James McMullin

The major league career of pitcher James McMullin spanned only eight days in 1887 with the New York Metropolitans of the American Association. Notwithstanding the brevity of his tenure, McMullin’s resume has a unique feature – involvement in as many homicides as major league victories: two of each. The second killing, a drunken shotgun slaying of his paramour in 1901, earned McMullin a stretch in California’s fortress San Quentin State Prison. Upon release, McMullin lived and worked quietly in the San Francisco area until taking another life in March 1929 – his own. A fuller account of the decades that preceded McMullin’s demise follows.

Significant aspects of our subject’s life have been lost to time. But government records indicate that James McMullin (often spelled McMullen)1 was born in San Francisco on an undetermined date between mid-July and early November 1866. He was the oldest of four children2 begat by day laborer-turned-blacksmith Kennedy McMullin (1842-1906) and his wife Ann Elizabeth (née Montague or McGahey, 1842-1927), both Irish Protestant immigrants. Next to nothing is known of James’s early life, but his literacy suggests that he received the elementary school education customarily afforded the children of immigrants.3 Thereafter, he found work as a carpenter.

The particulars of McMullin’s entry into the game are undiscovered, but by May 1885 he was pitching for a competitive San Francisco amateur club called the Clippers.4 McMullin stood 5-foot-8½5 and possessed an unremarkable physique; he was presumably right-handed.6 McMullin threw hard but was undermined by poor defensive support, as witnessed by an effort on May 10. He struck out 11 and allowed no earned runs but was undone by the Clippers’ nine errors and three passed balls in a 6-4 loss to the Unions of Sacramento.7 By the end of the year in temperate California, he was hurling for another San Francisco amateur nine, the Actives.8

In spring 1886 McMullin turned professional, engaged by the San Francisco Pioneers, a member of the newly formed, four-club California League. Following a 10-strikeout, 6-5 victory over the Sacramento Atlas in late May, it was reported that McMullin “has a very effective delivery and caused some of the best men of the Atlas to ‘fan.’”9

Later that season, the San Francisco Chronicle published a brief profile of James McMullen that described him as “the phenomenal puzzler of the Pioneers. He is young in years and experience, but is one of the most promising twirlers that ever graced the box on this coast. He has more ‘speed’ than any other pitcher in the league, with the exception of [former major league standout Charlie] Sweeney [and also throws outstanding “curves”]. … His only defect as a pitcher is lack of experience, and this will no doubt be remedied by practice.”10 Accompanying the testimonial was an ink sketch of the young pitcher, the only known likeness of him created during his ballplaying years.

No individual statistics for 1886 California League players are available, but the Pioneers (12-20, .375) were evidently impressed enough by young McMullin’s performance to re-sign him for the 1887 season.11 And by late May, the pitching-poor New York Metropolitans of the major league American Association had taken interest in him. When approached regarding his terms, McMullin informed the Mets that he wanted a $300 per month salary, plus $300 advance money. The Mets promptly agreed.12 Before departing for the East, however, he retook the box one final time for the Pioneers – and absorbed a 16-7 pasting by the San Francisco Haverlys.13 As it turned out, this was a harbinger of what awaited McMullin in his coming foray into top echelon play.

On July 2, 1887, McMullin made his major league debut against the Brooklyn Grays in an away game at Washington Park I and staggered to an 11-10 complete-game victory. The newcomer was tagged for 13 base hits, walked four, and recorded only one strikeout. As a result, he “failed to make a very favorable impression” on the New York Times.14 Another Gotham daily rendered a similar assessment, observing that McMullin “was nervous and did not make a very flattering debut.”15 Still, a two-RBI single by the pitcher – his only major league base hit – provided the contest’s ultimate margin of victory.16

Four days later, McMullin was back in the box, facing the AA pennant-bound St. Louis Browns. Once again, he proved little mystery to enemy batsmen, being raked for 16 hits. He was also wild, walking five and throwing four wild pitches.17 But the Mets offense bailed him out: a three-run rally in the bottom of the ninth inning gave McMullin another one-run victory, 8-7.

McMullin’s good fortune ran out in his third and final major league start on July 10. Facing the Cincinnati Reds, he was lifted after three innings, trailing 8-0. In a scathing wire service dispatch published across the nation, the Associated Press declared that “the California Wonder” sent the “nearly 7,000” in attendance at League Park “into hysterics from laughing at the awful exhibition by the Wonder and his support.”18 McMullin “was utterly unable to get the ball over the plate.”19 He then “retired to right field and there made a couple of ‘yellow’ errors.”20 Final score: Cincinnati 21 – New York 7.

Although McMullin had managed to win two of his three decisions, Mets club management had seen enough of its prospect and released him. In 21 innings pitched, he had allowed an untidy 44 baserunners (25 by base hit, 19 by walk) and thrown six wild pitches, while striking out only two. Enemy hitters feasted on McMullin servings to the tune of a .393 OBA,21 while his ERA (7.71) and WHIP (2.095) were also stratospheric. Nor had McMullin been much of a threat with the bat, posting a .083 batting average (1-for-12). What’s more, he was abysmal in the field, making five errors (including two as a right fielder) in 13 chances (.615 fielding percentage).

Following his release, McMullin returned home and resumed pitching for the San Francisco Pioneers with unknown results. The following spring, the Oakland Tribune reported that “manager [Mike] Finn of the Pioneers is again giving McMullin a trial in the box. Thus far he has done nothing to warrant a hope that he will do good work. But this manager believes in giving all the youngsters a chance.”22 The newspaper’s misgivings were not unfounded. Early in the 1888 season, the Greenwood & Morans of Oakland “batted McMullin’s delivery at will and with perfect freedom” in a 7-2 triumph over the Pioneers.23 Shortly thereafter, he was on the losing end of a 14-11 beating administered by the G&Ms. And by mid-May, McMullin’s name had disappeared from the sports pages. As far as has been ascertained, the professional pitching career of James McMullin was over at age 21.

McMullin’s post-baseball life appears to have been devoted to two activities: working locally as a carpenter, the occupation listed in various San Francisco city directories, and chronic drinking. The next time that McMullin’s name surfaced in newsprint, it was in local crime sections, chronicling his first involvement in a San Francisco homicide. On this occasion, however, McMullin was the cause of a fatal shooting, rather than its perpetrator.

More particularly, on the evening of July 24, 1895, a butcher named Daniel Johnston encountered a highly intoxicated Jimmy McMullin in a seedy San Francisco neighborhood and decided to escort his friend home.24 As the two passed a shuttered tavern, McMullin began pounding on the door demanding admittance. Inside, the proprietor and his bartender were fearful that the premises, the scene of a spate of recent nighttime burglaries, were being unlawfully entered again. They responded by firing a volley of gunshots through the door. One of the bullets struck Johnston in the right side, inflicting grave injuries. He died in a local hospital four days later.25 Indicted for murder, the bartender, an ex-convict named William Wellman, interposed a claim of self-defense at trial and was acquitted by the jury.26 Newspaper accounts of the proceedings were sketchy but did not suggest that McMullin was called to testify by either side in the case.

Much more intensive coverage attended the next homicide that involved McMullin – his fatal shooting of paramour Rhoda (or Ruda) Martin in November 1900. For some time previous, the two had been living together on a ranch in Pinole, a Contra Costa County locale situated about 15 miles north of Oakland, waiting for Martin’s divorce decree to become final so that they could wed.27 On November 13, Martin and a Mrs. Sullivan returned to the ranch from a day-long trip and were promptly confronted by a drunk and surly McMullin. For reasons unclear – a previous quarrel, jealousy, intoxication, or whatever – McMullin menaced his paramour with a shotgun. When Mrs. Sullivan stepped between them, McMullin redirected his anger toward her. A first shot discharged at point-blank range missed its mark when Mrs. Sullivan swatted the shotgun barrel to the side, leaving her with only powder burns on her face. Rhoda Martin, attempting to flee the scene, then took a second McMullin shotgun blast in the back. She died the next day.

Charged with murder, McMullin stood trial in late February 1901. Although the proofs amply supported a guilty verdict (and a death sentence), the jury let McMullin off with a manslaughter conviction.28 This dubious judgment on a lesser-included offense was attributed in certain quarters to the outstanding advocacy of counsel for the accused.29

McMullin was then sentenced to a term of 10 years’ incarceration and remanded to San Quentin State Prison. With time off for good prison behavior, he served only six-plus years and was released from confinement in September 1907.30

McMullin spent the remainder of his life in obscurity, residing in San Francisco boarding houses and working as a carpenter. His final entry on California police blotters was entered in March 1929. At the time, McMullin was living at the San Francisco home of a longtime acquaintance named George Beckwith. On the afternoon of March 20, McMullin was discovered on the bathroom floor of the Beckwith residence, bleeding from an incised wound across his throat. A blood-stained razor was subsequently found in McMullin’s room. Transported to a nearby hospital, McMullin lingered for two days before succumbing to his injuries. He was about 62.

McMullin had been acting peculiarly in the days preceding his demise, and his death was officially ruled a suicide.31 The body was subsequently delivered to a local mortuary, but the final resting place of James McMullin is unknown. Never married and without issue, he was survived by his brother Thomas and sisters Sarah Young and Margaret Harmon.

Acknowledgments

The writer is indebted to 19th Century Research Committee colleague Justin Mckinney for generously sharing his extensive research on James McMullin.

This story was reviewed by Gregory Wolf and Rory Costello and fact-checked by Paul Proia.

Sources

Sources for the biographical detail imparted herein include the McMullin profile in David Nemec, The Rank and File of 19th Century Major League Baseball (Jefferson, North Carolina: McFarland, 2012); US Census reports and other government records accessed via Ancestry.com; and certain of the newspaper articles cited in the endnotes. Unless otherwise specified, statistics have been taken from Baseball-Reference.

Notes

1 Newspaper coverage of our subject’s brief professional playing career divides about equally between the McMullin and McMullen spellings of his surname. At the time that this bio was being written, modern day authority was also split. See e.g., Baseball-Reference: McMullin; Retrosheet: McMullen. For reasons too lengthy to explain in an endnote, the writer believes that the McMullin spelling is more likely correct and same will be employed herein.

2 The other McMullin children were Sarah (born 1871), Margaret (1873), and Thomas (1876).

3 The 1880 US Census lists 13-year-old James as still attending school in San Francisco.

4 See “Recreation Grounds,” Sacramento Daily Record-Union, May 9, 1885: 7.

5 Per 1901 San Quentin State Prison admission records.

6 Modern reference works list McMullin as throws unknown, but the probabilities and the absence of any newsprint indication that he was a southpaw – and left-handed pitchers were still enough of a novelty to draw press mention during the 1880s – suggest that McMullin was right-handed.

7 Per the Clippers-Unions box score published in the Sacramento Daily Record-Union, May 11, 1885: 4.

8 See “A Good Game,” Oakland Daily Times, December 28, 1885: 1, for game account/box score of the Actives’ 5-2 loss to the Greenwood & Moran’s club of Oakland.

9 “Atlas vs. Pioneers,” Sacramento Daily Record-Union, May 31, 1886: 3.

10 “The Diamond Field,” San Francisco Chronicle, September 27, 1886: 3.

11 See “On the Coast,” Sporting Life, April 13, 1887: 10.

12 According to “California Pitchers,” Sacramento Daily Record-Union, May 25, 1887: 1. See also, “Caught on the Fly,” Los Angeles Tribune, May 30, 1887: 5. Because the California League was not a signatory of the National Agreement, major league clubs were not obliged to respect its player contracts.

13 See “Haverlys Win Again,” San Francisco Daily Examiner, May 30, 1887: 3. Opposition batsmen ripped McMullin’s “weak and reckless delivery” for 15 base hits.

14 “Won by a Single Run,” New York Times, July 3, 1887: 3.

15 “Brooklyns Beaten by Mets,” New York Daily Tribune, July 3, 1887: 8.

16 According to the detailed game account published in “Closely Contested,” Brooklyn Citizen, July 3, 1887: 2. Modern reference authority credits McMullin with only one major league RBI.

17 Per the box score published in Sporting Life, July 13, 1887: 3.

18 See e.g., “Today’s Games: Cincinnati, 21 – New York, 7,” Cleveland Plain Dealer, July 11, 1887: 5; “Fiasco of the California Wonder,” (Portland) Morning Oregonian, July 11, 1887: 4; “Sunday Games: Cincinnati and Metropolitan,” Philadelphia Inquirer, July 11, 1887: 3.

19 “At Cincinnati,” Kansas City Journal, July 11, 1887: 2; “Cincinnati, 21; Mets, 7,” Louisville Courier-Journal, July 11, 1887: 3;

20 “Cincinnati, 21; Mets, 7,” Cleveland Leader, July 11, 1887: 3; “Base-Ball Yesterday,” Indianapolis Journal, July 11, 1887: 6.

21 Per Total Baseball (Kingston, New York: Total Sports Publishing, 7th ed., 2001), 1627, which misidentifies our subject as George McMullen. Deleting the 19 walks charged as base hits under an anomalous 1887-only scoring rule reduces McMullin’s OBA to a respectable .269.

22 “Stray Hits,” Oakland Daily Evening Tribune, April 18, 1888: 3.

23 Per “The California League,” Sporting Life, May 2, 1888: 5.

24 The above account of the tavern shooting incident has been stitched together from the reportage of San Francisco newspapers, including a published dying hospital declaration made by the mortally wounded Johnston. See “Daniel Johnston Dying,” San Francisco Call, July 28, 1895: 22.

25 See “The Wound Proved Fatal,” San Francisco Chronicle, July 29, 195: 12.

26 See “Wellman Acquitted,” San Francisco Call, October 5, 1895: 4, and San Francisco Chronicle, October 5, 1895: 4.

27 The account of the Martin homicide has been drawn from pertinent reportage in California newspapers.

28 See “Woman Slayer Found Guilty,” San Francisco Chronicle, February 28, 1901: 5

29 See e.g., “The McMullin Case,” Contra Costa County (California) Gazette, March 2, 1901: 1.

30 Per San Quentin State Prison records. 

31 According to a San Francisco police/medical report.