I’m so excited that Nicollet County Historical Society has agreed to host an exhibit of Camilla Hall’s artwork starting on March 24, which coincidentally is Camilla’s 79th birthday. This year is a big year–we are marking the 50th anniversary of major Symbionese Liberation Army actions, such as the kidnapping of Patty Hearst, the Hibernia Bank robbery, and the killings of six SLA members, including Camilla.

What follows is text I created for the Camilla exhibit. I will be giving a talk on March 24. If you can get to St. Peter, I hope to see you there.

Early life

Camilla as a young girl in St. Peter

Camilla Hall was born in St. Peter, Minnesota, on March 24, 1945, to the Rev. George and Lorena Hall. At the time George Hall was a theology professor at Gustavus Adolphus College, a job he had taken in 1938, shortly after he and Lorena were married. 

The only known picture of George and Lorena Hall with their four children.

Camilla was the third of their four children. George Terrance (Terry) was born in 1941, Peter in 1942, and Nan in 1947. 

Sadly, tragedy struck the young family early. Terry died in 1948—a virus attacked his heart while the family was returning from a trip out West, and he died in Rapid City, South Dakota. In 1951, Peter died of what was believed to be a genetic kidney condition.

In 1954, George took a missionary post in Tanganyika (now Tanzania), and he moved there with Lorena, Camilla, and Nan. In 1956 the family returned to St. Peter for a short time, but then George took a post at the Arlington Hills church in St. Paul. The family moved away from St. Peter and did not return.

More tragedy awaited. In 1962, Nan—who had battled health problems her whole life—died shortly before Christmas. Camilla was in her senior year of high school at Washburn in Minneapolis.

Camilla attended Gustavus Adolphus College her freshman year, 1963-64, then transferred to the University of Minnesota, where she graduated with a degree in humanities in 1967.

A move to California

Doesn’t she look so happy? Here is Camilla at an art fair in California. This picture was taken by a fellow artist and her friend, Cheryl Brooks.

Camilla worked for a time in Minnesota as a social worker—first for St. Louis County in Duluth, and then Hennepin County in Minneapolis. In early 1970, she quit her job and followed former co-workers to Los Angeles, California, with a plan to make a living as an artist.

Camilla was a talented artist, following the footsteps of her mother, who founded the Gustavus art department. Camilla’s line drawings were at turns whimsical, satiric, and self-exploratory. She also did some paintings. 

The art scene in Los Angeles in the early 1970s was vibrant and fun. Camilla sold her art at street festivals, where she made good friends. For a time she was able to support herself solely through this venture. But by early 1971, she reported to her parents that sales were not as good as she had hoped. She planned a move north to the Bay Area, which she had heard was a better market for artists. In that year she settled in Berkeley, in an apartment on Channing Way.

A fateful encounter

George Hall, Lorena Hall, Camilla, and Patricia “Mizmoon” Soltysik, c. 1972.
This picture is on the cover of my book.

One of the first people Camilla met in Berkeley was a neighbor in her apartment building, Patricia Soltysik. They quickly became friends, and then lovers. Camilla lived openly as a lesbian in Berkeley, but her parents and former friends never knew.

The relationship with Patricia was on-again, off-again. They would break up, only to reunite. Camilla wrote poems for Patricia. After Patricia expressed a desire to change her name, Camilla christened her “Mizmoon” in a poem. Patricia went to a courthouse to have her name legally changed to Mizmoon. 

In February 1973, Camilla and Mizmoon ended their relationship. Soon after, Mizmoon would become one of the leading architects of the Symbionese Liberation Army.

The SLA forms

Top row: Emily Harris, Willie Wolfe, Donald DeFreeze, Bill Harris, Camilla. Botton row: Patty Hearst, Nancy Ling Perry, Angela Atwood. This means Mizmoon took the photo.

Mizmoon was part of a core group of revolutionary thinkers in Berkeley. They met regularly to discuss revolutionary tactics and to screen documentaries about revolutions around the world. This group also frequently visited prisons, taking part in discussion groups with inmates. One of the leaders in these prison groups was a man named Donald DeFreeze. DeFreeze escaped from Soledad prison on March 5, 1973, and sought refuge with some of the people he knew in the Bay Area. He ended up staying at Mizmoon’s apartment.

DeFreeze, who took the name Cinque Mfume, and Mizmoon started to write revolutionary manifestoes along with Nancy Ling Perry. They called the group the Symbionese Liberation Army. At the surface, the goals seemed innocuous: All people, no matter age, race, creed, or sexual orientation, should come together to unite for a stronger future. But the SLA also was not afraid to promote violence and revolution to meet their anti-capitalist goals. They declared war, and this war required combat and tactical maneuvers. Their first communique stated: “…the S.L.A. will build and fight for the socialist unity of all oppressed people. A cry from any one [sic] of us will echo in the body of our common ear, and we will attack out of instinct, and in self-defense, for our survival.”

Later in 1973 DeFreeze, Mizmoon, and Perry joined with other people they knew in the Bay Area. By the end of 1973, the SLA had about eight members.

The first crime

Marcus Foster

On the evening of November 6, 1973, the SLA assassinated Oakland schools superintendent Marcus Foster and seriously injured the deputy superintendent, Robert Blackburn. The two had just wrapped up a school board meeting. Foster was well known and well respected in national educational circles, having just turned around Philadelphia schools in his previous post. For a group purportedly committed to erasing discrimination and injustice, it seems odd that the SLA would target a black man. But SLA members were under the impression that Oakland schools were about to institute a student identification program, by which students would carry ID cards to prove they were students and allowed on school property. Prior to this proposal, Oakland schools had experienced non-students coming to schools and causing trouble. SLA members worried that the ID program would funnel student information into a database to note troublesome behavior and remove problem kids from school. 

It is unclear who exactly shot Foster and Blackburn, but during subsequent trials it was said that Mizmoon, DeFreeze and Perry were on the scene, along with SLA members Russ Little and Joe Remiro. Little and Remiro were later convicted for the Foster murder.

Camilla joins the SLA

It’s not known exactly when Camilla joined the SLA. Records show that she bought a handgun on January 2, 1974. According to Bill and Emily Harris, the entire group of the SLA came together on December 31, 1973, so it’s likely that Camilla was at that meeting and made plans to buy a gun as soon as possible. All we know is that at some point later in 1973, Mizmoon and Camilla reconnected and Mizmoon brought Camilla into the fold.

The Hearst kidnapping

On February 4, 1974, people around the world looked on in shock when the SLA kidnapped 19-year-old Patricia Hearst, an heiress to the Hearst media empire. She was the granddaughter of William Randolph Hearst, upon whom the movie “Citizen Kane” was based. On the night of February 4, three SLA members knocked on the door of Hearst’s apartment, which she shared with her fiancé, Steven Weed. When the door opened, the three took Hearst and badly beat Weed. They scuttled Hearst into a waiting car, shooting at witnesses who had peeked outside at the commotion, and took off into the night.

Camilla was driving one of the cars in the caravan that night. She had parked outside the Hearst apartment and waited for the others to arrive. There was a passenger in her car, likely Mizmoon.

For three weeks, Camilla was able to remain aboveground while the rest of the SLA went into hiding with their famous hostage. An earlier raid in January on an SLA hideout resulted in the arrest of Little and Remiro and had connected the rest of the gang to the Foster murder. But Camilla, being such a fringe member, had not yet popped up on law enforcement’s radar. It took about three weeks after the Hearst kidnapping for the FBI to identify her as a person of interest. Still, she was able to walk out of a bank on March 1 undetected with the entirety of her savings. At that point, she was forced into hiding with the others.

The Hibernia bank robbery

The image of Patty Heart that the SLA released when they reported she had joined the group and had taken the name “Tania.”

The SLA was running low on money by April. They were able to rent apartments under assumed names but needed money to pay the rent and buy supplies such as food (which they did by going out disguised in heavy makeup and wigs). As such, they planned a bank robbery, which they executed on April 15. The group of nine split into two teams: five entered Hibernia Bank in San Francisco, and the other four waited around the corner in a getaway car. 

Camilla was one of those inside the bank, along with Mizmoon, Perry, DeFreeze, and Hearst. A security camera captured the brief event: Camilla is wearing a dark wig and a dark peacoat, while Mizmoon leaps over the teller’s counter to get money from the back. The footage was notable for showing Hearst commandeering the lobby with machine gun in hand. After the robbery, Camilla, Hearst, and the others landed on the FBI’s Most Wanted list.

Shootout in Los Angeles: May 17, 1974

The heat was on. The SLA was forced into smaller and more decrepit living quarters in the Bay Area as they continued to elude authorities. By early May, they decided the Bay Area was no longer safe for them. They chose to relocate to Los Angeles—a bigger city, one which DeFreeze and Camilla were familiar with. They chose to go into south-central Los Angeles and briefly found an abandoned house to squat in. When that proved untenable, they searched for help. They found homeowners willing to shelter them. But word quickly spread: the SLA—including Hearst—was in the neighborhood. Before long, police got wind of their presence.

On May 17, 1974, the group was pinpointed to one location: 1466 E. 54^th Street. Six SLA members, including Camilla, were in the house. The other three—Bill and Emily Harris, and Hearst—had gotten themselves into trouble at a local sporting goods store and were hiding in a separate location. 

Just before 6 p.m., more than 400 Los Angeles police officers—many members of the newly formed SWAT team—surrounded the house. They shouted through a bullhorn for the group to surrender. Instead, shots were fired from inside the house and the barrage of gun fire and tear gas began. Within an hour, the house was in flames and all six people inside were dead.

Aftermath

Camilla’s body was not found right away. She had exited the house when she was shot, and another person inside had pulled her body back into a crawl space. George and Lorena Hall were initially told that Camilla had not been in the house. Only on Sunday, May 19, did they get confirmation that her body was found.

Hearst and the Harrises tried to carry on the SLA’s mission. The organization regrouped in the Bay Area, picking up a few more members, including Kathleen Soliah. On September 18, 1975, Hearst and the Harrises were finally captured. Soliah (later known as Sarah Jane Olson) and others went underground. Hearst was sentenced to prison for crimes committed while she was with the SLA. President Jimmy Carter commuted her sentence in 1979 and President Bill Clinton pardoned her in 2000. 

Olson was arrested in St. Paul, Minnesota, on June 16, 1999, after her case appeared on the TV show “America’s Most Wanted.” She was found guilty in 2002 of crimes committed while in the SLA and sentenced to prison. She served seven years. 

Camilla’s ashes were interred at Resurrection Cemetery in St. Peter on August 4, 1974. Her remains were laid to rest by her siblings Terry, Peter, and Nan. Lorena Hall died in 1995, and George Hall died in 2000. 

George and Lorena Hall at the interment at Resurrection Cemetery, St. Peter.