it was that on March 17, 1923, May Murdoch shot her husband 4 times with a .38 caliber handgun.
May would later claim to not know how the gun came into her hand nor could she recall the moment when she squeezed the trigger but 4 bullets found their mark following a quarrel on the front porch of their Biggs, California home.
The first shot pierced Robert's chin, another his right shoulder, the third his right side, and the fourth struck him in the back.
A bleeding and frightened Robert staggered some 300 feet to the home of James and Eva Frost and said his wife had shot him. The Frosts, who had heard the gunshots less than five minutes earlier, transported Robert to the Oroville Hospital.
May's actions were as surprising to Robert as the news of his homicidal intentions had been to May; Robert had no idea he was skating on thin ice with his wife. He was unable to understand her actions and told police "I think the woman is insane. She lost her mind."
According to Robert, he and May had the house to themselves as their son Robert was in town seeing a movie. Feeling amorous, Robert made a move towards his wife but she recoiled. Thinking her playful, he chased her around the room and finally out on to the porch.
May wasn't playing hard to get, she was terrified. The end was near.
Only the day before May had changed her will, leaving the bulk of her estate to her son Bruce, to be held in a trust until he was 21-years-old. May's sister Stella and two of her nieces were to receive $300 each. Her husband was to get nothing and May specified she was leaving a curse upon the whole Murdoch family who "have made a life of hell for me."
When Constable Barney Demes arrested May the day after the shooting, she was quick to tell him "If you had done your duty three months ago this wouldn't have happened."
May was reminding Constable Demes of her request three months prior to have Robert arrested because of his affair with Anna Baker.
Demes did actually look into May's allegations at the time of the complain but he found no evidence to support her claims.
In fact, Demes was unable to prove the existence of Anna Baker despite May providing an address for the woman. Constable Deme and Mrs. Murdoch drove to the specified location and found the information to be false. Nobody at that address had heard of Anna Baker.
From his hospital bed, Robert made a statement to police before blood poisoning claimed his life on April 1, 1923.
I'm not sure he ever fully comprehended what had caused the rift in his marriage or if he knew that his wife was getting all of her information from a Ouija board.
That's right - the Ouija board which May had purchased in November 1922 as a Christmas gift for her son Bruce had been the cause of all this trouble.
As May would later testify, "Had I stayed with my Bible and left the Ouija board alone I would have been all right today." Truer words were never spoken.
To most of us, it seems silly that anything revealed through the use of these "talking boards" could be believed 100% but Ouija boards, seances and spiritualism were all the rage in the early 1920s.
May Murdoch wasn't the only one to place her faith in the occult or to make irrational decisions based on what the Ouija revealed.
While Robert may have been unaware of how unbalanced his wife had become or how seriously she was listening to the spirit guides, the signs were there. Testimony given during May's trial, which began on June 12, 1923, revealed the woman's state of mind during the months prior to Robert's death.
Bruce told the jury that fear had compelled his mother to hide all of the axes, hammers and hatchets where Robert couldn't find them.
Mrs. Eva Frost, testified that May told her she would "get her husband if he don't get me first."
Eva had even been present on several occasions when May used the Ouija board and she'd even rested her fingers on the planchette as it revealed answers to questions May had written on pieces of paper but not spoken aloud. Without the questions, the responses meant nothing to Eva.
The District Attorney, William Rothe, refused to accept May's temporary insanity defense despite not being able to provide the jury with a clear motive for the crime. Rothe and Assistant D.A. Clinton Johnson charged May with murder and intended to seek the death penalty.
As usual, the defense and prosecution lawyers brought forth experts in the field of mental health to give their learned opinion(s) with regards to May's sanity. They essentially cancelled each other out.
Dr. J. O. Wilder, who appeared as a prosecution witness, later submitted a bill for $696. He was on the stand for one hour but had spent 4 days in Butte studying Mrs. Murdoch. The inflation calculator tells me that's $10,579.12 in today's money.
Neighbors and merchants who had dealings with May prior to the shooting took the stand and claimed to have noticed nothing different in the woman's behavior; she seemed as rational and steady as she always had been.
May's daily diary was delved into by the prosecution team and passages were read aloud but this revealed neither dementia nor her motivation for the crime.
The Murdochs seemed to be living normal, borderline boring lives. May testified that it was her habit to write her diary entries every evening following dinner. The March 17th entry was no different from the others in tone and yet less than three hours later, May would shoot her husband.
There were only two instances when the Ouija was mentioned by May. The first was when she purchased it in November 1922 and then months later when she instructed Bruce to take an axe to the board and destroy it.
A holographic (handwritten) last will and testament drawn up by May on April 24, 1923 as she sat in a holding cell at the Butte County jail, was witnessed by Mary A. Barkley, May's cellmate and Butte's first female bootlegger.
This document was entered into evidence alongside May's March 16th will as further proof of the defendant's state of mind. I'm not sure how the defense team thought this would strengthen the temporary insanity plea other than to prove May was lucid before and after she shot Robert.
May's first will begins with the words, "If anything happens to me ..."
The April 24th document begins "Believing myself to be sound in mind and innocent in the sight of God of any crime, I this day bequeath whatever property I own at my death to the following:"
The division of property, as stipulated on April 24th, is only slightly different from the will May had written 5 1/2 weeks earlier.
May no longer bequeathed specific sums of cash to her sister and nieces but rather all of the furniture, some belonging to her own mother, Phebe Hudson Standley, which May had left behind in Ohio before making the move to California with Robert some time between 1900 and 1904.
May asked, as she had in March, that Mr. Bernard Lucas be appointed her son's guardian and administrator of the estate until Bruce reaches the age of 21.
The jury heard from the dead man indirectly when stenographer/Deputy Clerk Miss Jean Howe took the stand to read Robert's official statement to police.
Robert believed May to be insane when she shot him and said he didn't blame her. That's not to say Robert felt he deserved to be shot, just that he didn't think May was in her right mind when she shot him. Robert even tried to cover for May and at one point claimed to not know who shot him.
May didn't deny shooting Robert, which made things easier for the prosecution, but she maintained that she wasn't sure how the gun got into her hand and she couldn't show police where she had hidden it afterwards. The spirits had played a part in all of this.
May claimed to not have experienced a lucid moment from the time the gun appeared in her hand until the police came to interview her. A thorough search of the Murdoch home and premises had been conducted but the weapon was never found.
While in the courtroom, May could be seen clutching her well-worn Bible. She was dressed in black and appeared composed for the most part.
Extreme emotions were on display when May openly sobbed as a potential juror, Mr. J. R. McDonald, asked to be excused because of his close friendship with the victim and later more tears were shed during her own attorney's closing argument.
However, during the District Attorney's closing argument, May fainted when he called a murderess and she had to be carried from the courtroom.
On June 16th, four days after the trial began, the verdict was in.
After deliberating for 5 hours and 15 minutes, the jury of twelve men found May Murdoch guilty of manslaughter.
Eight ballots were drawn before the verdict was reached. The first vote had six jurors leaning towards acquittal on the grounds of temporary insanity and six jurors willing to convict, but not on any specific charge.
Manslaughter wasn't as satisfying as the first degree murder conviction the District Attorney had hoped for but William Rothe left the courtroom convinced May would serve the maximum sentence of 10 years. Boy, would he be disappointed.
As explained in the June 18, 1923 edition of the Oroville Daily Register, "Under the indeterminate sentence law of California, the Superior Court merely goes through the formality of pronouncing sentence, which is set by the statute and in the case of manslaughter is not less than 1 year and not more than 10 years. The actual time the prisoner must serve is set by the State Prison Board after the convicted person has been incarcerated for one year."
May Murdoch arrived at San Quentin Prison on June 23, 1923 and she was paroled on September 7, 1925.
Upon hearing the news of May's release, William Rothe angrily told the press, "It is but little use to send murderers and other convicted criminals to the penitentiary if the prison board is to release them in such a short time after they arrive there."
Despite his disappointment with the State Prison Board, William Rothe was having a good year.
On August 20, 1925, William married Miss Jean Howe. Remember her from the trial? Jean had been the one to read Robert's statement to the jury.
In between the Murdoch trial and her wedding, Jean Howe became the Butte County court reporter.
William would eventually become a judge for the Chico Judicial District Court. He and Jean were together until his death in 1971, at the age of 80. Jean would survive him by 26 years and pass away in 1997 at the age of 96. They had two children.
As requested by May Murdoch in both of her wills and later in a petition to the court, Bernard F. Lucas, was appointed the administrator of her husband's estate and farm.
On April 11, 1923, the value of these holdings was estimated to be $10,500 (or $159,598.77, in today's money). The land alone was worth $7,500 (or $113,999.12, in today's money).
In October 1923, Lucas was assigned guardianship of Bruce's interests.
On December 9, 1925, Bernard Lucas was found guilty on four counts of falsifying entries in the records of the Sacramento Valley Bank located in Biggs, California. He received a sentence of 20 years and was shipped off to San Quentin.
Owing to the fact that he was incarcerated, Lucas was unable to fulfill his obligation to the Murdoch estate and a petition was filed to have him removed as administrator. Fair enough.
In her affidavit, Mrs. Murdoch stated that Lucas had never filed an account of the affairs of the estate, the value of which was dwindling under his care. In less three years, the value had depreciated by $695.66 ($10,215.51, in today's money).
The Murdoch family's request was granted and, on May 3, 1926, Esther B. Marshall replaced Lucas as administrator.
Barney Lucas was paroled on July 24, 1929 and discharged 2 years later.
Despite his criminal record, the 1930 US Census shows Bernard Lucas employed as an accountant with a bank. He died December 8, 1939 a the age of 46.
In a strange turn of events, one that not even the Ouija board could have predicted, in 1933 Constable Barney Demes was shot and killed by one of his best friends.
This shooting was as much of a surprise to all involved as the events in the Murdoch house ten years earlier had been. Maybe more so.
On March 11, 1933, William B. Hurd, 65 years old, entered the Boulware Bros. Pool Hall through the front door on B Street at 9:50 AM, he grabbed a piece of chalk and drew a puzzle on the blackboard. He, apparently, was well-known for this love of puzzles so this wasn't too much out of character.
The drawing consisted of three squares, supposedly representing houses, and below them, he drew three circles representing tanks. The object, Hurd said, was to connect the three houses with pipes without crossing any lines.
Hurd then walked out the back door and within minutes returned with a .38 caliber handgun. Without saying a word, Hurd shot his good friend Barney Demes, 73-years-old, in the stomach.
Another of Hurd's friends, Mike Wagner, 74-years-old, was shot in the groin.
Afterwards Hurd sat in a chair, thrust the muzzle of the gun into his own mouth and pulled the trigger. Hurd died instantly.
Amazingly, Demes and Wagner managed to walk out the front door under their own power.
One of six witness to the whole thing, Fred Pearne, escorted both victims to the Demes house on C Street. Wagner made it to the hospital first and would survive but Demes would not be so lucky.
The single bullet struck Deme low in the abdomen, perforating his bowel in six places then it went through the right hip bone and lodged in the large thigh muscle. He lost a large amount of blood and according to D. E.A. Kusel, Deme was "virtually pulseless" when placed on the operating table. He was pronounced dead at 2:10 PM.
An investigation into the incident revealed William Hurd had been suffering from depression the last six months and many of their mutual friends believed he "wanted to take Demes and Wagner with him."
Hurd's former mother-in-law, Fanny Dick, said William had often told her "Mama, when I go, I'm not going alone."
Two months prior to the shooting, Hurd had shown up at the Dick family home to collect all of his photos, saying he wanted to send thto his mother.
Friends remembered William Hurd as a man who "liked to work puzzles and read poetry" but they might have done well to also remember that when Williams' much younger wife Inez filed for divorce in 1920, after 8 years of marriage, she cited "extreme cruelty, claiming that he had choked her and that he used inhumane and vulgar language persistently." Linett was only 19 when she married the 41-year-old William Hurd.
Barney Deme's wife Frederika filed for the $5,000 widow's benefit but her claim was denied by the Industrial Compensation Insurance Company. It seems Barney was not killed "in the line of duty" despite the fact that a Constable is considered to be on call 24 hours a day. Barney was simply killed because he was William Hurd's friend.
I have been unable to find a death date or final resting place for May Murdoch.
Robert and May's son, Bruce Nelson Murdoch, died on December 26, 2001 at the age of 96. Zella, his wife of 58 years, died on March 23, 1991. She was 85.
Naturally, when I read that Bruce wasn't home at the time his father was shot because he was in town seeing motion picture, I wanted to know which movie.
Assuming Bruce was in nearby Oroville on March 17th, 1923, this is what was playing in both theatres -
