When three fur trappers in Oregon disappeared from their rural outpost in 1924, their family members sounded the alarm about a bizarre scene left in the snow. Authorities launched an investigation that was months behind a killer and found themselves hunting a career criminal who may have pulled off the greatest caper of his life.View source material and photos for this episode at: parkpredators.com/the-trappers Park Predators is an audiochuck production. Connect with us on social media:Instagram: @parkpredators | @audiochuckTwitter: @ParkPredators | @audiochuckFacebook: /ParkPredators | /audiochuckllcTikTok: @audiochuck
Chapter 1: Who was involved in the 1924 disappearance of the trappers in Oregon?
By mid-April 1924, a woman named Sarah Wilson was extremely worried. You see, it had been several months since her 36-year-old son, Harry Leroy Wilson, who often just went by Roy, had left their home in Bend, Oregon and headed about 25 miles southwest to Little Lava Lake in Deschutes National Forest. The last time Sarah had physically seen Roy was around Christmas of 1923.
At that time, he and one of his friends, 53-year-old Ed Nichols, had traveled from a cabin they worked at at Little Lava Lake to spend time with loved ones for the holidays. Sometime shortly after the festivities ended, the men departed and traveled back to the rural cabin. Joining them was another friend, 23-year-old Dewey Morris, who'd actually worked with Roy as a logger in the past.
Before setting off with his companions, Roy told his mom that he'd come home sometime in February. But when that month came and then went, and then the next, and Roy was still not home, that's when Sarah realized something wasn't right. It's hard to tell from the available source material if she got in contact with Ed or Dewey's family members during this time.
But what I can tell you is that she was not the only relative who was worried about the overdue men. On Sunday, April 13th, one of Dewey's brothers named Owen Morris and Roy's brother-in-law, Hervey Ennis, decided to go out to Little Lava Lake and figure out what was going on.
Weather conditions had improved greatly by that time, and so the roads were clear enough for them to drive some of the way and then snowshoe about seven miles or so to get to the trapper's cabin. The terrain they had to trek on foot wasn't treacherous, but it also wasn't a cakewalk. There was still a lot of snow on the ground. But eventually, Hervey and Owen did make it to the cabin.
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Chapter 2: What unusual discoveries were made at the trappers' cabin?
However, when they arrived, no one was there. Unsure of what else to do, the pair looked around inside and noticed a few things that seemed unusual. Dishes were left sitting on a table and utensils and cookware with food still on them were laying around and showed signs of mold. Firearms and traps were also inside the cabin and trash was scattered on the floor.
There was extra clothing and supplies that didn't appear to have been used. Hervey and Owen also found boots and snowshoes that reportedly belonged to Ed, Dewey, and Roy, cleaned and left near the front door. There was also a calendar that was still displaying January as the month, not April.
So it was almost like the cabin had been frozen in time for three months, which I imagine felt eerie to Hervey and Owen. Another clue that indicated no one had been there in a while was the presence of equipment that Ed, Dewey, and Roy would have normally used in their trapping duties. Except the stuff was in a state of neglect, which indicated the men had not been actively using it.
Other than everything just seemingly sitting idle, there really wasn't anything that indicated a struggle or violent encounter had occurred. There was nothing like a note or message that explained where the missing trio was. When Hervey and Owen checked outside, they made another discovery that felt unusual.
Several pens that the cabin's owner, a guy named Ed Logan, kept live foxes in were all empty. The source material doesn't state exactly how far these pens were from the cabin, but it's believed that the cages were close by.
Anyway, the pens being vacant was not a good sign, so I imagine figuring out whether the foxes had somehow escaped on their own or if they'd been stolen, Hervey and Owen investigated the animals' food supply. But that only led to more questions, because when they checked the foxes' feed pans, they realized there was a lot of food still left in them.
In fact, according to Melanie Tupper's book, The Trapper Murders, and coverage by the Bend Bulletin, Hervey and Owen had been informed before heading out to the cabin that food for the foxes had been delivered around January 13th, 1924. So a long time before they got there.
And yet, when the two of them saw how much food was still untouched, they realized the foxes could not have been fed after mid-January. Around the same time Hervey and Owen noticed the empty fox pens and excess food, they came across something else even more alarming.
In a patch of snow roughly 30 feet west of the cabin, the pair found what looked like a blood stain, three pistol shells and five shotgun shells. On the other side of the structure, about 10 feet away from the cabin, they stumbled across what appeared to be pieces of a skull.
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Chapter 3: How did law enforcement begin the investigation into the missing trappers?
They had a good evening together and chatted about how much money the three of them had made fur trapping over the winter, which was reportedly like $3,000 worth of skins at the going currency rate back then. On April 15th, Ed Logan, the owner of the remote cabin, along with two more of Dewey's brothers, traveled from Bend to the Lava Lakes to get involved in the investigation.
The source material isn't super clear on specifics, but it appears those guys and others, along with members of law enforcement, formed an official search party for Ed, Dewey, and Roy at that point.
Melanie Tupper's book, The Trapper Murders, refers to this search effort as the second search effort conducted for the men, since, you know, Hervey and Owen had technically been to the cabin first on their own.
Anyway, on the 15th, during the second search, the sheriff also ordered a boat crew go out on Little Lava Lake and a nearby reservoir to see if the missing trappers had possibly fallen through the ice somewhere in those locations and become trapped.
Back at the cabin, investigator Adams and other folks in the search party looking for Ed, Dewey, and Roy came across at least five fox carcasses that Hervey and Owen had seemingly missed during their initial trip. These carcasses were completely skinned of fur and discarded in some brush not far from the pens the animals were normally kept in.
The foxes themselves were valued at around $1,800 for that time period, which would be somewhere in the ballpark of slightly more than $33,000 today. Now, what made the discovery of the carcasses so odd was the fact that there were no fox pelts anywhere inside or outside the cabin.
So if Ed, Dewey, and Roy had killed the foxes and skinned them, it didn't really make sense that the furs were nowhere to be found. Unless for some reason the trio had left with the pelts and tried to sell them, but based on the available source material I could find, that wasn't something Ed Logan had tasked the men with or instructed them to do.
There was also no sign that the missing men had tended any of their previously set trap lines. So law enforcement's growing suspicion was that something untoward had happened to them. The next day, April 16th, Deputy Sheriff Adams traveled back to Bend to fill in the sheriff about what he'd seen at the cabin and what was going on with the investigation.
On that return trip, he'd brought with him a sample of the blood that had been found on the wooden sled abandoned at Big Lava Lake. Deep down, investigator Adams was one of those folks who suspected murder was afoot.
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Chapter 4: What clues suggested foul play in the disappearance of the trappers?
And he thought that the blood might belong to one of the missing men if perhaps they'd been killed closer to the cabin and then their bodies were transported on the sled and dumped in the lake. As interesting of a theory as that was though, when results from a microscopic examination of the blood came back two days later on April 18th, the findings indicated it wasn't human.
No source material confirms for sure whether whoever examined it suggested it could have belonged to a fox or some kind of other animal, but at that point in the case, the blood was not believed to have come from a person. Still, law enforcement strongly suspected that the three missing trappers had been killed by someone, not died accidentally or gotten lost, but murdered.
They didn't have bodies to prove that, but there was strong circumstantial evidence that pointed to homicides. An article published by the Oregonian just a few days into the investigation detailed how the sheriff of Deschutes County was convinced Ed, Dewey, and Roy had been sunken in Big Lava Lake after being killed by an unknown perpetrator or perpetrators who'd stolen fox pelts from them.
The problem was, with no bodies to support that assumption, the case couldn't go anywhere beyond just theories. That is until Ed Logan, the cabin's owner, took a walk across the still-frozen Big Lava Lake on April 19, 1924. He made it about 100 yards across the ice when he noticed a hole that had been either cut or hacked through the top of the lake.
It was apparently just the right size to fit a person's body through and was reportedly in the shape of a circle. All things considered, it looked out of place on the otherwise solid slab of ice. Ed Logan notified investigator Adams about this discovery, and shortly thereafter, Hervey Ennis, Roy's brother-in-law, and Owen Morris, one of Dewey's brothers, found out about the hole.
When Deputy Sheriff Adams took a closer look at the opening, he found what looked like blood around it and a piece of light brown hair near the edge that he suspected had come from a person's head. Until the ice melted, though, Adams and those helping him couldn't really do much more investigating. It's not like they could dive down into the frigid water or break up the ice themselves.
So for the time being, they were sort of at the mercy of Mother Nature. While law enforcement waited, they continued to scour the trap lines the missing men were known to use, you know, to make extra sure they weren't in any of those locations or out in the forest somewhere. But it became clear that the trappers were not in any of those places.
It was also around this same time that the sheriff's office learned about an interesting transaction that had occurred about three hours northwest of Bend, all the way in Portland, Oregon. A transaction that would change the course of their investigation. The End
According to Melanie Tupper's book that I've mentioned a few times already, on April 19th, just a few days into law enforcement's investigation, authorities learned that four of the five missing fox skins that had presumably been scalped from the live foxes at Ed Logan's cabin had been sold to a fur trading business in Portland called the Schumacher Fur Company.
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Chapter 5: What was found on Big Lava Lake that advanced the investigation?
on that day, while walking to Big Lava Lake with Hervey Ennis to catch some fish for what I presume was everyone out at the lake's dinner for the evening, Adams and Hervey spotted three objects floating near one another on the surface of the water in a spot where some ice had thawed and broken up. The pair immediately got into a boat and headed toward the dark objects.
When they arrived, it became obvious the ominous shapes were the bodies of the three missing trappers. According to Melanie Tupper's book and coverage by the Oregonian, Ed and Roy were both face down in the water and Dewey was face up.
All three were quickly identified by folks present at the scene who knew them, and shortly afterward, their bodies were transported a short distance from shore and anchored in the water until the coroner could arrive. That night, Deputy Sheriff Adams traveled back to Bend to inform his boss of the discovery.
Meanwhile, Ed Logan and Hervey Ennis stayed at the lava lakes to watch over the trappers and make sure no one messed with their bodies. As far as what was found with the men and what kind of injuries they sustained, the available source material varies a little bit, but overall, here's what I gathered.
Dewey, the youngest of the trio, had been struck in the head with some sort of blunt object, possibly a hammer, and he'd also been shot in his left forearm with a shotgun. A hat was reported to be either still on him or floating in the water or ice nearby. Ed, the eldest, had been shot in the head with a shotgun, but a pair of glasses were reportedly somehow still on his face when he was found.
He'd also been shot at least once in his throat with a .38 caliber round from a revolver. Roy had been shot in the head with a revolver, and the bullet was said to have entered near the back of his right ear. He'd also sustained a wound to his right shoulder from a shotgun. Both of his injuries appeared to have come from the shooter standing behind him when they fired.
All three victims' manners of death were eventually ruled as homicide, and their date of death was determined to be on or soon after January 15, 1924. Dewey left behind his mom and sister, who lived in Portland, and several other siblings. Ed was survived by two daughters and several brothers and sisters. Roy was mourned by his mom, Sarah, and two sisters.
Interestingly, when all of them were found, none of them were dressed in attire that you'd typically wear in cold weather. So no heavy coats, jackets, nothing like that. which kind of surprised investigators because it seemed odd that the seasoned outdoorsman would have ventured into the cold without at least a jacket on.
Based on this observation, the predominant theory investigators ran with was that someone had likely lured the three men out of the cabin while they were in the middle of eating or settling in for the day. That's based on what I gathered.
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Chapter 6: How did the sale of missing fox pelts in Portland impact the case?
And it was the pair for reading that was still on his face when he was discovered in the lake. So that detail only further supported law enforcement's theory that he and the others had most likely been inside the cabin when something or someone got their attention to make them curious enough to go outside.
That same piece by the Oregonian also stated that during a subsequent search of the cabin on April 24th, authorities had located a hammer with blood on it buried in the dirt floor of the cabin.
In light of all that information and findings from the coroner's review of the men's bodies, Deputy Sheriff Adams told local newspapers that he believed at least two people had been involved in the murders, with one acting as a distraction to get the three trappers out of their cabin and the other lying in wait to ambush them.
Adams explained that the evidence he'd gathered so far strongly indicated the attackers shot and beat the victims closer to the cabin and then loaded their bodies onto the wooden sled and transported them to Big Lava Lake to dispose of them in the ice.
I said shot and beat in that last part because it was believed that perhaps Dewey had initially been able to make a run for it but then was overtaken east of the cabin and bludgeoned to death, which explained the partial skull fragments that had been observed in that location early on.
Adams said that after committing the crime, the assailants had stolen whatever animal pelts the victims had already produced for the season and then skinned the live foxes near the cabin for additional furs. On April 25th, more than three months after Ed, Dewey, and Roy were last seen alive, all of them were buried side by side at Greenwood Cemetery in Bend.
That same day, the county coroner's inquest concluded, and he determined that all of the men had been shot with what he described as heavy game shot, and it was possible at least one of the victims' own firearms had been used in the crime. Though that's not a fact I saw emphasized in later reporting, so I'm unsure how accurate that is.
What's wild to me, though, is that around this same time, more information about the blood previously taken from the crime scene was discussed publicly. Apparently back when that one sample from the wooden sled had first been tested and determined not to be human, that was incorrect.
After the first microscopic exam, the sheriff had sent the blood sample to what was known at the time as the University of Oregon Medical School for a second opinion from a pathologist. And wouldn't you know it, when analysis from that testing came back in late April after the bodies were found, it was confirmed as human.
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Chapter 7: What led to the discovery of the trappers’ bodies in Big Lava Lake?
At that time, though, it seems as if Charles had gone by the alias Lee Collins. So apparently neither Ed Logan or Ed Nichols knew him by his true identity, Charles Kimsey. If they had, they would have learned he was a wanted fugitive from Idaho who was on the run absconding from a 14-year prison sentence.
In the spring of 1923, Ed Logan had a disagreement with Charles, and as a result, Charles ended up stealing furs, jewelry, and money from him and Ed Nichols. After that, he fled the area.
Within a few weeks, his real identity became known to the press because according to articles by the Bend Bulletin and the Oregonian, he committed a vicious robbery in August of 1923, not far from Bend, which involved carjacking and kidnapping. In that incident though, the victim survived.
Charles wasn't immediately caught for that offense, which meant during the timeframe that Ed, Dewey, and Roy were killed, his whereabouts were unknown. In late 1923 and early January 1924, there had been some suspected sightings of an unknown man or person riding on horseback in Lapine, which was the closest town to the Lava Lake's cabin.
But no one could definitively put Charles in the company of the three trappers. And it's not like anyone confirmed that that unknown person on the horse was Charles.
But interestingly, Roy Wilson had served in the United States Marine Corps during World War I, and even though he hadn't spent time overseas, he was still a trained Marine and was described as a rugged person who would have probably had the skills necessary to fight off an attacker, or at least put up a decent fight if he'd seen one coming.
His background might explain why Ed Nichols invited him to spend the winter with him in Dewey at Ed Logan's remote cabin in 1924. You know, to have a little extra muscle around. Especially considering the fact that Ed Nichols knew that Charles Kimsey, who'd already robbed him and Ed Logan once before, was still at large.
To do their due diligence, authorities in Portland decided to show a photo of Charles to the police officer who'd bumped into those two fur sellers. You know, the pair that reportedly went on to sell several pelts to Carl Schumacher? Well, when that officer saw Charles' picture, he identified him as one of the men in that duo who'd been hawking the furs.
Carl, on the other hand, though, couldn't make a 100% I.D., He said that Charles Kimsey sort of looked like the man who'd sold him the furs, but he couldn't be absolutely sure. He was kind of incredulous about the whole thing, telling the Oregonian, quote, I remember the fellow well. You would think that a man with that crime hanging over him would be secretive and nervous, but he was not.
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