Spencer Case, The Rest of the Story

 

Almost three years ago, I posted the story of the Spencer Case (Tapscott Family History: The Spencer Case). And I promised a future post on the fate of the rascal William Woodrow Rease. Here is, finally, his somewhat mysterious story.

In 1940, as a result of the outcome of the Spencer Case, William was an inmate at the Illinois State Penitentiary, in the town of Pontiac, Livingston Co, Illinois. After release he joined his mother, Emma Curtis (her married name at the time), in the town of Mount Carmel, Illinois, where they were living in 1943. In Mount Carmel, William was married 5 Dec 1947 to an Edna Smith. Then in October 1950 and October 1951 the Mount Carmel Daily Republican-Register published a series of announcements:

“NOTICE WILLIAM REASE is no longer employed by the Electomic Chemical Corporation on River Road.

Had William strayed again? And why were the notices posted only in October?

On 18 Oct 1956 in Lewistown, Fergus Co, Montana. Edna and William were divorced. Edna claimed desertion, and that is likely true. It is known that William, possibly while living in Phoenix, Arizona, did some traveling around Mexico in 1956. We don’t see William again, for certain, after that year. When his mother, Emma Arnold Ramsey (yet, another marriage, it is claimed), died on 14 Aug 1979 in Mount Carmel, her obituary stated that her son, William W. Rease, was deceased. But, since she had no close living relatives (other than possibly her son) at the time, the obituary information is suspect.

Now, the Mysterious Part

The 23 Dec 1977 edition of the El Paso Times relates a detailed interview by a reporter of William “Cherokee” Rease. Rease, self-described as the stubborn son of a Comanche-Cherokee mother and an Irish-Cherokee father, claimed to be seventy-nine years old (born 1898) and to have worked as a gas station attendant, inventor, sign painter, school teacher, magazine writer, Fort Worth cop, private investigator, and man-about-Las Vegas. And he was an autobiographer, authoring his life’s story, which formed the basis of the newspaper article (and all his claims).

El Paso Times.

He was also, it turns out, a wife-killer. On 29 Oct 1977, in a rented barn 25 miles from Van Horn, Texas, Rease put three bullets from a high-powered rifle into the skull of the woman he loved, Jacquelyn Rae ("Ray") Rease. It was her 43rd birthday. Nine days later, District Court Judge William H. Emory told Rease he would probate his sentence in exchange for a plea of guilty to the charge of murder. Rease agreed and walked free.

Rease’s autobiography was apparently never published, and in August 1987, Cherokee Bill died while still a resident of El Paso. His SSDI (Social Security Death Index) year of birth was given as 1907, considerably different from the year of 1898 indicated by the age he claimed during his interview by the El Paso Times reporter. Apparently Bill liked to stretch things.

A William Rease born around 1907 (excluding one or two who are ruled out by race or location) is first documented in the record of his marriage on 9 Feb 1977 in Chambers Co, Texas, to Jacquelyn R. Johnson, the woman he murdered later that year. In his interview, William said that he had been married twice before that. And before his death, he was married once more, to Carmen Leyva on 28 Feb 1983 in El Paso. With the possible exception of the SSDI, a 1907 William Rease appears in no record prior to the 1977 marriage record.

But, of course, that William Rease of El Paso born in 1907 cannot be found in early records does not prove a connection to our William Rease born in 1914. But there are two things strongly evidencing this. First, the middle name of William Rease of El Paso was “Woodrow.” Second, the SSDI birthdate of William of El Paso was 2 Feb 1907. William of the Spencer Case was born 2 Feb 1914. Could our William have changed his birth year, perhaps to obtain retirement benefits? Birthdate changes, not at all uncommon, usually involve only year changes. Are the two William’s the same? Probably. What are the odds for two William Woodrow Reases born on 2 Feb? And the William of El Paso was issued his SSN in Michigan, where William of Princeton, Indiana is known to have lived, at least for a while.