Hughes County,

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Deputy Sheriff Bill GADDY Who Survived Deadly Barrage Of Gun Fire Tells Of Calvin Shooting!

From the Holdenville Daily News, Thursday, March 12, 1936.

    With the life of Roy (Luke) CHADWICK, his severely wounded companion officer, hanging in the balance at Emergency Hospital and a bullet wound in his right shoulder sending darting pains through his own body, Bill GADDY, deputy sheriff, this afternoon related details of how the fusillade from two desperadoes moved down the officers at Calvin shortly after midnight.

    GADDY, visible racked by pain, remained on duty in an effort to help a posse of state and federal officers, in cooperation with Sheriff Harve BALL, weave together fragmentary clues which might lead to identification to the two heavily- armed men.

    At the sheriff's office, GADDY told how he and CHADWICK, with no warning, were mowed down by a hail of lead. After both officers had been felled by bullets, the gunmen kept firing in rapid succession at GADDY, who crawled 20 feet to a point of vantage where he could return the gunfire.

    One bullet entered CHADWICK's right side, ranged downward, and cut his intestines in three places. Burns from the bullet are proving as serious to CHADWICK was struck in the right ear by another bullet which miraculously missed wounding him fatally.

    During the fusillade, GADDY was wounded in the right shoulder. Another bullet pierced the left lapel of his coat, just grazing his clothes.

    As soon as they could gain partial composure, both GADDY and CHADWICK emptied their revolves at the fleeing car. "I don't see how one of the men in the car could possibly have missed being struck by our bullets," GADDY declared.

    Survivor of more than one harrowing gun battle, GADDY, in his usual calm and deliberate manner, continued;

    "I was parked out in front of the lunch stand, near the highway, waiting for 'Thad WILKES, bloodhound keeper at the McAlester State Penitentiary. We were going to use the hounds for investigation of the burning of an Indian's barn near Wetumka.

    "Roy CHADWICK, who had been in the lunchroom talking to John CASTLEMAN, Calvin night watchman, and Mack HARDWICK, night watchman for Moran-Buchner Construction Company, came out to my car.

    Roy asked me what I was doing there. I told him I was waiting for the bloodhounds. He then told me there were two men inside and there was something wrong with them for they were armed.

    I told Roy that perhaps they were officers. He said no, they were not because they acted peculiarly. Thinking nothing wrong, I reassured Roy by telling him that perhaps they were secret service men because often they wear guns in shoulder holsters.

    "That's the car one of the men got out of. We might walk over and get the tag number and see where it was issued," I told Roy.

    "We got out of my car and we walked within ten feet of the other car. One man came out and got into the driver's seat. The other then came out, got in the car and said, " By -----, we don't want to break any of our whiskey."

    They backed the car around even with my car, stopped for just a second, then pulled up, starting north on the highway. They drove north about 50 or 60 feet, then backed up even with us again.

    One said, "What in the ____ do you call this place?"

    As I turned to say something to him, I put my head in their car, and the man on the opposite side stuck an automatic in my face and told me to get 'em up.

    I told him we were officers.

    His companion next to me was leaning forward and the driver's hand holding the automatic was lying across the companion's back.

    I grabbed the gun with my left hand and shoved it to the top of the car. As I did so, he fired and hollered, "Look out,' evidently to warn his companion. 

    As the driver fired while he and I were grappling, the other man in the car nearest me, jerked out two guns, one in each hand.

    By then I was partly inside their car and the man next o me holding both his guns on me while I was still holding the driver's gun above my head.

    Roy was right back of my left side.

    Before we could pull our guns for the holsters, both men started shooting.

    While all three of their guns were being fired directly at us, Luke later told me he shot into the stomach of the man nearest us. He might have wounded him which accounts for mo more of their bullets hitting us.

    I fell backwards to the ground wounded and turned my face to the ground to miss their gunfire. I then crawled 20 feet to in front of a car parked there and finished emptying my gun from there.

    When I finished emptying my gun, they had pulled up 30 or 40 feet from where the shooting started. I glanced around to see where Roy was. He was lying on his right side trying to raise himself on his right arm. Blood was streaming from the right side of his head where the bullet pierced his ear. He was still holding his gun which he had emptied. Roy was soon unconscious.

    I reloaded my gun and hot my other gun out of the car and hollered to somebody to take Roy to the hospital as quickly as they could.

    The two men had then driven out of shooting range and were driving north from Calvin as fast as the car would travel.

    After telling them to get Roy to the hospital, I ran across the street to phone Sheriff Harve BALL, telling him to cover all  the highways and only told him about Roy having been wounded.

    By the time I finished phoning, I was bleeding freely from the shoulder wound. I asked what they had done with Roy and they told me they had taken him to Dr. MARTIN's residence in Calvin.

    I told them he needed to be taken to a hospital right now." Dr. SPETTEL came up about that time and told me I was bleeding quite a bit, having noticed the blood coming through my coat.

    Dr. SPETTEL told me I needed to go to a doctor, but I was more interested in seeing Roy taken care of, so I got Broaddus MARTIN to drive my car since my arm was them becoming numb, and we started to Holdenville with Roy.

    I stayed with Roy at the emergency hospital until 3:30 o'clock this morning when Dr. FLOYD and Dr. DAVENPORT told me I had better get home. I would not let them take care of me until I knew they had done everything that could be done for Roy.

    With but a few hours sleep and showing no strain of the withering gunfire of a short time previously, GADDY arose at his usual hour this morning and joined fellow officers in an effort to obtain clues as to the identity of the two assailants.

    GADDY has had an uncanny experience in emerging from gun battles with desperadoes, without fatal injuries. In February 1935, he was forced to the curb on North Hinckley Street by Red KUYKENDALL, Dale STAMPHILL, and three companions, all escaped convicts, who attempted to rob him. Although greatly outnumbered and with a sawed-off shotgun staring him in the face, GADDY shot STAMPHILL, armed with a shotgun, knocking him down. after riddling GADDY's car with buckshot, the quintet fled. 

 

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