My great-uncle gunned down Bonnie and Clyde
THE SATURDAY BIG READ
For almost nine hours, they had watched the pine tree-lined dirt road as the night turned into a bright Louisiana morning. Finally came a noise to disturb the dewy stillness, a car travelling at such high speeds those who were there said it was “singing like a sewing machine”.
Veteran lawman Frank Hamer stepped out from his hiding place in the roadside brush, bringing the flying Ford V8 Ford to a sharp halt.
With his back directly to the rising sun – forcing anyone looking at him from the vehicle to squint – he cried “Stick ’em up” as the rest of the ambush posse emerged from the surrounding woods.
Facing such insurmountable odds, even the hardest of criminals would have done as ordered. But Clyde Barrow and Bonnie Parker were not only high on their own notoriety but well aware that if caught their lives were as likely to end on the gallows as here in the dirt.
Bonnie and Clyde reached for their deadly arsenal – more than a dozen weapons and 3,000 rounds of ammunition – and so did the law.
Hamer pulled the trigger fast on his Remington Model 8 rifle and his comrades let fly too – a hail of lead flying for the outlaws and creating so much noise people nearby thought a logging crew was using dynamite.
That witness with a sharp ear said Bonnie “screamed like a panther” as the battle began. It was over in seconds.
During that time, 187 bullets had hit the car as well as the young lovers, in their chests, faces and heads.
Since that day on May 23, 1934, the legend of Bonnie and Clyde, aged 23 and 25 when they died, has grown, making them the antiheroes of blood-soaked folk tales. But the real hero was Hamer, much maligned since and for whom the gunfight was just one of 52 in which he risked his life in during his career.
Now, finally, he is being recognised as such in new Netflix film The Highwaymen – out now, in which he is played by Kevin Costner. And none are more pleased than his family, who have had to watch him ridiculed in retellings including the 1967 Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway film Bonnie and Clyde, where Denver Pyle – best known as Uncle Jesse from The Dukes of Hazzard – played a blundering Hamer.
In an exclusive interview, Harrison Hamer, one of only three surviving relatives who knew “Captain Frank”, says: “At last we feel we have the justice we deserve. Bonnie and Clyde were no Robin Hoods, as they’ve been portrayed.
“They were pure and simple murderous thugs. The cruellest of killers.
“Once, after murdering two officers,
Bonnie is said to have
walked up to one of the dead men and took a c*** on his chest.
“She was no sweetheart who was roped in for the ride. She was as much a part of the bloodshed as Barrow.
“It galls me that they have been depicted as they have been while my great-uncle was cast by some as the bad guy. To have Bonnie and Clyde portrayed as some folk heroes has been a travesty my family have been forced to endure by Hollywood and all those who glorified their lives.” Harrison, 82, is Hamer’s greatnephew and is proud of his great uncle’s achievement and that of his famous crime-fighting family.
He tells how Hamer, one of four law enforcement brothers, was
ndary long before gunned down nie and Clyde on a l road in Gibsland, isiana. He was an spensable member of the Texas gers, who battled bank robbers, tleggers, outlaw Mexicans and ve Americans in the Lone Star State along the southern US border in the h and early 20th centuries. he group was brutal, fighting fire h fire. Their tactics led Mexicans to them “Los Diablos Tejanos” – the as Devils. Hamer became a senior captain of the Rangers in 1922 and played a significant role fighting the Ku Klux Klan. During his career, he saved 15 African-Americans from lynch mobs.
Six years later, Hamer put a halt to a murder-for-hire ring and his extraordinary means of accomplishing this made him famous nationally.
“The Texas Bankers’ Association had begun offering rewards of $5,000 ‘for dead bank robbers - not one cent for live ones’,” Harrison, of Early, Texas, explains. “Uncle Frank knew men were setting up deadbeats and two-bit outlaws to be killed by complicit police officers.
“The officers would collect the rewards and pay the men their finders fees. Uncle Frank exposed the ring and that led to a firestorm among the public.”
Hamer also became known for his ability to control riots and his patient, skilled investigative work. And his gun, a .45 Colt revolver nicknamed “Old Lucky”, became as famous as him.
He resigned in 1932 when Miriam “Ma” Ferguson, who detested the Rangers and is played by Kathy Bates in the Netflix film, took the Governor’s office. He turned to mostly private investigation work – and so came the job of hunting down Bonnie and Clyde. They were public enemy number one after a three-year robbery spree across the South which claimed at least 13 lives – including nine police officers.
Part of the larger Barrow gang, after 102 days Hamer’s detective work led him to a “mail drop” by that dusty highway in Louisiana where the outlaws would meet their violent end.
Here, the gang would leave messages for each other, far from the sight of the law – or so they thought. Before his death in July 1955, Hamer said the successful hunt for the couple was made after he learned their pattern of movements. “An officer must know the habits of the outlaw, how he thinks and how he will act in different situations. When I began to understand Clyde Barrow’s mind, I felt that I was making progress,” he said.
In the 1967 film, Hamer is seen being humiliatingly captured by the Barrow Gang before he then hunts them down for revenge. In reality, he was never captured and when his family saw this portrayal, they sued the film’s producers for defamation of character and settled out of court. In The Highwaymen, Costner plays Hamer with a growl, a slow gait and a steadfast sense of right and wrong. His
SO ACCURATE
Costner as Hamer