Nation: Chicago on the Charles

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If Lowells were still talking to Cabots, they were probably discussing the topic that dominated just about every other conversation in Boston. The subject was gang warfare, which last week claimed three more lives, for a total of 28 plain and fancy killings since March 1964.

Many of the Chicago-style murders stemmed from a feud between rival bands of hoodlums—one headed by Brothers George, Bernie and Edward McLaughlin of suburban Charlestown, the other by James ("Buddy") McLean and his pals from nearby Somerville. By last week, Bernie and Edward McLaughlin and Buddy McLean were dead, mowed down by unknown assassins; George McLaughlin was in death row at Walpole State Prison on a murder rap; bodies were still falling.

The latest victims were an ex-con, a bartender, and a box-factory worker. No one could tell why the ex-con or the bartender had been killed. But John B. O'Neil, 26, a Navy veteran and father of four, was innocently sipping a beer at the bar when two gunmen entered and cut down the bartender. As a memento, they also pumped five shots into O'Neil.