Jack McArthur, a 40-year-old man who served as chief of the Antigo Police Department, was killed in the line of duty on June 24, 1905. Historical records also identify him as John McArthur. The events that led to his death began after authorities learned that an escaped patient from the state psychiatric institution at Oshkosh was believed to be in the Antigo area.
The fugitive was identified in a history of Langlade County as James Weipinger, although surviving newspaper indexing contains variations of the surname. McArthur joined a deputy sheriff in searching the countryside for the wanted man.
The search carried the officers approximately six miles outside Antigo. McArthur moved ahead while the deputy followed some distance behind him. Unknown to the officers, the fugitive had concealed himself in a tree along their route. McArthur apparently never saw the man before the attack began. From his concealed position, the gunman opened fire with a shotgun, discharging two loads of buckshot at the police chief. McArthur was struck and killed instantly. The deputy, despite being nearby and approaching behind McArthur, escaped the ambush without being struck.
The killing immediately turned the search for an escaped institutional patient into a manhunt for the person responsible for the death of Antigo's police chief. The gunman was not captured at the scene and remained at large as authorities searched the surrounding area. Historical accounts identify Langlade County Sheriff John Driggs as the officer who ultimately captured Weipinger. Law-enforcement memorial records indicate the fugitive remained free for approximately ten days after McArthur's killing before he was apprehended.
McArthur's death deeply affected Antigo and the surrounding county. A later history of Langlade County described him as an efficient officer who was especially popular with the children of Antigo. He had served more than one period as the city's chief of police, including service beginning again in the early 1900s. His funeral drew an exceptionally large turnout and was remembered in the county history as one of the largest funerals the community had witnessed. McArthur left behind his wife and three children.
The surviving online record clearly identifies James Weipinger as the man responsible for shooting McArthur and establishes that he was eventually apprehended by the Langlade County sheriff. Contemporary newspaper indexing from June 1905 contains differing spellings of the suspect's surname, including forms resembling Wellinger and Weitinger, making the historical spelling somewhat uncertain. Available online sources located for the case do not clearly document subsequent formal murder charges, a criminal trial, a verdict, or a conviction, so no later judicial outcome can be reliably stated.
