BIRDMAN OF ALCATRAZ The Story of Robert Stroud

Hardback. 1st US Edn. PRESENTATION COPY INSC. AND SIGNED. Robert Stroud had been in solitary confinement since 1916, longer than any Federal prisoner in American history. Why? Because he killed a prison warder, because the prison authorities wanted him hanged for it, and when he was reprieved everything was done to make life hell for him. Twice Stroud killed, but by modern opinion perhaps in neither case would he have been treated as a murderer today. He saw his own gallows built - and been saved from them only by his mother's devoted and determined efforts. But Stroud's world fame came because while in solitary confinement he secured some canaries; he studied them and became accepted as a leading authority on bird diseases. Stroud's incredible story passes the bizarre when he, though still in solitary confinement, married an admirer in an effort to save himself from being transferred to a prison where he would be deprived of his bird friends. 334pp. 8vo. h/back. PRESENTATION COPY INSCRIBED AND SIGNED BY THOMAS E. GADDIS. With lightly browned edges and pp., sl. wear to head/tail of sp. o/w Vg. in sl. sunned G++ pcdw.