Alcatraz warden's notebook page for Sam Richard Shockley, No. 462
Bureau of Prisons notebook page with the identification photograph of Sam Richard Shockley, No. 462, received at Alcatraz from Leavenworth on 23 September 1938 under a life sentence for bank robbery and kidnapping (Eastern District of Oklahoma); a handwritten header records execution in the San Quentin gas chamber on 12-3-48. A copy is stored here.
- Date
- 1938-09-23
- Kind
- photograph
- Retrieved
- 2026-10-12
- NAID
- 236735583
- Rights
- A Bureau of Prisons record, public domain under 17 U.S.C. § 105. Series "Warden's Notebook Pages" (NAID 296686), Records of the Bureau of Prisons (Record Group 129), National Archives at San Francisco. The National Archives catalog marks the item "Use Restriction: Unrestricted." The series note says that some information on the pages is incorrect when compared with the fuller inmate files, and that clippings in the series may be copyrighted; this page is a prison form. The copy stored here is a downsample of the first digitized image.
The National Archives catalog titles this page “SHOCKLEY, SAMUEL RICHARD - Alcatraz Number 462 - Warden’s Notebook.” It is a Bureau of Prisons notebook form with an identification photograph at the upper right; the placard in the photograph reads “U.S. Penitentiary Alcatraz 462”. It belongs to the series Warden’s Notebook Pages (NAID 296686).
The typed entries, as printed: name “SAM RICHARD SHOCKLEY,” No. 462, received 9-23-38 from “LEAVENWORTH,” age 29, date of birth 1-12-09. Offense “BANK ROBBERY & KIDNAPPING”; date of sentence May 21, 1938; sentence “LIFE”; district sentenced “E/OKLA., - Muskogee.” A red line at the top reads “Note Below To Court, San Francisco, 11-20-46,” and a handwritten line reads “Executed in Gas chamber 12-3-48 at San Quentin.” The note under the detainers records that on 11-20-46 he went on trial for murder in the U.S. District Court at San Francisco as a result of the prison break of 5-2-46, “at which time two officers were killed (and 3 inmates)”; that on Dec. 21, 1946 a jury found him guilty of first-degree murder without recommendation; that he was sentenced to death the same day; that he was received at San Quentin on 12-27-46; and that he appealed. The “Reason for Transfer” box and the account of the bank robbery are staff text and are not repeated.
Catalog data, labelled as such: offense “BANK ROBBERY & KIDNAPPING; MURDER, FIRST DEGREE”; received at Alcatraz 09/23/1938; transferred 11/20/1946; birth date 01/12/1910; death date 12/03/1948 at San Quentin. The page prints 1-12-09 and the catalog 1910; this archive records both. The Bureau of Prisons says Shockley and Thompson received the death penalty and were executed in the San Quentin gas chamber in December 1948 (BOP Alcatraz history).
