Officers Down – Hamilton Police Museum

Officers Down (5th May 1949)

Constable Jim Campbell played the call by the numbers. Flattened against the east wall of the Hub City Men's Wear store at1359 Main St. in east Hamilton (now Ciotti Insurance), he peeked cautiously around the corner of the building and into the rear yard. The information that had crackled over the car radio had been correct; two men were trying to pry the bars from a window but their efforts were clumsy, their jimmy a mere plank jammed between the bars. Judging that he'd given his colleagues enough time to get into position, Campbell stepped into view. Predictably, the two men abandoned their efforts and ran for a nearby alley. Campbell shouted a warning then headed in after them.

After almost fifty years, the circumstances surrounding what happened next are unclear. What began as a routine call, ended with gunfire, men struggling desperately, curses, fear, blood and pain. The miracle was that nobody died.

Shortly after 1:15 a.m. on the morning of May 5th, 1949, Constables Campbell and Herb Connolly fielded a routine “entry in progress” call. Sergeant Arthur Ellis, who was with them in the cruiser, must have perked up his ears when he heard the location since he lived just around the comer at 19 Huxley Avenue North. Although he was in uniform, he was unarmed, which suggests he was heading home. (In those days we had to sign in and out of the station and travel to and from work in uniform).

Their plan was simple: Ellis and Connolly would seal off the south end of the alley between the Main Jewellery Store, which was next to the men’s wear store, and the Community Theatre just west of that again while Campbell would make his way to the rear of the building. Anyone in the rear yards would be trapped between them.

As Jim Campbell entered the darkened alley from the north, he could just make out the silhouettes of Ellis and Connolly at the south end and in between, the denser shadows of two crouching figures. When he got to within five feet of one of the crouching men, he was fired upon without warning. It is here that opinions diverge. Constable Campbell said that the same man fired upon Constable Connolly then forced his way back in the direction he had come leaving one man in the alley; however, newspaper accounts of the day suggest that two men were left behind.

In any event, Jim Campbell left Connolly and Ellis to contend with whoever remained and courageously chased after his man. Running across open ground, the gunman took two wild shots at Campbell from point blank range but missed. Campbell tried to draw his own revolver but had trouble getting it clear of his holster. When he did pull it free and tried to return fire, it misfired.

As he cleared the wasted round, the gunman turned suddenly, knelt and fired. This time his bullet found its mark striking Jim’s left shinbone. Adrenaline pumping, Jim managed to run as far as Huxley Avenue before his shinbone shattered. He managed to get off one shot but could only lie on the ground and watch in pain and frustration as his quarry ran off into the night.

Back in the alley, Connolly and Ellis had fared just as badly. Both had been shot; the unarmed Ellis through the left shoulder close to his neck arteries at close range, and Connolly in the groin and back as he wrestled with one of the men. At least one of the men made his escape by bolting across Main Street, narrowly being missed by a passing Streetcar in the process, and into the alley by Rankin’s Restaurant. All they left behind were a Lugar pistol, some 9 mm casings, a couple of flashlights and a glove.

In the flurry of activity that followed, a 21 year-old petty crook by the name of Joseph Hasler was found with a gun in his car. Behind dosed doors he talked. He admitted being at the break-in with two other men but made it clear he hadn’t shot anyone, In court he was sentenced to two years imprisonment after pleading guilty to the weapons charge and attempted shop breaking.

A few days after Hasler’s arrest, another small time criminal, 21 year-old Arthur Taylor, had a chat with his minister then gave himself up to the police. He also said he was one of three men who were involved in the attempted break-in and admitted he was the one who shot Constable Campbell. As the shooter, he went to prison for four years.

The mysterious third man, if he ever existed, has never been identified.

Information courtesy: Det. Mike Campbell, the Hamilton-Wentworth Regional Police Service
and the Hamilton Spectator .

NOTE: Jim Campbell was Det. Mike Campbell’s father. On 12th September, 1972 as the lieutenant in charge of the Persons Section of the C.I.B., while assisting the Crown at a murder trial, he experienced chest pains but refused to go home. He died of two massive heart attacks. At the time he was 50 years old.

Joseph Hasler drowned in Hamilton Harbour in 1969. Arthur Taylor still lives in Hamilton’s north end. In October 1995, he told me there were only two people involved that night just as the dispatcher and Constable Campbell had said. When we discussed who shot the other two policemen, he said,”I guess I’m responsible for shooting the three of them.” He confirmed that Hasler hadn’t shot anyone.

The Way We Were… By Rob Rankin