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Authors: Max Allan Collins
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grand kidnapping of William Hamm, the Hamm’s Beer baron. It didn’t make sense; Touhy was well fixed and moving into legit concerns. Maybe Touhy’s motive was supposed to be envy—since Hamm was back in the brewing business legally.
Purvis proudly told the press he had an “ironclad case,” an opinion the jury didn’t share. Even before Touhy was cleared, underworld word was the Karpis-Barker gang had pulled the Hamm snatch; if Purvis was any kind of investigator he’d have heard that too— I heard it, and I wasn’t anywhere near the case.
Almost immediately, Purvis hit Touhy with another kidnapping charge—that of Jake “The Barber” Factor, no less, a notorious if slick international con man with Capone ties. Everybody in town knew that Factor was just looking to avoid extradition to England, that he’d kidnapped himself (with a little help from his Capone connections) and framed Touhy.
Everybody but Purvis, apparently; he’d bought it—and managed to sell it to a jury, this time, because poor old Roger “The Terrible” was doing ninety-nine years at Joliet. And no sooner had the prison doors shut than Frank Nitti—at the helm of the Capone Outfit—waltzed into Des Plaines.
Purvis had come off looking good in the press, however, though the Little Bohemia episode, last April, had finally caught “Little Mel” with his pants down. (I heard Purvis didn’t like
M ELVIN P URVIS
being called Little Mel to his face, but that’s how everybody referred to him behind his back.)
Purvis had had a tip that Dillinger and his gang were holed up in the Little Bohemia Lodge way at the top of Wisconsin. He and a couple handfuls of other agents piled into three little planes and flew to Rhinelander, where they connected with Division of Investigation agents from St. Paul. The hastily assembled task force commandeered some local cars and drove another near-fifty miles over snow-covered secondary roads. Two of the four cars broke down along the way, and by the time the sixteen agents reached Little Bohemia, half of them were riding the running boards, chattering with cold.
They approached the lodge on foot, moving through the pines, flashlights in hand. As the agents reached the lodge, which was brightly lit, three men exited the front door and went quickly to a coupe in the nearby parking area, and Purvis ordered his men to open fire. One of the three men was killed instantly; the other two were wounded.
Purvis and his agents had just killed a Civilian Conservation Corps worker and wounded a CCC cook and a gas-station attendant. Meanwhile, John Dillinger, among others, having seen the flashlights, had gone out the back way. Baby Face Nelson stopped long enough to shoot up some feds. And hours later Purvis collared some of the gang’s molls, who’d been huddling in the basement with the lodge’s staff, while the feds had pummeled the place with machine-gun fire.
This time the press had Purvis for supper. There were demands for his resignation aplenty, but his boss J. Edgar Hoover had made a show of standing behind his boy—at the same time bringing reliable, methodical Sam Cowley in to take charge of the Dillinger case….
There was no secretary or receptionist in an outer office, at the Chicago field office of the Division of Investigation. There was no outer office. It was just a big open room full of desks, without any partitions. Agents were scurrying around with papers in hands, going from desk to desk conferring with their brethren, and the typewriters clicking and phones ringing and electric fans whirring mixed with street sounds coming from open windows, making a cacophony that had to be talked over.
One of the agents, seated at a desk near the door, looked up from a typewriter with irritation; apparently being close to the door got him stuck with receptionist-type duties.
“Can I help you?” he said sharply. He had a smooth rosy-cheeked face and light blond hair and, like everybody
Purvis proudly told the press he had an “ironclad case,” an opinion the jury didn’t share. Even before Touhy was cleared, underworld word was the Karpis-Barker gang had pulled the Hamm snatch; if Purvis was any kind of investigator he’d have heard that too— I heard it, and I wasn’t anywhere near the case.
Almost immediately, Purvis hit Touhy with another kidnapping charge—that of Jake “The Barber” Factor, no less, a notorious if slick international con man with Capone ties. Everybody in town knew that Factor was just looking to avoid extradition to England, that he’d kidnapped himself (with a little help from his Capone connections) and framed Touhy.
Everybody but Purvis, apparently; he’d bought it—and managed to sell it to a jury, this time, because poor old Roger “The Terrible” was doing ninety-nine years at Joliet. And no sooner had the prison doors shut than Frank Nitti—at the helm of the Capone Outfit—waltzed into Des Plaines.
Purvis had come off looking good in the press, however, though the Little Bohemia episode, last April, had finally caught “Little Mel” with his pants down. (I heard Purvis didn’t like
M ELVIN P URVIS
being called Little Mel to his face, but that’s how everybody referred to him behind his back.)
Purvis had had a tip that Dillinger and his gang were holed up in the Little Bohemia Lodge way at the top of Wisconsin. He and a couple handfuls of other agents piled into three little planes and flew to Rhinelander, where they connected with Division of Investigation agents from St. Paul. The hastily assembled task force commandeered some local cars and drove another near-fifty miles over snow-covered secondary roads. Two of the four cars broke down along the way, and by the time the sixteen agents reached Little Bohemia, half of them were riding the running boards, chattering with cold.
They approached the lodge on foot, moving through the pines, flashlights in hand. As the agents reached the lodge, which was brightly lit, three men exited the front door and went quickly to a coupe in the nearby parking area, and Purvis ordered his men to open fire. One of the three men was killed instantly; the other two were wounded.
Purvis and his agents had just killed a Civilian Conservation Corps worker and wounded a CCC cook and a gas-station attendant. Meanwhile, John Dillinger, among others, having seen the flashlights, had gone out the back way. Baby Face Nelson stopped long enough to shoot up some feds. And hours later Purvis collared some of the gang’s molls, who’d been huddling in the basement with the lodge’s staff, while the feds had pummeled the place with machine-gun fire.
This time the press had Purvis for supper. There were demands for his resignation aplenty, but his boss J. Edgar Hoover had made a show of standing behind his boy—at the same time bringing reliable, methodical Sam Cowley in to take charge of the Dillinger case….
There was no secretary or receptionist in an outer office, at the Chicago field office of the Division of Investigation. There was no outer office. It was just a big open room full of desks, without any partitions. Agents were scurrying around with papers in hands, going from desk to desk conferring with their brethren, and the typewriters clicking and phones ringing and electric fans whirring mixed with street sounds coming from open windows, making a cacophony that had to be talked over.
One of the agents, seated at a desk near the door, looked up from a typewriter with irritation; apparently being close to the door got him stuck with receptionist-type duties.
“Can I help you?” he said sharply. He had a smooth rosy-cheeked face and light blond hair and, like everybody
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