I never thought researching our state’s historic courthouses would give me reason to crack open a book about cruise missiles. That changed when I learned the Putnam County Courthouse in Greencastle has a buzz bomb, a legitimate German V-1 flying missile. How’d it get there? Keep reading to find out.
Today, many know Putnam County as the home of DePauw University, the site of eight covered bridges, myriad old highway alignments, or the home of Cagles Mill Lake. None of that existed in the early 1800s. Neither did Putnam County! Its land was ceded from Owen and Vigo counties, along with parts of Monroe and Parke counties acquired via the Treaty of St. Mary’s1, an “agreement” with the Miami Indians in 1818.
The county was officially established in 1822, a year after Greencastle was founded by Ephraim Dukes2. Some scholars believe that the county seat was first located in an unofficial town called Bedford but concede that finding the ghost settlement is impossible. Unfortunately, county records from 1822 to 1828 aren’t available, so no one truly knows what the first courthouse looked like or where exactly it stood3.
In 1828, county commissioners signed an order to pay Amos Robertson money that “may become due on the last payment on the courthouse contract,” though a second report the following year indicated that “[we] have proceeded to examine [the courthouse project] and beg leave to report that we find the same in an unfinished situation”. Robertson had defaulted!
Commissioners turned to Arthur McGaughey to finish the building, which was completed by September 1829 “with the exception of one Venetian blind in the northwest corner of said house- upper window4.” Two years later, a second building with offices for the clerk and recorder was built nearby. A larger courthouse that looked like a Greek temple was built in 18485.
Indiana’s portfolio of historic courthouses is full of identical twins, cousins, siblings, and triplets. The Putnam County Courthouse, designed by John W. Gaddis, fits the latter category as the first of three similar designs. An eclectic attempt at neoclassicism, the limestone building rises two stories above a rusticated basement. Overall, the courthouse cost $175,729 upon its completion in 1905.
By the time it was finished, work was underway at Gaddis’ next courthouse in Huntington County, 150 miles northeast of Greenfield. Although similar, Gaddis made it a half-story taller and added a prominent dome and drum. The building cost nearly double what Greencastle’s did when it was completed and even surpassed Gaddis’ final Indiana courthouse in Brazil, which was finished in 1914.
Back in Greencastle, not a lot has changed. Although the building was designed to feature a pair of clocks, it wasn’t until 1983 that the south elevation received one6. The north side of the courthouse was left with an unsightly louvered vent until 2017, when new, backlit Smith and Bell clock faces were installed in both the north and south sides of the building7.Unfortunately, an enormous waymarking sign for IN-231 significantly mars the front view of the courthouse and the surrounding green. I hate when that happens!
That’s what brings us to the buzz bomb. Known as Vengeance Weapon 1 or as “Cherry Stones” in code8, buzz bombs were basically early German cruise missiles. Using a jet engine that pulsed fifty times per second and created a characteristic buzzing sound9, the V-1s were first used to target London on June 13, 1944 in retaliation for the allied landings in Europe during the Battle of Normandy. More than 9,500 were launched at southeastern England until October, 1944, when the Nazis switched to sending nearly 2,500 towards Antwerp, Belgium10.
In 1947 J. Frank Durham, a navy reservist and native of Greencastle, was receiving explosives training in Maryland when he heard an announcement that all obsolete enemy projectiles that had been captured would soon be disposed of. He made a list of forty items he wanted and asked the officer in charge to set them aside to donate to Greencastle’s VFW.
Scoffing, the officer replied that it’d take an Act of Congress for him to get the materials, so Durham got to work. Later that year, Senator William Jenner informed Durham that the Secretary of the Navy had signed an ordinance allowing the disposal. The House and Senate passed the bill in 194811, and Greencastle became the home of one of the nation’s ten Nazi V-1 buzz bombs. It was that easy!
I’ve been on the prowl for a Thunderbolt-1000 tornado siren for a couple years now, something with much less notoriety than an early cruise missile but still owned by the government. Maybe all I have to do is ask for one! Perhaps I’ll drive down to Greencastle and appeal to officials there for an old one with the same sense of generosity that netted them their Buzz Bomb. In the meantime, if you hear a loud, oscillating noise coming from my house, please know that it’s not a Buzz Bomb: I’m sure the one in Putnam County will stay stationed in front of its landmark 1905 courthouse for many years to come.
TL;DR
Putnam County (pop. 37,505, 41/92)
Greencastle (pop. 10,310)
58/92 photographed
Built: 1905
Cost: $175,729.68 ($4.68 million in 2016))
Architect: John W. Gaddis
Style: Neoclassical
Courthouse Square: Shelbyville Square
Height: 3 stories
Current Use: County offices and courts
Photographed: 3/13/16
Sources Cited
1 Peggy Tuck Sinko: Indiana Atlas of Historical County Boundaries, John H. Long, Ed., Charles Scribner’s Sons, Simon & Schuster Macmillan, New York, N.Y., 1996,
2 “History” Putnam County, Indiana. Putnam County Auditor. Web. Retrieved 4/12/20.
3 Enyart, David. “Putnam County” Indiana County Courthouse Histories. ACPL Genealogy Center, 2010-2018. Web. Retrieved 4/12/20.
4 Weik, Jeese W. “Weik’s History of Putnam County Indiana” 1910. B.F. Bowen Company [Indianapolis]. Print.
5 Courthouse History. Keith Vincent. 2018. Web. Retrieved 4/12/20.
6 “Projects” Installation of Two Clocks in the Putnam County Courthouse Facade. The Heritage Preservation Society of Putnam County. Web. Retrieved 4/12/20.
7 “Courthouse Clock Installation” The Banner Graphic. April 14, 2017. Web. Retrieved 4/12/20.
8 Zaloga, Steven (2005), V-1 Flying Bomb 1942–52, Oxford, UK: Osprey Publishing
9 Werrell, Kenneth P. (1985), The Evolution of the Cruise Missile, Maxwell Air Force Base, Alabama: Air University Press.
10 “The defence of Antwerp against the V-1 missile” (PDF). Defense Technical Information Center. 1971. Web. Retrieved 4/12/20.
11 “J. Frank Durham Endowment for the Buzz Bomb War Memorial”. The Putnam County Community Foundation. 2020. Web. Retrieved 4/12/20.
