The Morris County chronicle. [volume] (Morristown, N.J.) 1877-1915, 1908-08-18
HAMS KILLS WIFE'S FRIEND
Shoots Down William E. Annis,
His Brother Assisting.
/. Jenkins Hams Holds OnIooISers Of
at Bayside Yacht Club While
Generals Son Does Shooting.


New York City-His wife's warn
Ing scream still echoiug, William e.
Annis, Of Recreation and the Burr Nc
tntosh Monthly, whom Captain Peter
c. Hams, Jr., U. S. A., Jr., blamed for
the wrecking of the Hams home, was
shot nine times by that Army officer
In yacht beside the float of the Bay
side Yacht Club, in Little Neck Bay,
Flushing, and he died three hours
later in Flushing Hospital.
While Captain Hams was doing the
shooting, his brother, Thornton j.
Hams, of No. lao Eighty-sixth
street, Bay Ridge, held off crowd of
yachtsmen with a pistol, telling them
the tragedy was family affair, and
that if any of them attempted to in
terfere he would shoot him. Mrs.
Annis' shrieks for mercy were ig-
nored by Captain Hams, who is a son
Of Brigadier- General Peter G. Hams,
U. S. A., retired, until Annis was shot
In the right arm, once in each leg and
six times in the abdomen. The slayer
used a magazine revolver of forty-five
calibre, containing fifteen shots, built
to fire continuously from the moment
the trigger was touched until another
finger movement locked the hammer.
SO rapid was the fire that the nine
shots to unaccustomed ears sounded
almost ike one.
Hams shot Annis from military
kneeling position, with his weapon
thrust under the bowed arm of Lewis
Harway, whom the victim used as a
shield, Harway attempted to shelter
Annis from the rain of shots, but the
captains Army training had given
him quickness in handling firearms
that enabled him to circumvent both
men. Annis, after receiving the ninth
shot, toppled out of Harways yacht,
the Pam, into the water, whereupon
Captain Hams ceased firing. When
club members rescued the wounded
and drowning man from the bay the
Hams brothers tossed their revolvers
on the float and sat down to await
the police.
Capt. Hams, calm and self-pos-
sessed, told Capt. Ruthenberg, of the
Flushing police, after giving himself
up, that he had committed the muir
der because Annis had broken up his
home. He had discovered, he de-
clared, an intrigue between Annis
and his beautiful wife, whom he
married eight years ago.
After driving his wife from home,
he said, he learned that the liaison
continued, and it preyed upon his
mind until he determined to put An
mis- out of the way. Annis was until
the discovery of the intrigue warm
friend of Capt. Hams.
Capt. Hams filed a suit for di-
Vorce last June in Boston, but did
not name Annis. He is thirty-six
years old and the son of Gen. Peter
G. Hams, retired, of Fort Hancock.
His wife, who was Claudia Libby,
was high school girl of sixteen at
Winthrop, Mass, when he married
her. They have two children.
Annis, who was thirty-eight years
Did, had been living for the last two
months at his handsome villa at
Murray Hill, near Bayside, with his
wife, charming woman, and their
two sons-William, aged seven, and
Howard, aged five.
Thornton Jenkins Hams, maya
zine writer and author of books, was
charged Jointly with his brother,
Capt. Peter G. Hams, Jr., of Fort
Hancock, in the Long Island Police
Court with the murder of William
E. Annis