Constable Ash

Constable O. A. Ash: Complete Testimony on the Aimee McPherson Kidnapping Investigation (1926)

Arlin E. Nusbaum
July 19, 2026

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Introduction

Constable O. A. Ash of Douglas, Arizona was the most credible first-hand witness in the 1926 Aimee Semple McPherson kidnapping investigation. Over seven months, Ash provided multiple accounts of his role in tracking McPherson's alleged escape route and discovering the shack where she claimed to have been held captive.

This document consolidates all known testimony from Constable Ash into a single, coherent narrative, sourced from three newspaper accounts spanning June 1926 to January 1927.

Research Note: This compilation is based on primary source documentation recovered from newspaper archives. The original "Angelus Sentinel" church bulletin (cited by the Madera Tribune as an intermediary source) has not been located in any digital archive.

Part I: Constable Ash’s Credentials

"I have been a police officer or a deputy sheriff since 1899, and I am now serving my second term as constable."
— Madera Tribune, January 18, 1927

"Mr. Ash has been a constable and deputy sheriff in Douglas many years. He is a man of middle age, quiet and conservative in speech and is a member of the Masonic fraternity. He has every appearance of telling the truth and of being most sincere in all he says and does."
— Redlands Daily Facts, October 29, 1926

Summary: Ash was a career law enforcement officer with approximately 27 years of experience as of 1926. He was the elected constable of the Douglas District in Cochise County, Arizona, and testified as a witness for the defense in McPherson's case.

Part II: Initial Contact with McPherson

How I Learned of the Case

Version A (October 29, 1926):

"Gonzales said the woman had stumbled across the doorway of his home and fallen in a faint. He and his wife picked her up, rubbed her with alcohol and partially restored her, and seeing that she was an American, summoned the American taxi, and directed that she be taken to Douglas. The driver took her passenger to the police department, and a police officer by the name of Cook sent her to the hospital, guaranteed her hospital bill, and summoned Constable Ash."

Version B (January 18, 1927):

"John Anderson, the cab driver who brought Mrs. McPherson across the border at the request of the mayor of Agua Prieta, did not heed the mayor's order to take her to the hospital because the woman in a semi-conscious condition continually called for the police. Therefore, Anderson took her first to the Douglas police station. That is how I learned of the case immediately."

Her Physical Condition Upon Arrival

Ash's description remained remarkably consistent across all accounts:

Injury	Ash's Observation	Los Angeles Press Claim
Swollen ankles	✅ Verified	❌ Denied
Blistered soles	✅ Verified	Not addressed
Burned/welted wrists	✅ Verified	❌ Denied
Torn pocket	✅ "One pocket was torn from her gingham dress"	Not addressed
Holes in stockings	✅ Verified	❌ Denied

Part III: Organizing the Search

"I know the border country well and I have had considerable training in tracking, so when I heard the evangelist's story I organized a party to search for the shack and to hunt for the kidnappers."

Search Party Members:

• Constable O. A. Ash (lead investigator)
• Leslie Gatliff (lieutenant, Douglas Police Department)
• Unnamed Indian tracker
• Additional posse members

"Accompanied by an Indian and Leslie Gatliff, lieutenant of the Douglas police department, I back-trailed Mrs. McPherson..."
— Madera Tribune, January 18, 1927

Part IV: The Terrain

Ash's most important contribution was correcting the misinformation spread by Los Angeles newspapers about the desert terrain.

"The country there is not a desert as reported. On the contrary, it is a grassy, well watered spot, a fine cattle country."

"The elevation there is approximately 5000 feet and the country the woman traveled over was grassy, in some cases the grass being up to one's knees. It is the exact opposite of a desert—yet the Los Angeles papers insist upon calling it a desert."

Temperature Reading:

"The maximum temperature reached the day Mrs. McPherson walked across the grassy country was 96 degrees; at least, that's what it was in Douglas."

Ash's Defense Against Skepticism:

"Please observe that the shoes I now have on have not the slightest scratch, yet I walked days and nights over the grassy country in search of Mrs. McPherson's trail... When I testified in Los Angeles on Tuesday and Wednesday I wore a silk-finished alpaca suit which contained no blemishes, despite the fact that I had worn it constantly two days and two nights when I finally arrived at the shack which the evangelist had described to me."

Part V: Tracing the Route

Specific Route Details:

Segment	Direction	Distance	Terrain Feature
Leg 1	East from Douglas	9 miles	Along fence toward Niggerhead Mountain
Leg 2	South	9 miles	Along Galardo ranch fence
Gap	N/A	~2 miles	Lost due to cattle tracks
Total	East then South	20 miles	Combined distance

Tracking Methodology:

"We set out in the general direction indicated by the woman and soon picked up her trail. We followed it and finally came to the fence she described. There it was easy to track her and we did so without difficulty for miles. The grass or weeds would be broken down; a stone dislodged, and occasionally there would be a footprint. Her shoes fitted these prints."

Shack/cabin discovered:

"We tracked her indisputably to within a mile and a half of a cabin, and the house answered her description of the place where she was held captive."

Part VI: The Shack Discovery

Timeline of Discovery:

Date	Event	Status
June 26, 1926	Initial shack located based on footprints	✅ Shack found ❌ Fetters NOT YET FOUND
August 18, 1926	Second verification with McPherson's help	✅ Confirmed shack identity ✅ Fetters found

Initial Discovery (June 26, 1926):

"The discovery of a shack 18 miles southeast of Agua Prieta, Sonora, Mexico, by a searching party under Constable O. A. Ash, who identified it from descriptions as the one in which Aimee Semple McPherson, Los Angeles evangelist, said she was held captive, marked the only development here today in the investigation into the alleged kidnapping of the evangelist."

"The cabin was located, according to Ash, after difficult tracking over desolate prairies."

"The windows of the cabin were barred, Ash said, and one of them had been broken. There were four rooms in the structure, the greater part of which was of adobe brick."

Confirmation Discovery (August 18, 1926):

"Then, on August 18 that was after Mrs. McPherson had returned to that region to help officers hunt the cabin where she had been held prisoner we found the shack that the evangelist and the other officers failed to find. Lieutenant Gatlitf was the first to spy the place. The shack was really a miner's cabin at the abandoned San Juan gold and copper mine."

Part VII: Physical Evidence Found

The Binding Materials

Item	Description	Purpose	Status
Oil can	Five-gallon	Cut binding strips	✅ In custody
Rawhide strands	Found in room and outside door	Binding material	✅ Found
Heavy ducking	Fabric strips	Binding material	✅ Found
Bed ticking strips	Cloth binding	Wrist/ankle bindings	✅ Found
Can-opener marks	Rough edge on can	Cut the bindings	✅ Verified

"Her hands and feet were not bound with rope, but with strips of cloth similar to bed ticking."

"In this shack we found the can which has been opened with can-opener, and we could see that the rough edge had been used to cut the bed ticking strips which apparently had bound the woman's wrists and ankles."

Secondary Finding: Horse Tracks

"Throughout the time the posse has been attempting to find the shack, according to the constable, it has encountered the tracks of a shod horse, parallel to the woman's footprints. During the search the party came upon a fence through which the woman's tracks passed, and through which the horseman had cut a gap. He expressed the belief that the woman who made the tracks was followed later by a rider."

Part VIII: Critique of Los Angeles Press

Witness Misquotations:

"Los Angeles newspapers certainly can lie. While eating my lunch in Los Angeles the other day I purchased a newspaper which gave a full account of the testimony of M. R. Irvine, a photographer from Douglas. But Irvine had not yet been on the witness stand and did not get to testify until two and one-half hours after I read his alleged testimony in the paper."

Withholding Facts From Public:

"He declares that 'honest facts concerning the case of Aimee Semple McPherson have been withheld from the public' and that Los Angeles newspapers had deliberately misinformed their readers regarding important phases of the evangelist's kidnaping story."

Final Assessment:

"In conclusion I might add that California certainly has some prize winning liars."

Part IX: Ash’s Position on the Case

"I do not know anything about the case prior to it coming under my observation," continued Constable Ash, "I know nothing of the woman, her motives, nor how she got to the cabin. All I know is that we tracked her, beyond all possibility of a mistake, to within a mile and a half of the cabin; that she came exhausted to the cabin of Gonzales and had to be revived there; that she was taken to the hospital in Douglas and that there her feet were blistered, her ankles swollen, her wrists and arms burned, welted and swollen. And we have the can and bandage with which she was bound, and have it in safe keeping. The other officers who had to do with the case in and around Douglas will substantiate all these things."

Appendix A: Chronological Summary

Date	Event	Documentation
May 18, 1926	McPherson disappears from Venice Beach	Background event
June 23, 1926	McPherson reappears in Douglas hospital	Background event
June 26, 1926	Shack initially located by Ash's party	San Bernardino Daily Sun, June 27
June 27, 1926	Ash interview published (AP wire)	San Bernardino Daily Sun
August 18, 1926	Shack confirmed with McPherson's help	Madera Tribune
October 1926	Ash testifies in Los Angeles grand jury	Madera Tribune
October 29, 1926	Ash gives interview at Redlands office	Redlands Daily Facts
January 10, 1927	DA Keyes drops all charges	Background event
January 18, 1927	Madera Tribune publishes Ash interview	Madera Tribune (& Angelus Sentinel)

Appendix B: Source Comparison Matrix

Detail	Article 1 (Jun 27, 1926)	Article 2 (Oct 29, 1926)	Article 3 (Jan 18, 1927)
Shack found	June 26, 1926	Not mentioned	August 18, 1926
Fetters found	NOT YET FOUND	Can & bandage in custody	Bed ticking strips found
Wrist marks	Not mentioned	"Burned, welted and swollen"	"Marks made on wrists"
Route details	None	"Followed fence...canyon"	"Nine miles east...nine miles south"
Cab driver named	Not named	"Gonzales"	"John Anderson"
Leslie Gatliff named	Not mentioned	Not mentioned	Lieutenant, Douglas PD
LA press critique	Not present	"Different from LA colorings"	"Prize winning liars"
Source attribution	AP Wire	Redlands Daily Facts original	From Angelus Sentinel citing SBDS

Conclusion

Constable Ash was the most credible first-hand witness in the McPherson kidnapping case. His account provides the primary evidentiary foundation for McPherson's claim, directly contradicting the skeptical stance of the Los Angeles press.

Strengths

• ✅ Career law enforcement officer (27+ years experience)
• ✅ Local expert on border terrain
• ✅ Physical evidence in custody (oil can, bindings)
• ✅ Consistent core narrative across three separate accounts
• ✅ Independent of McPherson's church/following
• ✅ Corroborated by other Douglas officers

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Sources Used

1. San Bernardino Daily Sun, June 27, 1926, Page 2 (Newspapers.com)
2. Redlands Daily Facts, October 29, 1926 (Newspapers.com)
3. Madera Tribune, January 18, 1927, Page 4 (CDNC.ucr.edu — MT19270118)

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