Combat Sports Historian and Martial Artist
Posts about police history with special emphasis on St. Louis police history.
Tom Allen was born in Birmingham, England on April 23, 1840 but he became famous as a heavyweight bare knuckle prizefighter in America. Settling in St. Louis around 1867, Allen won the American Heavyweight Championship in 1873 and held the title until 1876. He returned to England for a year before returning to St. Louis for good in 1878. Back
On Saturday, April 9, 2022, the Franklin County Missouri Historical Society invited me to give a PowerPoint presentation on the Union Missouri Bank Robbery of 1902. The book covers the robbery, the investigation, two nationwide hunts for the fugitive and a daring break from the St. Louis City Jail. Two daring robbers, not yet 23 years of age, pulled off
On Christmas Night 1902, two small town, small-time, holdup men blew open the safe of the Union, Missouri Bank. After threatening a few citizens, they made off with over $15,000. The men were relatively safe for a few months until the Pinkerton Detective Agency was called in. The Pinkertons had a nationwide agency, which was the closest thing the United
On Monday evening, July 16, 1917, St. Louis Police Officer Julius H. Petring assigned to the North Market Division entered a rooming house at 2301 N. Market Street. Petring asked the proprietor William Dietrich to rent a room for him and his wife. His “wife” was his recently divorced girlfriend Freda Hagenmeyer. Officer Petring had been seeing Freda Hagenmeyer, who
Over his 17 year career, St. Louis Chief of Detectives William Desmond dealt with many criminal’s family members. Some family members were as bad or worse than the criminal Chief Desmond and his men had locked up. However, many family members were honest, hard-working people, who struggled to understand what went wrong with their loved one. Early in his career
“For the good of the department”. With those 6 words, the St. Louis Board of Police Commissioners removed St. Louis Chief of Detectives William Desmond from the position he held for 17 years. They replaced him with Desmond’s ex-assistant James Smith, who was dismissed by the previous board. How did one of the greatest, if not the greatest, detectives in
On December 15, 1903, about 2:00 o’clock in the morning, George Harding, the clerk of the Erie Hotel, was busy working in his office. Used to working alone, Harding had relaxed his vigil and didn’t notice three large, hard looking men enter the hotel at Fourth and Clark Streets. His attention was arrested, when the first man entered his office
Before he was promoted to Special Officer, St. Louis Police Officer Preston Anslyn responded to calls for service like any other patrolman. On the morning of February 28, 1916, Anslyn was patrolling the area of Franklin and Jefferson Avenues. A citizen notified Anslyn that 30-year-old Albert Kivet was celebrating after his birthday on February 27th. During his revelry, Kivet assaulted
On October 16, 1920, Special Officers Preston Anslyn and William A. Moller were following two burglars in the 3800 block of Juanita Avenue during a heavy fog. One or both burglars shot the officers from a gangway as they walked onto the lawn of a house, where they thought the burglars entered. The officers both suffered fatal wounds, which killed
Running a pawn shop has always been a tough business because you constantly have to be on the look out for thieves attempting to pawn their stolen goods in your shop. In the late 19th Century, police detectives worked with pawn shops, as they do today, to try to stop the fencing of goods. In August 1885, future St. Louis