Some of the sadder stories in the town’s history are those of the four Plymouth officers who have died in the line of duty.
The history of policing in Plymouth dates to 1633 when the General Court appointed Joshua Cooper as the town’s constable. But it wasn’t until 1861 that the modern police department emerged. That was when captains Peter Smith and Josiah D. Baxter were named “day and night police.”
Fourteen years later, tragedy struck the department. Baxter was shot and killed while trying to arrest a domestic abuser on a charge of public intoxication. The assailant, Christopher Stoddard, was captured soon after the shooting. He was eventually tried, found guilty, and sentenced to life in prison.
Baxter’s end of watch came shortly before 11 a.m. on May 3, 1875. He left his wife and adult son. Local historian Jim Baker’s website provides more details in a post called Murder in Clamshell Alley.
Seventy-one years would pass before the second deadly incident. Patrolman George S. Bell, who had recently returned from serving in World War II, lost his life on June 29, 1946. According to records, he was responding to a call on Burley Lane, but there is no street by that name in town, so I am uncertain of the actual location) Bell had received a tip that a murder suspect was in the area. The suspect, an itinerant farm worker, was wanted for the murder of a housemaid or his wife, according to different reports. Bell was shot and killed by the suspect, who escaped. The suspect was later shot by a state trooper when he fired upon the officer in a migrant workers camp.
Bell was only 31 years old and had only been with the police department for three weeks. He is buried in Vine Hills Cemetery here in Plymouth.
Sixty years ago – on January 28, 1965 – police Officer Paul Murphy suffered a serious head injury when he fell down a flight of icy stairs off School Street. Murphy, 36, was taken to a Boston hospital where he remained unconscious until he died on February 20 from head injuries. He was a two-year veteran of the department, having previously served in the United States Marine Corps. He left behind his wife and two children.
Plymouth police officer Gregg Maloney was killed in a motorcycle accident in 2014.
I have a personal connection to the fourth local officer killed while on duty, which makes this retelling more difficult.
My office at the time was located at 16 Main St. It featured a large picture window on the second floor, making it an ideal location to watch downtown happenings. It was such a prime observation post that when I worked late and on weekends, officers walking the beat came up to get warm during the winter and avail themselves of the commanding view of the bars and adjacent street action.
I can’t remember how I met Officer Gregg Maloney. It was either through word of mouth about my office perch, or when I had the pleasure of designing Gregg and his wife’s first new home in Plymouth. He quickly became a friend. It was devastating when he lost his life on April 1, 2014, in a motorcycle accident while on patrol. He left behind his wife and two boys and is buried at Vine Hills.
All four officers are memorialized by a plaque outside of the police station. All but one has a gravestone in Plymouth. And that is where our story of remembrance takes an interesting turn.
The lack of a gravestone for Baxter has long been a point of frustration in the department. We know he was buried atop Burial Hill, but not precisely where, making placement of a stone difficult. Complicating matters is the fact that there are more people interred on the hill than there are gravestones.
Enter Cheryle Caputo, co-founder and president of the Friends of Burial Hill group. I was able to sit with Cheryle as she mapped out the detective work she’s used in an attempt to locate Baxter. Cheryle relied on two books published in the late 1890s that document the stones on the hill, their inscriptions, and maps of the stone locations. Using town records and the books, Cheryle noticed in the records that Charles Irving Baxter (the Baxters’ infant son) was buried on the hill. Knowing the location of that site, Cheryle went to inspect it.
The location of the Baxter baby’s stone is dominated by a large beech tree. The roots revealed fragments of a marble and brownstone gravestone. typical of the 1850s (when the child died). Cheryle also used postcards from the 1890s to further narrow the search area. The Baxter plot is in the vicinity of the Cushman monument which was a popular postcard scene during that period.
The postcards also offered another clue – images of the Baxters’ family plot surrounded by a wooden fence with stone corner makers-markers. Cheryle had seen the markers during her visit to the hill.
My guess is that a stone wasn’t placed at Baxter’s gravesite because his oldest son had moved to the North Shore and there was no one from the family here to make it happen.
Still the precise location remained a mystery. Recently, however, something fortunate happened.
Friends of Burial Hill had been using ground-penetrating radar on the hill in an attempt to locate the mass grave of sailors from the General Arnold, an American revolutionary ship that sought shelter in Plymouth Harbor during a winter storm.
The ship grounded itself on a mudflat towards the end of Plymouth Beach. Most of the crew died because of the frigid weather. Many of them are buried together on the hill.
During the radar search Cheryle asked if the team would have time to make a pass over the Baxter site. The radar revealed two adult-size graves in the plot. Although it’s not certain they are Baxter and his wife, logic points to a match.
But because the graves cannot be absolutely proven to be the Baxters, the stone will be a memorial to the captain and his wife. Discussions are underway to determine the type of stone and its exact placement, but after 149 years, Baxter’s name will finally be on Burial Hill.
The stone, and possibly a base, will be paid for by the Plymouth Police Relief Association, with physical labor coming from the Friends of Burial Hill.
May will mark the 150th anniversary of Baxter’s death. There is hope that the stone will be placed this year – a touching tribute to a man who sacrificed his life for our town.
Architect Bill Fornaciari is a lifelong resident of Plymouth (except for a three-year adventure going West as a young man) and is the owner of BF Architects in Plymouth. His firm specializes in residential work and historic preservation. Have a question or idea for this column? Email Bill at billfornaciari@gmail.com.