HYSTERICAL GIRL FOUND WITH KILLER: THE KEY WEST CITIZEN, JANUARY 30, 1958

The chase was over by the time this column was set. On January 29, 1958, officers ran Charles Starkweather to ground in the badlands of eastern Wyoming, and the next morning the Associated Press account led a front-page column in The Key West Citizen at the far end of Florida. The wire writer had the toll as it stood that day: ten dead, nine in Nebraska and one in Wyoming. Starkweather was nineteen, red-haired, in rimless glasses. Beside him in the story, as she had been in the car until the last minutes, was his girlfriend Caril Fugate, fourteen, who told the officers she had been afraid he would kill her.

What he said on the way to his cell is what makes the column worth keeping. "They wouldn't have caught me if I hadn't stopped," he told the officers. "If I'd had a gun, I'd have shot them." A sheriff's bullet had shattered the glass of his stolen sedan in the final chase and a sliver nicked his ear, and Sheriff Earl Heflin explained the surrender in one line: "It was his own blood that got him." Fugate, in shock after fleeing the car, was sheltered in the sheriff's own living quarters. In Lincoln, Starkweather's father, Guy, offered his theory that "everything just built up inside Charlie until he went beserk."

The rest of the page-one text turns to the case being built. Converse County Attorney William P. Dixon was preparing to charge him with the murder of Merle Collison, a shoe salesman from Great Falls, Montana, shot as he slept in his car near Douglas; the autopsy found nine wounds from a .22-caliber rifle. Heflin had a handwritten statement from the prisoner, "about as long as a rope," and would not discuss it. A letter from Caril's mother, Velda Bartlett, one of the dead in Nebraska, had turned up in his pockets. The column breaks off mid-sentence over a county commissioner who wanted him handed to Nebraska. Nebraska did get him, at his own choice: he was tried in Lincoln that May and executed there in June 1959.

This is an Associated Press report written within a day of the capture, not a court record, and its count is the one known that morning. The paper's ten killings in three days leave out Robert Colvert, the gas station attendant killed in Lincoln on November 30, 1957; the toll was later put at eleven, ten of them in the eight days before the arrest. The paper gives Merle Collison's age as 37 and Velda Bartlett's as 37, where other records give thirty-four and thirty-six. Starkweather was tried for one killing only, the murder of Robert Jensen, and convicted in May 1958. Fugate was later convicted in Jensen's death as well and always maintained that she had been his hostage.

The Key West Citizen for January 30, 1958, is less than ninety-five years old. The Library of Congress believes issues of this age in Chronicling America are also in the public domain, but it cautions that they may contain some copyrighted third-party material. Nothing in this item appears to be syndicated or separately copyrighted. The scan is the Library's copy, and the citation and rights statement are printed under it.

The page-one text was transcribed word for word, and the type was clean enough that nothing is marked illegible. The paper's slips stay as printed: "beserk" for berserk, "whe nhe" where the compositor shifted a space, and a capital M on "Caril's Mother" in mid-sentence. In one paragraph the county attorney turns into "Nixon," a name the story never introduces, and the transcription keeps it. The column ends at the line "(Continued on Page Four)"; the rest of the story ran on page four, which was not captured, so it is not part of this transcription.

Transcription

Transcribed word for word from the page scan. Original spelling, punctuation, capitalisation and typographical errors have been kept exactly as printed. Unreadable words are marked [illegible]. Nothing has been modernised or corrected.

Hysterical Girl Found With Killer

DOUGLAS, Wyo. (AP) — A young gunman, sought in a wave of 10 savage killings, was captured yesterday in the badlands of eastern Wyoming.

Charles Starkweather, 19, and his brunette girl friend, Caril Fugate, 14, were caught after nine persons in Nebraska and one in Wyoming had been slain in a three-day period.

The girl told officers she feared Starkweather, red-haired and wearing rimless glasses, would kill her.

"They wouldn't have caught me if I hadn't stopped," Starkweather snarled as officers hailed him to a jail cell. "If I'd had a gun, I'd have shot them."

Automobile glass, shattered by bullets in the wild chase that led to Starkweather's capture, nicked the gunman's ear.

Sheriff Earl Heflin said "It was his own blood that got him. He thought he was shot deader'n hell when he saw that blood."

"He thought he was bleeding to death," the sheriff added. "That's the kind of yellow s.o.b he is."

The girl, in a state of shock after fleeing Starkweather's car before the final chase leading to his capture, was sheltered in the living quarters of the sheriff and his wife.

Two possible reasons for the wave of slayings came to light today.

At Lincoln, Neb., his father, Guy Starkweather said: "He is to lose his sight within a year," because of being hit on the head by a piece of lumber. The father said he believed "everything just built up inside Charlie until he went beserk."

County Atty. William Dixon at Douglas said a letter to Starkweather from Caril's mother was found in his pockets. Dixon declined to say what the letter said, but said it "had to do with Caril's mother and her attitude toward Starkweather."

Caril's Mother, Mrs. Velda Bartlett, 37, was one of the nine persons killed in Nebraska.

Sheriff Heflin served papers on Starkweather in his cell today charging him with the Wyoming slaying of a Montana shoe salesman. The sheriff said he had a hand-written statement from Starkweather, a statement "about as long as a rope." He wouldn't discuss it further.

He said he planned to get a statement today from the girl.

Starkweather spent two hours in his cell last night working on his statement. Afterward Nixon said "we have everything we need now." He said the statement is evidence and declined to disclose it to reporters.

The bandy - legged little gun toter complained mostly of a small nick in his ear suffered when a sheriff's bullet shattered glass in his stolen sedan.

He seemed unconcerned about the girl, who was put under sedation after she had fled his car in hysterics shortly before he was captured.

Converse County Atty. William P. Dixon prepared to file murder charges today against Starkweather in the death of Merle Collison, 37-year-old shoe salesman from Great Falls, Mont. Collison was shot as he slept in his car near Douglas. An autopsy disclosed nine bullet wounds from a .22-caliber rifle.

Starkweather had an empty .22-caliber rifle whe nhe was surprised by another motorist standing by Collison's car.

Dixon said that one member of the Converse County Board of Commissioners at Douglas wanted to turn Starkweather over to Nebraska authorities but that he

(Continued on Page Four)

Transcriber's notes

- Readability: Very good. The body type is clean and well inked and no [illegible] markers were needed. The weakest patch is the gutter between the paragraph "That's the kind of yellow s.o.b he is." and the one following it, where a faint band of show-through from the reverse of the sheet crosses the column; the words there are still plainly legible.

- Printers' errors kept as printed: "until he went **beserk**" (for "berserk"); "an empty .22-caliber rifle **whe nhe** was surprised" — the compositor has transposed the space, setting "whe nhe" for "when he"; and "the kind of yellow **s.o.b** he is." with no point after the final "b".

- Capitalisation kept as printed: "**Caril's Mother**, Mrs. Velda Bartlett, 37" takes a capital M on "Mother" in mid-sentence.

- Spaced-out setting: to justify its lines the paper letter-spaces three words — "red-h a i r e d", "hand-written s t a t e m e n t" and "bandy - legged" (the last with spaces either side of the hyphen). The first two have been closed up to "red-haired" and "statement" as ordinary words; the spaced hyphen in "bandy - legged" has been left as printed because it reads as the paper set it.

- Unexplained name, left exactly as printed: "Afterward **Nixon** said 'we have everything we need now.'" No Nixon is introduced anywhere in the article; the official quoted throughout is County Atty. William P. Dixon. This looks like a wire-copy or composing error for "Dixon", but the transcription keeps "Nixon".

- The Associated Press credit is printed with the AP logotype inside the parentheses rather than plain letters; it has been transcribed as "(AP)".

- Jump line: the column breaks off mid-sentence at "…but that he" and carries the line "(Continued on Page Four)", which is included above as printed. The remainder of the story is on page four and is not part of this column; the eighth tile (c1_005180.png) is a short tile containing only the end of the column and that jump line.

- Factual note, offered neutrally and with no change made to the transcription: the paper gives Caril Fugate's surname correctly and her age as 14, and Merle Collison as a 37-year-old Great Falls shoe salesman, both of which match the accepted record. The headline figure of "10 savage killings" is the count as known on 30 January 1958; the toll attributed to Starkweather and Fugate was later put at eleven. Caril Ann Fugate's mother is generally recorded as Velda Bartlett, as printed here.