The Murder of John P. Jones, of Storm Hill (Lansford), Pennsylvania, September 3, 1875

Prologue

On Friday, September 3, 1875, Tamaqua found itself in the epicenter of “Molly Maguire” hysteria. Three arrests were made west of Oddfellows Cemetery in the early afternoon. Those arrested were shortly charged in the shooting and murder of John P. Jones a mine superintendent for the Lehigh & Wilkes-Barre Coal Company (LWC), Colliery No. 4, located in present day Lansford, PA.  

Jones had been shot in Storm Hill (near the Lansford Station and telegraph office) in a crowd of people early that morning. Jones was walking to his office near the Lansford Train Depot. The train from Tamaqua was shortly due, and about one hundred people, travelers, railroad men and employees of the LWC, were milling about, nearby.  Two men suddenly appeared near Jones, and commenced firing repeatedly but quickly at Jones, killing him.  The perpetrators then disappeared, as the Tamaqua train arrived, and disembarked its passengers. Several men proceeded to Tamaqua on railroad trucks to station themselves to intercept the perpetrators, if possible, in their believed escape towards Tamaqua. They did not capture them but the citizens and police in Tamaqua became aware of the murder 

Scene of Jones' Murder near the Office of the LWC and the Lansford Depot

The Jones murder and arrests followed another prior murder in Tamaqua proper on July 6 at the corner of Broad and Lehigh Street. Killed at that time was Benjamin F. Yost, a Tamaqua policeman.  That murder had remained publicly unsolved in the intervening two months, even though many believed it was related to the “Molly Maguires”.  An undercover private detective - James "McKenna" McParlan, working for the Pinkerton Agency employed in turn by The Philadelphia & Reading Railroad Company was immediately sent to Tamaqua after the Yost murder to investigate any connection with so-called Molly Maguires.

McParlan became aware of a related transaction (conspiracy) in the weeks after the Yost murder occurred and reported his findings. But the decision was made by his employer to not reveal all facts to the authorities to protect its undercover investigation. Moreover, although the record is unclear, McParlan learned of the Jones plot and, half-heartedly at best, warned Jones’ employers; in retrospect, his and his employers' lack of real action likely caused Jones to lose his life.

What McParlan appeared to know that the Jones murder was to be a "quid pro quo" for the Yost murder. The leaders (body-masters) of the Tamaqua Ancient Order of Hibernians (AOH) Division, James Kerrigan and James Carroll, who kept the Union House, a tavern on East Broad Street and sort of AOH hangout, met with James Roarity of nearby Coaldale and head of the AOH there. Later, Roarity mentioned this nascent plot to Alex Campbell a liquor-dealer and tavern owner in Storm Hill (Lansford) and previous owner of Carroll’s Union House. Coincidentally, at this time in the neighborhoods of Storm Hill and Summit Hill, it had also determined that another murder was being discussed. - that of Jones. Thus, the idea of an exchange of retributive killings at once suggested itself. Men from Summit Hill in Carbon County would kill Yost and men from Schuylkill County would kill Jones. The Yost murder occurred first and the Jones murder followed two months later.

The Arrest

On September 1, James Kerrigan met with Edward J. Kelly and Michael J. Doyle (from the Pottsville - Mt. Laffee - area) at Carroll’s bar in Tamaqua.  The three traveled to Lansford (Storm Hill) to Alec (Alex) Campbell’s bar there.  In a bit of irony, Campbell had previously owned the Union House Tavern in Tamaqua.  For several days the three observed Jones and on September 3, Jones was shot by Kelly and Doyle.  Kerrigan took them back to Tamaqua using backroads and out of the way paths. They escaped detection until they stopped for lunch near Kerrigan's residence in Newkirk.

James Kerrigan had grown up near Tuscarora and Tamaqua in the 1840s and 1850s.  During the Civil War he served with the Union Army and for two years was in General Philip Sheridan’s cavalry. By 1870 he was back living in the Tuscarora/Tamaqua area.  He was married to Marguerite (commonly called Fanny) Higgins and had at least three children, including a son. He was the Tamaqua Body Master (head) of the AOH. 

Tamaquan, Samuel Beard, coincidentally a law student, who had been in Storm Hill and knew about the shooting (returning quickly to Tamaqua with the news) and William Parkenson who had observed Kerrigan with two unknown men that morning near Oddfellow's Cemetery. Beard and his friend George Priser, put two and two together and searched the area near Kerrigan’s residence west of Oddfellows with a field (spy) glass and saw Kerrigan and two other men from a distance, stopping for lunch and whiskey.  Beard went to the police and a posse was formed to go and arrest the three men. The arrested were placed in the Tamaqua jail, charged with the killing of John P. Jones, at Storm Hill, Carbon County.

Badges of the AOH were found on Kelly and Doyle, and from them a portion of a letter to James Carroll (Union House Proprietor) was also obtained. The two had met up with Kerrigan at Carroll’s Union House Tavern before the three of them proceeded to Storm Hill on August 31/September 1.  Carbon County Deputy Sheriff John Painter then assumed custody of the men and accompanied them first from the Tamaqua police station (behind the US Hotel on Rowe Street to what was then called the New York depot (Tamaqua’s Train Station) accompanied by a squad of LWC Coal & Iron Police. Painter took the prisoners to Mauch Chunk (Carbon county seat) via the New Jersey Central train connection on a special non-stop train directly to Mauch Chunk.

The Trials

Commonwealth v. Doyle

The prisoners demanded separate trials. Michael Doyle was put upon trial first at Mauch Chunk, on January 18, 1876.  This was the first of what became known as the “Molly Maguire” trials.

Defendant, Michael J. Doyle

This trial was to set a precedent for future “Molly Maguire” trials that followed – the extensive use of private prosecutors and private police. Charles W. Parrish, the President of the LWC decided that that coal company would take a hand in the prosecution of the case. First, LWC would pay for the prosecution. Secondly, the lead prosecutor was to be mining company attorney Charles Albright, who added color to the proceeding by appearing in court wearing his full Civil War uniform (he had served as a general in the Union Army) complete with sword. 

During the trial the prisoners were under guard by the Coal & Iron Police. Several days elapsed before a full jury was selected. The majority of jurors were Pennsylvania Dutch (descended from) German immigrants whose first spoken language was not English.

The trial was before Judge Dreher. In addition to Albright, E. R. Siewers, the District Attorney for Carbon County, appeared for the Commonwealth, and with him J.W. Hughes, of Schuylkill County, and attorney Allen Craig of the Lehigh Valley. 

For the defense appeared John W. Ryon and Lin Bartholomew, of Pottsville, James. B. Reilly, member of Congress from Schuylkill County, Daniel Kalbfus and Edward Mulhearn, attorneys of Carbon County. 

At the time of the trial, it was still unknown that James McParlan was, in fact, an undercover detective. The prosecution built its case on solid circumstantial evidence supplied by about 200 witnesses. Anticipating every move by the adversary, the prosecution successfully stymied the defense. Such anticipation did not solely stem from an astute knowledge of courtroom strategy, nor was it the result of clairvoyance. McParlan, as a high-ranking Molly, was privy to most of the defense’s plans, which he relayed to the prosecution. Finding themselves hopelessly outmatched, the defense did not call witnesses. On February 1, 1876, the jury returned a verdict of “guilty of murder in the first degree.”

Mauch Chunk PA Court House 1876

Kerrigan Confesses

During the late stages of the Doyle trial Kerrigan broke. Locked in solitary confinement, the Tamaquan, the Body-master of the AOH (which McParlan conflated with the Molly Maguires), became apprehensive and decided to save himself and turned informer. The confession which contained the principal outlines of McParlan’s prior reports of the plans to kill Jones and their relation to another recent murder in Tamaqua, the Yost (policeman) murder. Now the State/Local authorities could bring that case to trial as they immediately arrested the men implicated by Kerrigan, but they still did not know the presence of undercover agent, McParlan. However, these arrests created a flurry of rumors. Fearing that others involved would leave the area, Coal and Iron Police (acting as the State) rounded up additional Mollies (implicated by McParlan). Since Kerrigan did not know the men arrested by the second posse, the Molly Maguires could only suspect the existence of a second informer. Shortly thereafter, McParlan disappeared from Schuylkill County.

Commonwealth v. Kelly

Next the trial of Edward Kelly for the murder of John P. Jones proceeded beginning on March 29, 1876. The prosecution felt that their case against Kelly was so strong they did not need Kerrigan’s confession. The same counsel appeared on the part of the Commonwealth as in the Doyle case. On the part of the defense, Lin Bartholomew, attorney Daniel Kalbfus, General John D. Bertolette, and attorney, Edward Mulhearn. appeared. Application was also made in this case for a change of venue but this was denied. 

Defendant Edward J. Kelly

Judge Dreher directed a jury to be called. The trial concluded on April 6. The evidence was a repetition of that already given on the trial of Doyle, and was of the same overwhelming character. The whole story of the crime was given in evidence, and the prisoner was identified as one of the murderers. 

Unsurprisingly, the jury found Kelly guilty of first-degree murder, and the judge sentenced him also to be hanged. 

Epilog

Alex Campbell, owner of the Storm Hill tavern where the Jones murder was allegedly planned on September 1 and 2, was also arrested (after Kerrigan’s confession) and successfully prosecuted (June 20-July 1, 1876), despite remarkably flimsy evidence of guilt other than Kerrigan’s confession and McParlan’s testimony (even with no first-hand knowledge of the murder).  This was the fourth “Molly Maguire” trial, after the first trial of the killers of Yost in Pottsville, Schuylkill County.

Kerrigan testified at several other trials - the Yost trials, the conspiracy to reward Thomas Hurley for the murder of Gomer James, the conspiracy to kill William and Jesse Major, the Morgan Powell murder, and in the murder of George K. Smith.  

Kerrigan was never prosecuted for any crimes he admitted to and left the Tamaqua area for the Richmond, VA area. He assumed at times the last name of this wife, Higgins. He died in Manchester, VA in 1898.  After his death his wife applied for his Civil War pension. 

Kerrigan was not the only informer (turned State’s evidence) of the AOH membership. Lawler and Butler had turned.  In addition, Frank McHugh, John Slattery, Michael Doolin and Charles Mulhearn were informants on other cases.

The “Molly Maguire” trials did not end labor unrest of the coal regions. At the tail end of the trials and hangings, one of the first nationwide strikes, the Railroad Strike of 1877 occurred with just as much workplace violence if not more. An effective union did not take place until 1902 when the United Mine Workers were able to successfully represent labor.

The "Inverted Jenny" and Tamaqua, Pennsylvania

This is another interesting story (mostly unknown) about Tamaqua and its relationship to other more famous stories and history. Moreover, it involves the father of one of my best friends in Tamaqua (Ron Gerber) so I knew the subject of this story personally.

Background

The Inverted Jenny is a United States postage stamp first issued on May 10, 1918 in which the image of the Curtiss JN-4 airplane in the center of the design appears upside-down; it is probably the most famous error in American philately. Only one pane of 100 of the inverted stamps was ever found, making this error one of the most prized in all philately as indicated by the following recent sales:

The Inverted Jenny Air Mail Issue of 1918

• On 15 November 2018, the position number 49 stamp was auctioned for a price of $1,350,000, with a buyer's premium raising the total cost to $1,593,000. [Healey, Matthew. "Nov. 15 Jenny Invert sale sets record". Linn's Stamp News.] 
• On 11 November 2023, another Inverted Jenny stamp was auctioned for a price of $1,700,000, with a buyer’s premium raising the total cost to $2,006,000. ["US stamp sells for a record-breaking $2m". BBC News. 2023-11-13.] 

Eighty-two of the US’ rarest postage stamps, including an “Inverted Jenny”, went missing from the New York Public Library in May 1977. The stamps, worth about $1 million (at that time), from the Benjamin K. Miller collection. Miller's sharp legal mind made him a lot of money at an early age. But the quiet Wisconsin bachelor left the bar for his first love. philately. He retired young and devoted his life to collecting what many stamp experts believe to be the 

Benjamin Kurtz Miller, whose Inverted Jenny, position 18 on the sheet, was stolen in 1977 was one of the early buyers of inverts, 10 in all, bought the stamp for $250. 

finest collection of rare U.S. stamps ever assembled. Miller moved to New York City to personally supervise the massive collection, which was on display in the New York Public Library, until he died in 1928 of a heart attack while sitting in the lobby of the University Club. Miller willed the stamps to the library on one condition, that they be displayed publicly "forever."

Police were clueless as to whodunit, until another Inverted Jenny was reported stolen in 1982.

From New York to Tamaqua

On Monday, May 9, 1977, someone walked into the basement office of Lambert W. Gerber's home on East Broad Street in Tamaqua and offered numerous rare U.S. stamps for sale. The same day, Gerber's records showed a $60,000 disbursement to a person who used a fictitious name.

What the tall, distinguished-looking Tamaqua man, an internationally known and respected dealer who had sold stamps to President Franklin D. Roosevelt and actor Adolphe Menjou, apparently didn't know was that the stamps had been stolen from the New York Public Library only days before during the weekend.

Mr. Gerber was rated as one of the top 10 philatelic auction specialists (stamp brokers) in the United States back in in the 1960s/1970s. Gerber got his start in the business in 1930 when he was a student in Tamaqua High School and sold/carried newspapers in Tamaqua.  Once after delivering papers he found he had an outstanding bill of $9 he owed the publishers. $9 was hard to come by and he placed an advertisement in a magazine noting he had stamps for sale. He said it wasn't long until he had mail coming in from people in distant places who were interested in purchasing the stamps for collections.

Gerber soon raised the money to pay off his bill and additionally, now found himself in the stamp business. In 1964 he noted that "I have been in the business more than 30 years and devote all my time to it today." Millions of stamps have passed through his hands during this time. Gerber classed the stamp broker business as "the Tiffany end of the trade." The Tamaqua man said there were 35 divisions in the stamp broker business. He deals with the advanced collectors, with people who need scarce items.

In this same interview (1964), Mr. Gerber talked about an inverted Jenny stamp, "one of the stamps in his possession" and his "plans to sell his inverted air mail stamp in the fall". This was obviously not the stolen stamp (1977).

Lambert W. Gerber examining in 1964 an inverted Jenny which had been consigned to him by a client and was later sold for about $11,000

Gerber's daughter has theorized that the thief or an intermediary came directly to Tamaqua from New York and sold the stamps to her father before the news of the robbery had been publicized. She also contended that it would have been foolish of her father to advertise the stamps in his catalogs, sent to 20,000 collectors around the world, if he had known they were stolen. Moreover, the stamp itself had been altered (perforations cut off) to appear to be from the top row of the original sheet.

She pointed out that her father was himself a victim of theft in 1953, when a briefcase containing stamps worth $35,000 was stolen from his room in the Hillsboro Hotel in Tampa, Fla. She recalled that her father had carried the briefcase everywhere, but left it in the room hidden under clothes in a bureau drawer while the family had breakfast on the final day of the Philatelic Americans Convention. When they returned, the room was as it had been left, except the stamps were missing.

FBI Breaks the Case

In December 1982, while working on another stamp theft case, Special agent Earl Sumner came across the photograph of a rare "Inverted Jenny" stamp in one of Gerber's auctions then current catalogs. Sumner took particular notice of the stamp in Gerber's catalog because, like another he had seen, it seemed to have a defect on the "2" in the lower left corner. It turned out that the stamp taken from the Miller collection had an identical mark, a defect in the paper. The agent, a specialist in stamp theft who works out of the FBI Cleveland office, then researched Gerber's old catalogs and found photographs of 81 more of the stolen stamps.

In January 1983, more than five years after the theft, a New York grand jury subpoenaed Gerber's inventory. Instead of moving the thousands of stamps to New York, a team of FBI agents and philatelic experts went to Tamaqua and discovered that 82 of the stamps had been in Gerber's inventory at one time. The FBI seized the 69 remaining stamps, valued at $500,000. The other 13, including the "Inverted Jenny," had been sold. The FBI still isn't certain what happened to the remaining 71 stolen stamps taken in the May 1977 heist, that were not traced to Gerber.

The FBI investigation revealed Gerber sold the inverted Jenny stamp to John W. Kaufmann, a Washington dealer, who featured it on the front page of a 1979 auction catalog (See below.). Lawrence A. Bustillo of Suburban Stamp, Inc., of Springfield, Mass., subsequently purchased the stamp from Kaufmann for $51,700, according to Linn's Stamp News. Sumner said Bustillo surrendered the stolen stamp, which was listed in the then current Scott's Stamp Catalog as being worth $110,000. 

it is not uncommon for stamp dealers, who sell more than collect stamps among the premiere dealers in the country, both bought the "Inverted Jenny" without knowing it was stolen. Linn's Stamp News reported that Kaufmann had the stamp reviewed by an expert at the Philatelic Foundation in New York before he bought it from Gerber. The expert found the stamp to be legitimate. The FBI said (according to experts) the top perforations were cut off the stamp, which was No. 18 of a block of 100, to make it appear it came from the top row of the sheet. Agent Sumner said he did not know whether it was altered before or after Gerber purchased it.

"No way would I know Miller material if it was put in front of me," said William R. Weiss, an Allentown stamp dealer, one of two major Lehigh Valley PA stamp auctioneers. Weiss said the thief or thieves were smart enough to know that they could not pass them into philatelic circles without altering them. Some stamps, like a block of four 1909 stamps printed on blue paper valued at about $50,000, were broken up to disguise them.  Weiss who knew Gerber before his death in 1981 said he felt Gerber was not knowledgeable enough about stamps to mastermind such a theft. "He was a very honest guy. My gut feeling is that he didn't know he was handling stolen merchandise."

Epilogue

Even the FBI concedes that a thorough examination of Gerber's records showed no illegalities in a career that spanned more than 50 years. But there is no denying that Gerber had possession of many of the stamps taken in what was one of the largest stamp thefts in history. And the recovery of those stamps, the largest such case in FBI history, has focused attention on the quiet man who devoted his life to cataloging and selling collections of rare stamps at auctions and by mail.

It also casts light on the inner workings of big-time stamp collecting, which contrary to its low-keyed exterior often involves high-stakes business where single stamps can now bring more than one million dollars. Furthermore, the FBI never issued indictments in the case, which broke after the five-year statute of limitations had expired. The actual perpetrators of the robbery were never named.

A color photograph of the actual stamp appeared on the front cover of Kaufmann’s May 5, 1979, Official NAPEX Auction catalog, which drew widespread attention to the stamp, and gave experts who had not seen Gerber’s price list their first opportunity to study it. Clifford C. Cole Jr. and Calvet Hahn, using different analytical techniques, concluded that the stamp was really position 18, the stolen Miller copy. Cole had sketched the stamp when he viewed it in the frame at the library in 1966, noting the usual plating features such as perforation anomalies and placement of the vignette in relation to the frame. Hahn had developed a technique for identifying the horizontal row from which each stamp originated based on the height and tilt of the vignette, which eliminated the possibility of a top row position.

 

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