Sherrill was born November 13 1941 to father Charles Bennington Sherrill and mother Anna B Wiens in Watonga Oklahoma. Though little is know about Sherrill’s childhood, accounts of his later life vary. Some accounts say that Sherrill was a known peeping tom, and would chase children around as they yelled out “Crazy Pat!” Though whether this last report took place while he was a kid or an adult is unclear.
Patrick Henry Sherrill, a former Marine who qualified “expert” (highest rating) with a rifle straight out of boot camp in 1965. Sherrill would re-qualify in 1966 as “marksmen” (third highest rank) in rifle and “expert” in pistol. He would be honorably discharged from the Marines and would go to join the Oklahoma Air National Guard, 137th Combat Support Squadron of the 137th Tactical Airlift Wing, Based out of Will Rogers Air National Guard Base.
Sherrill was known to be a loner, socially inept, and would blame management for his his inability to keep a job. He would eventually get a job as a relief carrier for the USPS in Edmond, Oklahoma. Being a relief carrier, meant that he had no permanent route, putting him low in the ranks at the USPS.
Most stories vary as to what kind of a postal worker he was. Some stories state that Sherrill excelled at delivering mail, gaining him praise and admiration from the people on his routes. Other stories state that he was terrible at his job and that Sherrill was prone to outburst.
On the day of August 19th 1986, Sherrill went in to work and would be reprimanded by his two supervisors. Again conflicting accounts would tell two different stories. One side said Sherrill had been reprimanded for personal reason unrelated to his job performance. Yet the other side of the story, say that he was reprimanded by his supervisors for his performance on the job. As if the conflicting accounts of Sherrill getting in trouble at work weren’t bad enough there are reports that state that Sherrill had at one point reached out to a union steward to say he was being mistreated and that “he needed to get out of there”.
Conflicting theories aside, that afternoon after the incident with the supervisors. It is said that Sherrill approached one of his female coworkers and asked if she was going to be working the next day, She replied and said “of course” to which Sherrill said “you should stay home”. Apparently this female coworker was the only one that was “nice” to Sherrill.
August 20th 1986, Sherrill entered the post office at 7AM, in uniform with his blue courier bag in tow. He would immediately seek out his supervisors finding only one of them. Sherrill would pull out two 45 caliber hand guns from his courier bag and open fire killing one of the two supervisors. (Call it luck or a miracle or whatever have you, by some strange chance his second supervisor had over slept and was running an hour behind.) Sherrill would move through out the post office shooting everyone he could find. Going out of his way to insure he killed everyone he could. Looking under desks and cubicles.
When the police arrived they would use bullhorns and telephones to try to communicate with Sherrill. For 45 minutes the police attempted to make contact with Sherrill. It wouldn’t be until a little after 8AM, after the Edmond Swat team stormed the building that they would discover that Sherrill had shot himself in the head.
In the end 14 bodies were found dead, 7 Female, 7 Male. 6 others were wounded and had only survived because they had played dead. Sherrill had two 45’s and a 22 pistol in his possession, along with 200 rounds of ammo. In the end only the 45’s had been shot and only 50 rounds had been fired. Authorities would say one of the 45’s had been “fine-tuned to make it as accurate as possible.” Sherrill had obtained the two pistols and the ammo from the Oklahoma Air Nation Guard.
One interview with the Edmond District Attorney, Bob Macy who said, “…you walk back a little ways on the right in a booth there’s three bodies, and walk back a few feet further and there’s four bodies, you go back a little bit further and there’s another couple, come back up the other side and there’s isolated bodies. You go back in the backroom where they are having break, there’s donuts and coffee on the table, and a dead body laying there…”
To this date, and as of writing this, the Edmond Post Office shooting stands at number 14 of the 30 deadliest mass shootings in the us. This terrible event is credited with helping coin the term going post. The event also spurred a number of copycat shootings in post offices, over the next 10 years. Including John Merlin Taylor.
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