Captain Sanders' Boys

From the window of his office in the State Penitentiary at Columbia, S. C, Prison Guard Captain Olin Sanders last week shouted to Corporal Charles L. Christmus on duty in the yard below:

"Charlie, these boys have got me tied up in here. . . . They've got a gun in my ribs and want a car to get out."

"These boys" were six convicts who had trapped unarmed Captain Sanders in his office. Since Captain Sanders had given instructions to disregard any order he might give under such circumstances, Corporal Christmus called Prison Superintendent J. S. Wilson. Colonel Wilson called South Carolina's 41-year-old Governor Olin Dewitt Johnston, who hurried to the prison. Toward the window of Captain Sanders' office marched the Governor with his hands deep in his overcoat pockets.

"Take your hands out of your pockets!" ordered a convict.

The Governor obeyed, then argued, urged, pleaded that the convicts come out and surrender.

"Get us a car. Open the gates. Otherwise it will be too bad for Sanders," came back the answer.

The Governor made one more plea to the convicts:

"If you boys will walk out of there and let Captain Sanders walk out first, I'll see that nothing goes against your records."

A growl was the only answer.

Said Governor Johnston to the Guardsmen: "Go ahead boys, let them have it."

Half-a-dozen gas grenades arched through the window. A moment later six licked convicts stumbled out, but Captain Sanders was not with them. Guardsmen found him on the floor of his office in a pool of blood, covered with fresh stab wounds. A few minutes later in the prison hospital. Captain Sanders died.

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