May 23, 1934: Bonnie and Clyde Are Gunned Down

May 23, 1934: The deadly bank-robbing rampage of Bonnie and Clyde comes to a fitting end, in a hail of bullets in the Louisiana bayou.

This one of those stories where so much of what you think you know is wrong. The 1967 film Bonnie and Clyde, and the Georgie Fame song "The Ballad of Bonnie and Clyde," a hit the next year, didn't help.

Bonnie Elizabeth Parker was born on October 1, 1910 in Rowena, central Texas. Her father died when she was 4. She got married in 1926, when she was just about to turn 16 and he was 18. He was a petty crook, and they split in 1929. But they never got divorced, and she was still wearing her wedding ring at the end, at which point he was in prison for robbery. He tried to escape from prison in 1937, and was shot and killed in the attempt.

Bonnie moved back in with her mother in Dallas, and got a job as a waitress. Postal worker Ted Hinton was a regular customer, and he later went into law enforcement, becoming a member of the posse that killed her and Clyde.

Clyde Chestnut Barrow was born on March 24, 1909, on a farm outside Waxahachie, Texas. He moved with his family to the nearby slums of West Dallas. Clyde was 17 when he was first arrested, for car theft. That proved to be his favorite crime, along with robbing stores.

In January 1930, he met Bonnie, through a mutual friend. But they were only together through April, when he was sent to prison for car theft. He soon escaped, but was quickly recaptured. He was raped in prison, and he killed his attacker, his 1st murder. Another inmate took the fall for him.

In order to avoid hard labor, he had 2 of his toes cut off. This turned out to be a very stupid idea: He was released 6 days later, on February 2, 1932, and walked with a limp for the rest of his life. His sister Marie said he had become a hardened criminal, prison doing the exact opposite of what it should. Another inmate, Ralph Fults, said, "I watched him change from a schoolboy to a rattlesnake."

And the Barrow Gang was born. In addition to Bonnie and Clyde, there was the aforementioned Fults; Clyde's brother, Marvin, nicknamed Buck; Buck's wife, the former Blanche Caldwell; Henry Methvin; Raymond Hamilton; Joe Palmer; and a 16-year-old kid named W.D. Jones. Fults didn't last long with them, unable to make an escape with them after a robbery on March 22, 1932.

While they did rob banks, most of their robberies were of small stores or gas stations, the kind of places where a quick getaway was much easier. But it was the depth of the Great Depression, and they often got away with as little as $5.00 -- about $106 in 2022 money. Their biggest haul from any single "job" was $1,500 -- around $32,000 today.

Most of these robberies were done in the Lower Plains: Southern Missouri, southern Kansas, Arkansas, Oklahoma and Texas. Joplin, Missouri was a popular base of operations for criminals in the Great Depression, because it was close to where 4 States came together: Missouri, Kansas, Arkansas and Oklahoma, making escape across State Lines, and out of the jurisdictions of State Police, easier.

The State Line of Kansas is 6 miles from downtown Joplin, the State Line of Oklahoma is 18 miles away, and the State Line of Arkansas is 50 miles. There's no "Four Corners," like there is with Utah, Colorado, Arizona and New Mexico, although there is the AR-MO-OK Tri-State Marker, 57 miles from Joplin.

As much as Clyde hated law enforcement, he didn't go out of his way to kill people, not even cops. Nevertheless, including shootouts, the Gang is known to have killed 9 policemen. The number of civilians they killed is not clear, but it was at least 4.

On June 10, 1933, Clyde flipped the Gang's car into a ravine near Wellington, Texas. Bonnie was the only one seriously injured: She was doused with acid from the car's battery, and her right leg was so badly burned that skin and muscle were taken away, down to the bone in some places.

On July 19, 1933, the Missouri Highway Patrol caught up with the Gang at a tourist court in Platte City. There was a shootout, and Buck was shot in the head, but, for the moment, survived. The Gang somehow escaped, despite both Bonnie and Clyde being wounded.

Five days later, there was another shootout, at an abandoned amusement park in Iowa. Bonnie, Clyde and Jones escaped, but Buck and Blanche were shot and captured. Blanche lost the sight in one eye, but survived to be extradited to Missouri. Somehow, Buck hung on and lived for another 5 days.

Jones helped tend to Bonnie's and Clyde's wounds, but was too scared to stay with the Gang any longer. He left with not merely Clyde's blessing, but Clyde's instructions to blame him for anything he might get arrested for, since Clyde was sure he would never be allowed to live to be arrested. Jones was arrested in November, and did as Clyde asked.

By this point, between the bullet wounds, Bonnie's burn, and Clyde's dumbass toe-chopping stunt, they could both barely walk. Not a good condition for someone needing to make a quick getaway. On January 16, 1934, Clyde managed to get Hamilton and Methvin out of a local jail, and Joe Palmer shot an officer during the attempt, killing him.

Now, the State of Texas wanted them dead. Knowing this, Hamilton and Palmer left the Gang shortly after the breakout, and were arrested on April 25. They were both executed on May 10, 1935.

Desperate to avoid capture, the Gang killed more people. Now, for the 1st time, there was a price on Bonnie's head as well as on Clyde's, because she was believed to be the triggerperson on a murder. In fact, there is no evidence that Bonnie ever killed anyone.

Captain Frank Hamer of the Texas Rangers -- the law enforcement agency for whom the baseball team that began play in 1972 would be named -- was put in charge of the posse trusted with hunting the Barrow Gang down. Hamer discovered that the Gang's itinerary centered on family visits, and they were due to see Methvin's family, in Louisiana.

On May 23, at 9:15 AM (Central Time, 10:15 Eastern), the posse were in the bushes along what's now Louisiana Route 154 in Gibsland, Bienville Parish, about 50 miles east of Shreveport. With them was Ivy Methvin, Henry's father. The Ford V8 they were looking for approached, but Clyde slowed down when he recognized the senior Methvin's car. He hadn't even come to a complete stop when the first shot was fired.

That first shot was to Clyde's head, and he was killed instantly. Bonnie screamed. All the officers opened fire, and 130 rounds were recovered. Clyde was hit 17 times, Bonnie 26. Neither ever had a chance. Bonnie was 23 years old, Clyde 25.

It's worth noting that, despite the 1st term of President Franklin D. Roosevelt being a period of massive growth of power and influence for J. Edgar Hoover and his Federal Bureau of Investigation, the FBI had nothing to do with the pursuit and elimination of Bonnie and Clyde. Nor did Hoover, publicity hound though he then was, claim any involvement.

Despite their publicly-known status as murderers, they were still folk heroes, with many people choosing to believe that those who robbed the banks that had taken advantage of the people were heroes. Thousands of people tried to attend their funerals.

Fellow Midwestern bank robbers/folk heroes John Dillinger and Charles "Pretty Boy" Floyd each sent flowers, despite their never having met either half the couple. (Dillinger's base of operations was Chicago, and Floyd's was Kansas City, and both cities are "a fur piece" from Joplin, never mind Dallas, although all of them covered long distances in their crimes.) I suppose this is one of those times that the expression "Honor among thieves" holds.

Despite their twisted love match, they never married, because Bonnie was still married. Nevertheless, Bonnie's last living relative, a niece, has been trying to have her remains moved from Crown Hill Cemetery in Dallas, across town to Western Heights Cemetery, next to Clyde and his brothers, who are buried under a marker reading, "Gone but not forgotten."

Henry Methvin was arrested shortly after Bonnie and Clyde's unwitting last stand. He was sentenced to death in 1935, but this was commuted to life in 1936. He was released in 1942, but still couldn't stay out of legal trouble. In 1948, he was driving drunk, when he attempted to cross a railroad track, and was hit by a train.

W.D. Jones, eventually known as Deacon Jones (lots of men named Jones, including a future football star, were nicknamed "Deacon"), was released from prison in 1939, kept up a life of petty crime, got married but had no children, and was shot and killed in an altercation in 1974.

Blanche Barrow was released from prison in 1939, was married and widowed again, adopted a son, and lived until 1988.

Ralph Fults was pardoned in 1935, but was arrested for another robbery later that year. He was sentenced to 50 years, but was released in 1944. He went straight, and eventually hosted a TV program on the evils of crime. He died in Dallas on March 16, 1993, the last survivor of the Barrow Gang.

Patrolman Edd L. Miller was the last survivor of the posse that killed Bonnie and Clyde. He lived until September 18, 2000.

The death car, with bullet holes preserved, is on display at Whiskey Pete's, a hotel and casino in Primm (a city formerly named State Line), Nevada, 44 miles south of Las Vegas on Interstate 15, on the Nevada side of the California State Line.

(UPDATE: Whiskey Pete's went out of business in 2024. The car was moved across Primm Boulevard, to Primm Valley Casino Resorts.)

On August 13, 1967, the film Bonnie and Clyde premiered, directed by Arthur Penn. The script by David Newman and Robert Benton took more liberties than the Barrow Gang took dollars from most of their robberies.

Bonnie was played by Faye Dunaway, Clyde by Warren Beatty, Buck Barrow by Gene Hackman, and Blanche Barrow by Estelle Parsons. Michael J. Pollard played C.W. Moss, a composite character based on W.D. Jones and Henry Methvin. Gene Wilder made his film debut, a small role as Eugene Grizzard, an undertaker taken hostage by the Barrow Gang. And Captain Frank Hamer was played by Denver Pyle -- ironically, now best known for playing a 1930s criminal turned 1970s good guy, moonshine runner turned country family patriarch "Uncle" Jesse Duke on The Dukes of Hazzard.

The film was nominated for 10 Academy Awards, including Best Picture, and Best Director for Penn. It won 2: Best Cinematography, and Best Supporting Actress for Parsons. The real Blanche, having lived long enough to see the movie, didn't like it, though: "That film made me look like a screaming horse's ass!"

The film's violence was at a level that American film audiences were not used to. The fact that it so seriously challenged the Hays Code -- the one love scene between Bonnie/Faye and Clyde/Warren was understated, enough that the film could be shown to a high school class that included myself 20 years later -- helped bring the Code down, replaced a year later by the Motion Picture Association of America ratings system that has since grown to G, PG, PG-13, R and NC-17.

Walt Frazier of the NBA's New York Knicks favored sharp suits and fedora hats that reminded his teammates of 1930s gangsters, so someone nicknamed him Clyde -- as in Barrow. But, despite Bonnie having a love of photography, and many of her pictures surviving, no picture of Barrow wearing a fedora does. Whoever nicknamed Frazier "Clyde" was thinking of Warren Beatty, not the real Clyde Barrow.

One more pop culture note: In a 2014 episode of the YouTube series Epic Rap Battles of History, YouTuber Hannah Hart played Bonnie, and "Epic" Lloyd Ahlquist played Clyde, against "Nice" Peter Shukoff and comedian Grace Helbig as, respectively, William Shakespeare's characters Romeo and Juliet.

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May 23, 1934 was a Wednesday. Baseball was the only sport in season at the time, and a full slate of major league games was played:

* The New York Yankees lost to the Chicago White Sox, 14-2 at Comiskey Park in Chicago. Not quite as bad a beating as Bonnie and Clyde got a few hours earlier. The Yankees only trailed 3-2 going to the bottom of the 6th, but the Pale Hose scored 2 runs in the 6th, 2 in the 7th, and 7 in the 8th to chase Red Ruffing.

Even before the 8th, Ruffing, a future Hall-of-Famer, gave up home runs to Jimmy Dykes, Al Simmons, and Ted Lyons, the opposing pitcher -- who, to be fair, was a very good hitter for a pitcher, batting .233 lifetime and driving in 16 runs in 50 games that season. Luke Appling went 4-for-5 with 4 RBIs.

Tony Lazzeri hit a home run for the Yankees. Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig each went 1-for 4, and Ruth added an RBI.

* The New York Giants beat the Chicago Cubs, 5-2 at the Polo Grounds. Mel Ott went 2-for-4 with a 2-run homer.

* The Brooklyn Dodgers beat the St. Louis Cardinals, 5-3 at Ebbets Field.

* The Boston Braves beat the Pittsburgh Pirates, 6-1 at Braves Field in Boston.

* The Philadelphia Phillies beat the Cincinnati Reds, 3-2 at Baker Bowl in Philadelphia.

* The Boston Red Sox beat the Cleveland Indians, 7-5 at League Park in Cleveland.

* The Philadelphia Athletics beat the Detroit Tigers, 11-5 at Navin Field in Detroit. (The ballpark was renamed Briggs Stadium in 1938, and Tiger Stadium in 1961.) Jimmie Foxx went 2-for-5 for the A's, Hank Greenberg 1-for-4 for the Tigers.

* And the St. Louis Browns beat the Washington Senators, 6-2 at Sportsman's Park in St. Louis.