Long Beach Police Death Essay

A number of Long Beach police officers are also buried at local cemeteries. Several of them lost their lives in the line of duty. I’ve only included the two buried at Sunnyside. You can read of the tragic deaths of the others in my book Prohibition Madness.

Thomas Cicero Borden (4/13/1851-3/17/12) buried Sunnyside Cemetery. On Sunday, March 17, 1912, 60-year-old officer Thomas C. Borden became the first Long Beach police officer to be killed in the line of duty. Returning from church that Saint Patrick’s Day evening, his wife Matilda stopped to talk to a neighbor as Tom continued to their home at 226 E. 10th Street. He quickly saw that something was amiss. Their front door was open and someone was coming out. Matilda heard her husband

Neighbors, attracted by the gunfire and cries, came and carried the wounded officer into a nearby house and called an ambulance. Tom Borden was rushed to the Long Beach Sanitarium where he died just as the ambulance reached the entrance. An autopsy later revealed that two bullets had entered Tom Borden’s body. The first hit Borden in the stomach just above the navel. This wound caused the police officer to bend in pain. The second shot, which entered the top of the head, traveled downward, splitting in two; one half emerging under the jaw and the other penetrating the chest and lodging in the

He had been trying to help motorists Ed Sims, a teller at the Long Beach National Bank, and P. J. Hudson start their car. As Bridgeman stooped down to crank the auto, his Smith and Wesson revolver, carried in a holster on the front of his belt, dropped to the pavement and landed on the hammer. Although the safety was on, police investigation later showed the cartridge in the chamber was fired. The Phoenix, Arizona, native, who had been a member of the Long Beach police department since July 1921, was killed