Beloved Frenchtown Lawman Slain Doing a Favor in Holland

DOAN, Clarence – (1893-1938) part-time Frenchtown constable, carpenter and projectionist at Fred Sipes' silent-movie theater.

He was an Army veteran, serving before the Great War. During the 1935 trial of Bruno Hauptmann, killer of Charles Lindbergh Jr., Doan was a jury guard. Gloria Sipes Paleveda remembered that when it snowed, Doan would control the traffic on Milford Road so kids could sled down Everittstown Road in relative safety. She said he was a handsome, genial man and very popular in town. He helped her father build the third story apartment onto the theater building where his family would reside.

On Jan. 13, 1938, World War I veteran George Washington Wallace Wismer, age 46, needed a mental examination in Trenton in connection with a pension application. Wismer was living with his mother, Lydia, age 77, on on a small rented farm near Milford. Although Holland Township was not in Doan's jurisdiction, Wismer's family had asked Doan to transport him as a favor.

This would be his third encounter with Wismer, and the man had been troublesome both previous times. So Doan borrowed handcuffs from Frenchtown marshal Godfrey Hawk. Doan's brother-in-law Jens Tange of Everittstown drove him to the farmhouse just before noon.

Present besides Lydia, were Wismer's brother Samuel, and his sister Anna and her husband, Clark Heath. Wismer was lying on a couch in a corner of the kitchen. He was emaciated and had thick, shaggy black hair and a long beard. He was wearing a heavy woolen shirt, pants and slippers.

Doan asked Wismer if he knew him.

“Certainly, you're Clarence Doan, the constable from Frenchtown,” he replied, intelligible despite a speech impediment.

Doan said, “I'd like to take you for a ride.”

Then Wismer got up from the couch protesting, then reached under a stack of newspapers and snatched out a 12 gauge, double-barreled shotgun loaded with No. 4 shells. (Depending on the size of the pellets, No. 4 shells were either for shooting deer or ducks.) Doan got a hold on the gun and lifted it above Wismer's head, saying he would take it away from him. But Wismer suddenly twisted the gun and immediately pulled the trigger. Doan's abdomen received the full blast.

The Milford Fire Company's ambulance rushed Doan to Easton Hospital, where he lived long enough to speak with investigators, but died that afternoon.

Wismer was arrested that same day by state troopers and taken to the county jail in Flemington. Under interrogation, Wismer was largely incoherent, but spoke about what “George” had done. His condition was diagnosed by alienists as dementia praecox, which is currently called schizophrenia, and it was decided he was “dangerously insane and growing steadily worse.” His mother was diagnosed as “insane but not dangerous.” Mother and son were committed to the state hospital.

Later on, Doan's widow, Janice, was denied a pension because her husband had not been on official business when he was killed.

Irrelevant facts:

--Doan and Wismer had both been born on Aug. 22.

--Wismer was not alone in being named George Washington. It was a thing back then. Other local George Washingtons include George W. Hummer (two of them) and Milford photographer George W. Freeland. If you were named George in the 1800s, it seems your middle initial was W. Here are some suspects: Frenchtown hardware merchants George W. Eddy and George W. Bunn, George W. Laire of Everittstown, Frenchtown's first borough garbage collector George W. Hartpence, Pvt. George W. Opdycke (Civil War) and Sgt. George W. Britton (World War I).

From "Rick's Frenchtown Encyclopedia"