3. In 1848 Wilmington becomes a city and is named the county seat and
with a growing population the police force grows as well. The
Wilmington police are often referred to as the “city constables" and
as the city police during this time. The department was relatively
small in the following decades as it is less than forty officers by 1873
however there were outcries by the newspapers of the day to
increase the force.
Between 1848 and 1873,the department during this time came under
what was commonly known as the “spoils system” in government.
The entire police force was appointed by the mayor and served at his
pleasure, which meant that an officer could be dismissed without
cause at anytime. It also meant that a new mayor could appoint a
new police force while dismissing the entire existing force.
4. Officer Charles W. Schultz
Officer Schultz was appointed to the department in 1888 to patrol the 9th
Ward of the city. By trade, Schultz was a painter and patrolled his district
by night. Officer Schultz was well liked by the citizens of the 9th ward and
was known as a fair and fearless officer who discharged his duties with
fidelity to his profession. Officer Schultz showed no fear in performing his
duties for the citizens of Wilmington. When Officer Schultz spoke his word
was final.
Officer Schultz was paid $60.00 a month and as was the case with most
officers, they lived in the Ward where they patrolled. Officer Schultz lived
at # 12 W. 20th Street with his wife, his sister Clara, and children
6. The weeks prior to the assassination
Wilmington, at the time, was experiencing what the papers
described as a Rein of Terror as Burglars, Thieves, Thugs over
the past fortnight had descended upon the city
The 9th Ward contained many tough localities and many
groups gathered on the street corners harassing the citizens
of Wilmington. Officer Charles W Schultz had made several
arrests in the weeks prior to his assassination. When needed
the law was enforced with a iron hand, bar fights were
broken up and groups without purpose were disbanded with
the command of his voice. Defiance meant arrest
7. On a cold and bitter night of January 29, 1891 between the hours of
12:45 AM and 1:00 AM, Officer Charles W. Schultz was conducting his
beat in the 9th ward dressed with his heavy gum overcoat wrapped
tightly around him to keep him warm in the bitter cold of the night. The
weather forecast called for a possibility of rain that night
Officer Schultz now walked alone where two officers walked before the
installation of the new Telegraph system. The night was darker than
normal, no stars, no moon light. The only light is from new electrical
street lights and those of houses and drinking establishments
8. Officer Schultz started his beat that night at 18th and Market Streets
After checking in, using the new Telegraph stations installed just weeks
before ,Officer Schultz confers with Mr. H.W. Evans of the William Lee
and Son’s Flower Mills.
1891. Note the signal (telegraph) box
9. Wilmington's police were first in Delaware to adopt a “signal service”
on December 21, 1890, combining telegraph/telephone to allow
patrolmen on their beats to summon an ambulance or patrol wagon.
Patrolmen were required to report hourly to ensure they were awake
and on the job
10. While traveling westerly on 20th street, pass his residence Officer
Schultz turns north on Tatnall Streets. Officer Schultz observes two
individuals walking east on Elliott Avenue (now Elliott Place). These
individuals fit the description of suspects wanted in a safe cracking with
explosives case that occurred the previous night at the George W.
Lodge and Son’s Grocery store on 7th and King Streets. Unknown to
Officer Schultz, it was believed these same two desperados were
responsible for an armed robbery a short time earlier on Concord
Turnpike.
11. As the assassins walked towards 21st Street at Tatnall, Officer Schultz
stepped out from his concealed location and under the newly installed
electric street light demanding the assassins to stop and raise their
hands. They in turn with guns already in hand, demand officer Schultz
to raise his hands. Officer Schultz refuses to cooperate and attempts to
withdraw his gun from under the heavy coat, but does not succeed
12. Without hesitation or warning and at point blank range two shots ring
out shattering the silence of the night
The taller of the two assassins, described as a rough burley fellow in a
light jacket with a derby hat, fires at Officer Schultz striking his head.
Officer Schultz’s helmet falls to the ground with a bullet hole clearly
visible covered in blood. The shorter suspect, also in a derby hat,
shoots Officer Schultz in the stomach. This bullet is the one to cause
great damage including his kidney, and is the fatal wound.
14. The two assassins flee easterly on Concord Turnpike running
towards Market Street . They were last seen running on
Vandever Avenue towards the East Lake section of Wilmington
and disappeared into the darkness of the night.
15. Officer Schultz rises from the street where he had fallen, staggers along,
falling several times, in his weaken condition, (possibly in a feeble attempt to
chase the suspects or to get to the nearest signal box at 18th and Market
Streets) passing his own residence at #12 W. 20th Street to sound the alarm
#12 W. 20th Street as it appears today 18th and Market Streets as it appeared in 1891
16. His cries for help are finally heard by George Akins and
Mr. W.H. Dunnell, a mill worker from Lea & Sons Flower
Mill on Superfine Lane. Both take Officer Schultz to the
offices of Doctors E. Shortledge, of 1812 Market Street
a police surgeon.
17. Officer Schultz is able to give a description of the two assailants to the
doctor and requests to be taken to the newly built Delaware Hospital at
16th and Washington Streets.
Delaware Hospital as it
Appeared in 1891
18. Death finally came to Officer Schultz with his family at his side 41 hours after being
shot. The 37 year-old Officer Schultz died at 5:10 p.m. Friday evening January 30, 1891.
Schultz’s father and two brothers from Kennett Square are with his wife and children.
19. Wilmington officers continued hunting down the cold blooded murderers involved in
the deadly attack while newspapers editors worried that any possibility of identifying
the assailants had vanished because of the “complete mystery enshrouding the few-
known facts” of the terrible tragedy. The “only witnesses of this frightful crime were the
victim and his assailants, and while the former’s lips are sealed in death, the latter have
thus far succeeded in eluding arrest, leaving such meager clues as to admit only slight
hopes of their speedy apprehension,” a paper wrote. No one from the public steps
forward as witness’s to the assassination
The lookout continued for days as squads rushed to Richardson’s Woods on the
Newport Turnpike, the West Yard, the B & O Station, and other places but to no avail. As
the sun faded one more time on New Castle County, officers on the day watch were
detailed for extra duty with instructions to arrest all suspicious characters. And that they
did for a number of arrests were made of tramps and others, however, one by one, they
were all discharged. The only warm lead remaining developed Saturday when the chief
received a telegram from that two men answering the description of the fugitives were
lurking in that area. Officer Yates rushed to the Pennsylvania village, but when he got
there the men had disappeared.
20. Authorities continued following leads and tracking down suspects, but the tangled trail kept
leading them down paths to nowhere. Despite a wide search, some baffled investigators
suspected the murders still lurked about Wilmington since it seemed almost impossible for the
assassins to have escaped to another place, they asserted. All “cities and towns were notified of
the shooting and reports from those . . . places indicated that no such men had been seen,”
reported the Morning News. As the cold trail continued getting colder, Chief Swiggett received a
telegram from the Norfolk, VA advising that authorities had two men answering the description.
He jumped on a midnight train, but returned home empty handed for this, like other leads,
proved fruitless. The slayers remained at large.
21.
22. With investigators unearthing nothing new, the outrageous murder also started disappearing
from headlines, but before it became a long forgotten case in the annals of Delaware crime
the editor of the Morning News noted some lessons from the tragedy. When the city
installed police signal boxes officers began patrolling alone instead of in pairs since the city
believed there would be no problem with summonsing aid from the police booths. That
“order should be rescinded at once, especially in such lonely places as was patrolled by
Officer Schultz,” the paper editorialized.
They also thought that the force was too small for the territory patrolled. “There are not
more than eighteen officers on duty at night, and with the handful of men scattered from
south Wilmington to outskirts of the Ninth Ward and from the West Yard almost to
Edgemore, the only wonder is that more robberies and other crimes don’t occur.”
Finally, the men should keep their guns where they can be reached instantly for if it is under
coat, they might as well be without a weapon.
23. As is so often the case, the young Officer Schultz was survived by his
Irish Immigrant Wife, Mary E. Schultz nee Callahan and five children.
The funeral procession started at Officer Schultz’s residence at #12 W.
20th Street to St Patrick’s Church. The police marched two abreast in
full dress uniforms and wearing white gloves.
St. Patrick’s 1890 photo
24. Inside St Patrick’s church, the coffin was carried on the shoulders of six
Wilmington police officers with the Chief of Police leading the procession.
Mary Schultz follow the coffin in the arms of Officer Schultz’s brother
followed by her five children, the youngest being 2 years old and the eldest
being 11 years old.
The coffin was covered in white flowers with a white dove with spread wings
from the police department. His head rested on a bed of roses. Father
Bradford celebrated the high mass.
Final Internment was in the new Cathedral Cemetery on Lancaster Avenue
25. Over the next several years, Mary Schultz, her children
and Officer Schultz’s sister move about the city, being
poor and destitute. The Newspaper holds a public fund
raiser for the family and the city offers Mary Schultz $500
27. The Parents
• Charles F. Shultz- (Father) • Asenatha A. (Pierce) Schultz
• b. September 1828 Pennsylvania (Mother)
• m. 1853 Pennsylvania (Asenatha • b. 14 January 1833
A. Pierce) • m. 1853 Pennsylvania (Charles F.
• d. after 1900 and before 1906 Shultz)
• d. 16 February 1906,
They lived in Kennett Square Pennsylvania. The 1860, 1870 and Philadelphia Pa
1880 census records has Charles’ occupation listed as moulder.
He is also crippled in the 1880 census. According to the 1900
census they had 7 children and 4 alive at the time. The
newspapers states that Edward (Lawrence) and William came
to visit Charles when he was dying in the hospital
28. Brothers and Sisters
• Charles W. b.1854 d.1891
• William b.1856
• Walter J. b. 1857 d. before 1900
• Edward Lawrence b.1862
• Lillian b.1864 d. before 1900
• Clara b.1865
• Anna b.1872
29. Charles W Schultz
• Charles Webster Shultz • Mary E. Callahan (wife)
• b. 08 September 1854 Kennett • b. 1858 (some census records say
Square Pennsylvania Ireland others Hammerton
• m. Kennett Square Pennsylvania Pennsylvania)
(Mary E. Callahan) • m. Kennett Square, Pennsylvania
• d. 30 Jan 1891 Wilmington, Delaware • d. after 1920
• Charles’ occupation in 1870 was,
“working in a coach factory”. His 1910 census has Mary as a widow with 3 children living
occupation in 1880 was “painter”. He at home. The census also states that she has 4
moved to Wilmington in 1880. He was surviving children out of 5. At the time of Charles’
baptized at the Kennett Square death the newspaper states that there are 5 children.
Presbyterian Church but converted to The 1920 census has Mary living with daughter Mary
Catholicism on his death bed. Wilkinson.
30.
31. Daughters
• Mary A. Shultz -daughter • Alice C. Schultz - Daughter
• b. 19 September 1884 Wilmington • b. 1891 Wilmington Delaware
Delaware • m. 17 February 1909 Wilmington
• m. 1912 Wilmington Delaware Delaware (Harry Beeson)
(John Newton Wilkinson) • d. 1953 Saint Petersburg Fl.
• d. after 1946 •
• John Newton Wilkinson Sr. • Harry Snyder Beeson
(husband of Mary A. Schultz)
• b. 16 November 1865 Pennsylvania • b. 2 December 1887. Wilmington
Delaware
• m. 1912 Wilmington Delaware • m. 17 February 1909, Wilmington,
(Mary A Shultz). Second marriage Delaware (Alice C. Schultz)
• d. 07 Jan 1946 Wilmington Manor, • d. 1949 , Saint Petersburg FL.
Delaware (burial Mt. Salem Cemetery ,
Wilmington )
32. Beeson children
• Harry A Beeson
• b. 26 February 1910 Wilmington
Delaware
• m.
• d. 12 Feb 1984 St. Petersburg FL
•
• Alice I Beeson
• b. 1913 Wilmington Delaware
• m.
• d.
• Gene C Beeson
• b. 04 May 1919 Wilmington
Delaware
• m. 1947 St. Petersburg Fl (Ann
Louise Samon)
• d. 24 May 2000 St. Petersburg Fl.
36. Family found in Florida
Gene Beeson is in a nursing home in St Petersburg Florida.
Larry Beeson, Barry Beeson, and Alice Jean aka Alison Beeson are
Gene’s children
Harry Almond Beeson has two children Gary and Cherie Beeson. Gary
had two children David Brian Beeson and Paul Alan Beeson.
Harry ‘s son Gary Beeson is exchanging information with this writer and
the Wilmington Police Department
37.
38. Chief of Police Christine Dunning accepting the
proclamation Honoring Officer Schultz for the
Schultz family
39.
40.
41. Officer Schultz death is recognized by his brothers
and sisters of the Department of Police
42. The Puzzle is not complete
Officer Charles W. Schultz’s grave is unmarked At Cathedral Cemetery
WE will be doing a fund raiser to have the grave stone placed on Officer’s Schultz grave
43. To be added to the city of Wilmington memorial
44. And recognition at the National Law Enforcement
Officers Memorial in Washington DC
To be recognize in May 2014
