Bill Payne? Why does that name sound familiar?

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Chad Mitchell and Tom Paxton wrote this song, which became a hit for the Chad Mitchell Trio in the early 1960s. They may have made Dubarry up, but there have been plenty of real Dubarrys over the years. Heed the tale of our own, home grown Dubarry-with-a-strong-touch-of-John-Dillinger, born and raised in the Abbot's Creek township of Forsyth County, NC, around the turn of the 20th century. What a story!

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"I was there at the cage when (he) and a companion walked in. (He) was dressed in a neat brown suit. His hat was at a rakish angle. His shirt collar was spotless. He looked like a respectable person.

"He asked me to change a $10 bill. I reached to take it from his hand. I never got that $10. A gun was in (his other) hand.

"Just as casually as he strolled into the bank, he said 'Make it snappy, pal. I've come to clean you out. Where've you got the money?'

"I wasn't surprised when Bill Payne stuck a gun in my face and told me that he had come to rob my bank. I had been expecting a visit from him for a long time, ever since he escaped from Caledonia Prison Farm last February.

"For months I had been practicing what I would do if Payne, the man everybody in North Carolina dreads, should walk in and throw a gun on me. I had my own gun in my pocket. But he had me where I couldn't do a thing. We never do what we think we would."

—M.T. McGaskill, cashier of the Bank of Candor, NC, as told to John A. Parris, Jr., reporter for the Twin City Sentinel, September 28, 1937

M.T. McGaskill and his sister, photographed by a Winston-Salem Journal photographer in the "cage" at the Bank of Candor, September 28, 1937. Right, Bill Payne, 1937.

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It seems that Bill Payne was a snappy dresser. After every bank robbery, the press always described his attire, as if it were some sort of social occasion. And he also favored snappy lines. After he cleaned out the vault in Candor, he ordered M.T. McGaskill and his sister, the assistant cashier, into the vault and closed the door, saying "I don't need no commotion."

But as McGaskill later pointed out to reporters, Bill Payne missed $6,000 dollars which had been hidden under a newspaper in the vault. $6,000 dollars in 1937 equates to $94,681.41 in todays dollars. So maybe Bill was not quite as snappy as he thought he was.

At any rate, thus begins the final chapter of the improbable story of William Andrew Payne, born to respectable farming parents in the southeastern corner of Forsyth County, NC, who lost his father before he could meet him, who was reared by a doting, land owning mother and grandfather and two respectable older sisters, who worked on the farm and later as child labor at the infamous "kindergarten mill" operated by the Piedmont Hosiery Mill in High Point, who spent his Sundays at the Abbot's Creek Primitive Baptist Church in Wallburg, who followed the law, even registering for the World War One draft in 1917, until one day, just shy of his 26th birthday, something snapped and he went off in an entirely new direction.

The Bank of Candor, 1937. The Payne Gang tried to burn their first getaway car.

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Elisha Payne was already past the age of thirty and a successful farmer in the Abbot's Creek Township of Forsyth County when he met 22 year old Emma Clinard. She must have seemed the right one, because they got married the day after Christmas in 1889. Right away, they had a daughter and named her Christina. Two years later, another daughter, Minnie arrived. And two years after that came a son, William Andrew. A typical late 19th century farm family story.

But Elisha died just a couple of months before William's birth. He was only 39 years old. And Emma was left alone to run the farm and raise her children. The children worked on the farm and got their education where they could, none better than about 7th grade.

Crissie found her a man, Gaither Robertson, got married and moved to Indiana. Gaither took up farming and by 1920 they had three children, two sons and a daughter.

Minnie stayed at home, for good. When her mother got tired of being a farmer she bought a house on Pine Street in High Point and opened a boarding house. When Emma died in 1950, Minnie continued to run the boarding house.

Bill worked on the farm, then joined the brigade of child workers, some as young as six or seven, at the Piedmont Hosiery Mill in High Point. He was still working there when, in 1917, he registered for the World War One draft. His draft registration card describes him as being of medium height and medium build, with blue eyes and dark hair, nothing special. He was 22 years old.

Child workers, Piedmont Hosiery Mill, High Point, NC, ca. 1910.

About that time he met a young woman, Wilma Montgomery, of High Point. They got married and named their daughter Lucile. Then something went wrong and Bill was no longer working at the Piedmont Hosiery Mill or anywhere else. By 1920, he was living, unemployed, in his mother's boarding house. His wife Wilma was living with her parents nearby. And Lucile had been shipped out to Indiana to live with her aunt Crissie.

That may have been intended to be a temporary arrangement, because in the 1920 census she was listed as Lucile Payne. But by 1930, she had become Lucile Robertson.

There is no evidence that Bill and Wilma ever lived together again as man and wife, but they never divorced and Wilma was always referred to in the press as "Bill Payne's wife". They had a second child, a son named Harry, sometime in the mid 1920s. Wilma became a beautician and was still living with her mother, Hattie, her brother Howard and his wife Ethel and their two children and her then 16 year old son Harry in High Point in 1940.

But in 1921, Bill robbed his first bank, in Mount Airy. He was 26 years old. He was caught, tried and sentenced to 2 1/2 to 3 years in the state penitentiary. He was released on August 9, 1924.

Less than two years later, he robbed his second bank. He was caught tried and sentenced in Orange County, NC on April 22, 1926 to seven to ten years in the penitentiary. He escaped, was caught, returned. He escaped again, was caught, returned. You would think at that point that somebody would have said "Hey, we'd better keep a closer eye on this boy." But they didn't. He escaped again, was not caught, was not returned.

While inside, he had met some people. They would become a part of Bill's new life as a bank/highway robber, kidnapper and escape artist, eventually referred to as the "Payne Gang". For his next caper, he chose the tiny Bank of Norman in Richmond County, about 17 miles north of Rockingham in peach country.

Kelly Franklin Lowdermilk, the bank's owner and sole employee, was taking an after lunch nap at his home near the bank when he was summoned to make change. He was greeted by the Payne Gang, who took $300 and locked him in the vault, leaving behind the rest of the bank's cash, about $1,100. 

They escaped in a yellow car, then, after about 15 miles, near Troy, transferred to a green sedan where their "gun molls" were waiting. Payne, taking the alias T.F. Rowe, fled to Tennessee. On March 1, 1928 he and his pals got into a gun battle with local cops in Newport, near Knoxville.

"Jack Borden", whose real name was John Washington "Wash" Turner, was wounded three times. Worth Davis received a serious leg wound. Essie Foster, one of the gun molls, was shot in the face and blinded in one eye. As would always be the case, Bill Payne went unscathed.

All were returned to Rockingham for trial. While still in the hospital, Worth Davis married Delia Black, the other gun moll. He was brought to the packed courthouse on a litter, his leg encased in a metal cast.

Payne, "Borden" and Davis were sentenced to 9-10 years in the state penitentiary. Essie Foster and Delia Black Davis got 1-4. The authorities figured out who Payne was, but never discovered "Borden's" real identity.

In the spring of 1930, US Census taker Annapolis McCulloch found Bill Payne at the state prison camp in Bladen County. He didn't know how to spell "prisoner", but he got both Payne and "Borden", a few lines below, right. Payne was 31 years old, "Borden" only 20.

1930 US Census, White's Creek Prison Camp, Bladen County, NC

Under "Occupation", all the prisoners were listed as "laborer". Under "Industry", they were listed as "highway". Prison camps like this one were temporary, intended to make prisoners earn their keep by working on roads, railroads and schools. So Payne and "Borden" were working on the chain gang. They didn't like it.

A few weeks after the census was taken, on July 7, 1930, Bill Payne and his buddy "Jack Borden" escaped.

They committed several highway robberies around Winston-Salem, but the heat got too high, so Payne decided to move operations to sister Crissie's territory. He and "Borden" were arrested in Columbia, Indiana on August 13, 1931 and extradited to Winston-Salem, where they were sentenced, on September 9, 1931, to from ten to fifteen years for the highway robbery of a used car dealer near Kernersville.

After a brief rest, Payne and "Borden", by now identified under his true name, escaped again on September 12, 1934. It was Payne's fifth prison escape. He and "Wash" Turner were recaptured six months later, on April 1, 1935. Maybe this is the point where the powers that be should have said "OK, we're locking Bill and 'Wash' in the max security wing at Central Prison for good."

Instead, inexplicably, they sent them to the Caledonia Prison Farm in Halifax County. Caledonia is so old that it qualifies for a state historical marker. It was originally a private plantation, dating back to 1713. In 1892, it became a state prison farm, consisting of about 7,500 acres of land. I guess the idea was that prisoners would earn their keep by farming, a pastime that Bill Payne had already rejected twenty years before.

NC State Historical Highway Marker E94

Caledonia suffered a lot of damage from Roanoke River flooding in 1901 and 1902 and was temporarily abandoned, but by the early 1920s was back in business. A new brick dormitory was built in 1925. In 1927, 600 inmates moved in. In 1929 the state magnanimously provided the inmates with both running water and heat. By the time Bill arrived there the facility housed both male and female inmates, men in eight downstairs dormitories, women in two upstairs dorms.

"Old Stockade" Caledonia State Prison Farm, prior to 1925

No doubt, upon arrival at Caledonia, Bill took a look around, had a good laugh and started planning. There were plenty of his old pals around to help out. This was going to be Bill Payne's masterpiece.

New dormitory, Caledonia, 1926. Two prisoners to a bunk!

The big break came on the morning of February 15, 1937. Bill and his lieutenant Washington "Wash" Turner (aka Jack Borden), were the engineers. Five other inmates joined in.

They kidnapped two prison officials, commandeered a laundry truck, carjacked another hostage and raced several hundred miles back and forth through eastern North Carolina, slipping past a net of more than 200 law enforcement officers. In the early hours of the evening, they released their hostages near Southern Pines and vanished into the night.

This one made the front page nationwide. Payne and Turner stuck together, while keeping in touch with some of the others. Turner would later say that they cut a wide swath through Florida, Georgia, the Carolinas, Tennessee, Virginia and West Virginia. They established several hideouts, the principal one being in Brunswick County, North Carolina, where they kept their collection of newspaper clippings about their exploits and even a boat, which they bought with the idea that if things got too hot, they would sail out past the national limit off Southport and be free from even federal authorities.

Along the way, they committed a number of highway and bank robberies and kidnappings. Considering the ineptitude of the local and state authorities, they might have continued indefinitely, because none of their crimes met the standard for federal intervention. But then they made their first real mistake. 


They were staying in a cabin near Asheville and on their way to a nearby cafe when they came upon a weigh station manned by the North Carolina Highway Patrol. They whipped their car around and state trooper George C. Penn of Carthage gave pursuit, chasing them into a dead end road after 20 miles. They barricaded themselves behind a barn and began firing. Penn, 22, was killed.

George C. Penn, left. NC Highway patrolman and car, 1935.

Turner said that he fired four rounds from a shotgun and that Payne was firing a rifle. They later led officers to the spot where they had hidden their guns and officer Penn's pistol in Biltmore Forest.

Shortly after shooting Penn, Payne kidnapped two teenagers in Asheville and forced them to drive him to Thomasville. A day later, three men, thought to be Payne, Turner and another of their gang, kidnapped a Thomasville mill worker, drove him to Siler City, robbed him of $20 and burned his car.

It was at that point that US Attorney Marcus Ervin in Asheville swore out federal fugitive from justice warrants against Payne and Turner, the legal trigger for federal agents to enter the chase.

At that time, the now famous FBI "Ten Most Wanted" list did not exist. But J. Edgar Hoover had his own list, an indefinite number, just whoever really ticked him off. After fingerprints were found in Asheville implicating Payne and Turner, Hoover added them to his current list of six, making them part of the eight most wanted.

J. Edgar Hoover's list, late 1937. Bill Payne is at far right, with Wash Turner next to him.

That triggered a frenzy of sightings across the nation, from Washington state to Florida on up to Massachusetts. There were so many sightings in Charlotte, NC that the local police created a heavily armed "Payne squad". On some days they carried out as many as three or four "Payne raids".

On one occasion they nabbed a guy named Bill Payne in a local bar. Wrong Bill Payne. On another occasion they received a report that Bill Payne and Wash Turner were sitting on the porch of a vacant house eating fried chicken and corn on the cob. When they arrived, there was no one at home. A day or two later they found fresh chicken bones and stripped corn cobs under the porch.

At some point during all this, New Hanover County deputies tried to stop a car on the Carolina Beach Road. The chase reached speeds of 90 miles per hour. John Bowling Byrd, a Payne Gang member, was driving the car in question. He was shot in the head, crashed and was taken to the nearest hospital in critical condition, but survived. Deputies reported that the passenger ran into the woods and vanished. They were certain that he was none other than Bill Payne.

Shortly thereafter, FBI agents arrested a woman named Joan Murphy in West Virginia and threatened to send her to prison for a long time. She was a known associate of Payne and Turner. The deal was simple. Give them up and walk.

John Dillinger had his "lady in red". Joan Murphy did not wear red, but she was a red head. She talked.

Joan Murphy, the red haired gun moll, spent Christmas with the Payne Gang, then betrayed them.

A few days later, Payne and Turner were sitting talking in a car on Pitt Street in Sanford, NC. They looked up to find themselves surrounded by G-men and local police officers. They surrendered without a fight.

Bill Payne refused to talk to FBI investigators. Wash Turner couldn't keep his mouth shut.

The Buncombe County court system did not allow photographers in their courtrooms in 1938. But the presiding judge, overwhelmed by national demand, allowed these two pictures to be made before trial convened. They ran in newspapers coast to coast. Bill Payne, left, and Wash Turner.

Payne and Turner confessed to robbing several banks, burglarizing a steam laundry in Florence, SC, committing several holdups and safe burglaries and to stealing 20-25 cars. They admitted to stealing a total of $12-14,000, but when apprehended, Payne had only $40 and Turner $53.

In addition to the Bank of Candor robbery, they admitted to robbing the Bank of Montgomery in Troy, March 10; the Commercial State Bank in Laurel Hill, May 7; and the Waccamaw Bank & Trust at Clarkton, May 21. Police suspected that they committed dozens of other crimes along the way.

They were whisked away to the regional FBI headquarters in Charlotte, then transferred to Buncombe County for trial in the murder of the highway patrolman. From there, matters proceeded swiftly. They were tried, convicted, sentenced to die in the gas chamber and moved to Central Prison in Raleigh.

Central Prison, Raleigh, NC.

Seven executions were scheduled for July 1, 1938 in Raleigh. Four of those were deferred for one reason or another. At 10:00 AM, Wiley Price, a black man, was electrocuted, because his crime had occurred before the 1927 cutoff for the gas chamber. He went to his death fully clothed in a little less than four minutes, his heart stopped by the powerful current.

Gas had replaced electrocution as the preferred method of execution across the nation, promoted as a more humane method. But it was not, because gas literally set the prisoner on fire from inside and produced death by asphyxiation.

A half hour after Price died, Wash Turner entered the gas chamber wearing only underpants. He convulsed for fully five minutes, gasping for air, and was not pronounced dead for another eleven minutes by the prison physician, Dr. Felda Hightower, who would later join the faculty of the Bowman Gray School of Medicine in Winston-Salem. At 16 minutes, it was one of the longest death ordeals in North Carolina execution history.

At 11:11 AM, Bill Payne, similarly attired, took his first breath of the gas. It took him 15 minutes to die. He was 41 years old. His typed death certificate stated the cause of death as "asphyxiation pursuant to court order". But someone, wanting to make matters clearer, hand wrote "Legal execution" beneath that.

But Bill "Dubarry" Payne would escape jail one more time, except this time it was in a hearse and he was no longer running. Just riding.

Hearses leaving Central Prison, July 1, 1938. The one in front carries the body of John Washington Turner (aka Jack Borden), the second the body of William Andrew Payne.

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Afterword

Over his 16+ year criminal career, Bill Payne worked with a number of "bad guys and gals", who collectively achieved the title "The Payne Gang". They did not all stop operating with his death on July 1, 1938.

A few years after Bill Payne's death, his old running mate Worth Davis was sent to prison for robbing the Bank of Hemingway, SC in 1928. Neither Payne nor Turner was ever convicted for this crime.

The last of the "Payne Gang", John Bowling Byrd, was arrested in Carolina Beach, NC on August 4, 1954, along with his companion, Elsie Wicker McKee. He was 42, she was 25. Later that same day, Byrd's colleague, Herman Lamm, was arrested near Wilson, NC, along with his companion Hazel Smith McKee. He was 34, she was 28. "Herman Lamm" was almost certainly an alias, taken from the legendary German bank robber Herman Lamm, who inspired John Dillinger, "Baby Face" Nelson, "Ma" Barker, "Machine Gun Kelly", Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow and a host of other Depression Era gunslingers.

The women, Elsie and Hazel, claimed that they had no knowledge that their companions were criminals. Both were held as material witnesses. Neither was referred to in news stories as "gun molls". Bank robbing was no longer a glamor trade.

Byrd and Lamm were tried for the robbery of a bank in Carrboro in 1944. Byrd was sentenced to 25 years, Lamm to 15.

Lamm appealed, claiming mental incompetence, and accusing Byrd of leading him astray. That appeal was turned down by the federal Middle District Court on February 16, 1956, and Lamm was returned to the federal penitentiary in Atlanta.

John Bowling Byrd, like his mentor Bill Payne, had escaped from prison more than once. So the feds sent him to Alcatraz, the unescapable prison.

As far as can be determined, the two women were never tried on any charges. So ended, perhaps, the saga of Bill Payne. Or maybe not.

Elsie Wicker McKee, born August 7, 1929, died on July 3, 1963, age 33, of complications from asthma, and was buried in the James P. Tilley Family Cemetery at Oak Grove, Durham County, NC. Despite the vast resources of internet databases, nothing has been heard of Hazel Smith McKee, or John Bowling Byrd or Herman Lamm.

Let us hope that someone will add to this tale somewhere down the road.

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Sources

Articles and pictures from the microfilm of the Winston-Salem Journal and the Twin City Sentinel.

Various articles posted online from newspapers in Charleston, SC; Spartanburg, SC; Statesville, NC; and many other NC and national newspapers.

Census, death certificates and other information from Ancestry.com.

DigitalNC.org, one of the fastest growing digital history websites in the world.

Various websites which publish snippets about those involved, especially one about the founder of the Bank of Norman, Kelly Franklin Lowdermilk.

For inspiration, my grandmother, Estelle Ward Walker, who more than once cited Bill Payne to me as an example of how easy it is to start on the path to hell. Thanks, MeeMaw.