Murder at the Lighthouse - 1938 Cape San Blas Slaying Remains Unsolved

The 1938 death of Cape San Blas assistant lighthouse keeper E.W. Marler reads like a great mystery novel.

A young man with no discernable enemies is stabbed to death in his workshop.

His young daughter discovers his blood-soaked body, and a delegation of townsfolk convene to decide the question on everyone's lips:

Was Marler's death murder or suicide? 

Though a jury impaneled to investigate Marler's death ruled the case a murder on March 23, 1938, no one was ever charged with the crime.

Over 70 years later, the case remains one of the area's great, unsolved mysteries.

A Grisly Scene

In the first sign of something amiss, Marler, 39, did not report home for lunch on the afternoon of March 16, 1938.

He customarily tended the lighthouse light in the mornings, then retired to his workshop behind his home by 10 a.m.

When the clock struck noon on March 16, Marler's wife dispatched one of their young daughters to the workshop to sound the dinner bell.

The young girl returned home alone. Daddy is hurt, she told her mother, go and help him.

A grisly scene greeted Mrs. Marler.

Her husband lay in a pool of blood at the end of his workbench, with 13 stab wounds around the heart and one at the throat. Marler's nearly severed hand dangled at his side.

Those on the scene initially ruled the death a suicide, until Sheriff Byrd E. Parker questioned how Marler could have stabbed himself repeatedly and with such force.

The Sheriff wrapped up the knife and hatchet resting two feet from the body and transported them to Wewahitchka for fingerprint testing.

A coroner's inquest, conducted the same day, did not determine whether Marler's death was a murder or suicide.

The question still unsettled, Marler's relatives secured a permit to transport the body to Alabama for burial.

An Amiable Man

The Star printed a short notice of Marler's death in its March 18, 1938 edition, just below a photograph of the uncompleted St. Joe Paper Company Mill.

The news of Marler's gruesome death was in stark contrast to the newspaper's optimistic coverage of the mill, billed as "the south's newest and finest."

"Port St. Joe wears an air of expectancy, and faces of business men are wreathed in smiles as they look forward to the opening of the mill and the consequent expected increase in business," The Star reported.

The following week, as Port St. Joe residents proudly handled the first samples of paper produced at the mill, a second jury convened in city hall to weigh the evidence in the Marler case.

R. C. Rector, Adolph LeHardy, Dr. L. H. Bartee, G. P. Gary, J. O. Bragdon and A. E. Harrelson served as jurors, with Rector elected foreman.

W. J. Braun, Jr. and H. S. Salzer of the government lighthouse service were also present at the investigation, along with a federal investigator.

In analyzing Marler's death, jurors left no stone unturned.

After hearing the testimony of several witnesses, jurors debated Marler's financial situation, character and demeanor on the morning of his death.

Clem Brooks, Marler's uncle, testified that he had personally arranged a bank loan for his nephew to pay off his outstanding debts.

Marler's widow and daughter, Ernestine, echoed Brooks' assessment that he had not been killed by an angry creditor.

Brooks and S.R. White, the head lighthouse keeper, described Marler as an amiable fellow, with no enemies and no reason to commit suicide.

"He was the type of man who would not, in my opinion, do such a thing," said Brooks.

White, who had been summoned to the crime scene by Mrs. Marler on the afternoon of March 16, noted that Marler had been "in good spirits" on the morning of his death.

Having noticed only that Marler's injured wrist "had been cut to the bone," White initially ruled his death a suicide - a judgement perhaps informed by Mrs. Marler's reaction to her dead husband's body.

"Mrs. Marler threw her arms about her husband and said, 'Oh, darling, why did you do it?'" White testified.

"Not Possible"

The appearance of the crime scene and Marler's multiple stab wounds convinced jurors to suspect foul play.

Dr. Bartee, who viewed the body, emphatically ruled out suicide.

"It would not be possible for a man to stab himself so many times and then practically cut his wrist in two, or for a man to cut his wrist so deeply and then stab and cut himself 14 times in the chest and throat," the doctor concluded.

The wounds were so deep, in fact, that once Marler's body was embalmed, embalming fluid spurted out of three cuts on his chest and a deep slash across his neck.

The crime scene also revealed two other large pools of blood, one near a tool chest at the rear of the shed, and one extending from under the bench across the floor.

No trails of blood from either pool led to Marler's body.

Bloody fingerprints on one of the bench legs also seemed to indicate that Marler had attempted to rise to his feet after being attacked.

After weighing the evidence, the jury returned a verdict of "death at the hands of a party or parties unknown."

Citing several threats made to previous keepers by persons coveting their jobs at the lighthouse, White worried that he might be next.

"I'm afraid to stay there - afraid that some desperado will get me," said White.

"And if Marler was murdered they might get me."

Moonshine

Today, the Marler murder continues to fascinate.

It recently made mention in author and Panama City News Herald columnist Marlene Womack's new book, Moonshine Mayhem.

Though the case remains unsolved, Womack notes two theories espoused by local residents familiar with the crime.

In the first, Marler was killed by moonshiners after discovering a boat unloading "illegal whiskey or a cache of booze" onshore.

The second theory, which Womack deems "unlikely," credits Marler's untimely demise to his witnessing a break-in at one of the nearby cottages.

"Those who remember tend to go with the first theory since bringing in illegal, untaxed liquor was still common on the Panhandle's desolate shores, even after the end of Prohibition," noted Womack.

Cursed

Marler's murder was not the first, or the last, tragedy at the Cape San Blas lighthouse, leading some to suggest that the lighthouse may be cursed.

Roger "Mac" McDaniel, who attended the lighthouse reunion last weekend, served at the lighthouse from 1955-56 while in the Coast Guard.

"In thinking of Cape San Blas, and some stories I was told, I recall it being referred to as a 'hard luck' station, or haunted," McDaniel recalled in an e-mail.

In addition to the Marler murder, McDaniel cited a chief killed by a ricocheted bullet (he'd attempted to shoot a hole through a railroad iron), twins who drowned offshore while leaving their clothes on the beach and a young girl accidentally killed by a lighthouse keeper.

On the latter, McDaniel explained: "En route from Port St. Joe to the light, there was no road, so they rode down the beach. The children (the keeper's daughter and niece) were riding on the front fenders, and the niece fell off and was run over."

To McDaniel's list, add the 1932 suicide of Ray Linton and two civilians who plummeted to their death while painting the tower.

Today, the Cape San Blas lighthouse and keepers' quarters are picturesque reminders of the area's maritime heritage.

Tourists flock to the lighthouse grounds, which have witnessed no tragedies in recent history.

Perhaps the curse is broken.