Jeff Guinn
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This chapter also contains the first few annotations from My Life with Bonnie and Clyde, the memoir written by Blanche Barrow and edited for publication after her death by John Neal Phillips. Though it’s self-serving in the extreme, Blanche’s book still offers one more invaluable, firsthand look at Clyde and Bonnie during both action-packed and leisure times.
The car veered off the road into a muddy field: Marie Barrow Scoma with Davis unpublished manuscript, p. 84. In W. D. Jones’s November 1933 confession to Dallas County police, he claimed Clyde awakened three different farmers who teamed up to pull the car free.
during these months they wielded a screwdriver: Steele with Marie Barrow Scoma, The Family Story of Bonnie and Clyde, pp. 69–71.
They’d keep going until Clyde announced: Jones, “Riding with Bonnie and Clyde.”
W.D. snapped a photo of Bonnie posing: Ibid.
W. D. Jones was afraid of the dark: Sandy Jones interview; Blanche Caldwell Barrow, My Life with Bonnie and Clyde, p. 42.
Later, lawmen in Texas would spread rumors: Ben Procter interview.
bologna-and-cheese sandwiches: Jones, “Riding with Bonnie and Clyde.”
the kind of personal grooming that remained important to Bonnie: Ibid.
Twenty-four-year-old Thomas Persell had eked out a living: Knight with Davis, Bonnie and Clyde, p. 71.
Persell said later that Clyde was “quite profane”: Ramsey, On the Trail of Bonnie and Clyde Then and Now, pp. 92–95.
W.D. and Persell pried a battery out of a car: Knight with Davis, Bonnie and Clyde, pp. 72–73.
Clyde and Bonnie sent a steady stream of postcards: Marie Barrow Scoma with Davis unpublished manuscript, p. 86.
Clyde and Bonnie would simply drive past: Buddy Barrow Williams interview.
Jack and Artie, rarely saw their brother: Jonathan Davis interview.
Clyde and Bonnie gave their families money: Buddy Barrow Williams interview.
Nell had a question for her brother Clyde: Fortune, ed., Fugitives, pp. 107–9.
A few times, he even allowed Billie Jean Parker: The Truth About Bonnie and Clyde as Told by Billie Jean Parker.
Chapter 15: The Shootout in Joplin
Firefights can’t help but be confusing to everyone involved, so it’s no surprise that several conflicting accounts exist concerning what happened on the afternoon of April 13, 1933, in Joplin. Blanche Barrow’s memoir, W. D. Jones’s confession to Dallas County police, Jones’s interview thirty-five years later in Playboy, the unpublished memoirs of Cumie and Marie Barrow (providing Clyde’s and Bonnie’s accounts), and statements by Joplin police officers to the media all offer different perspectives and scenarios that just don’t reconcile. Many of the discrepancies are minor—was Bonnie rewriting “Suicide Sal” when the shooting started, or was she cooking red beans and rice?—but others are more substantial. If he was as severely wounded as he later claimed, how did W. D. Jones get up and down the apartment stairs so quickly and often during the gun battle? Did Blanche Barrow really help pull dying Harry McGinnis out of the driveway? How many shots were fired by the police, and why didn’t the cops keep shooting at the Barrow Gang as they drove away in their stolen Ford V-8 sedan?
There’s no way to be certain. The description of the gun battle in this chapter represents a best guess based on what we know about the participants and why they might deliberately or subconsciously alter their version of events. All descriptions of the apartment and its surrounding neighborhood are exact, though, the result of a lengthy visit to Joplin and over an hour spent inside the apartment and garage.
But the biggest question regarding the Joplin gunfight on April 13, 1933, is this: Did Bonnie Parker pick up a rifle and start shooting at the police from a window in the apartment? In her unpublished memoir Marie Barrow Scoma unequivocally stated she did: “Bonnie grabbed a gun and looked out the window down at the area immediately in front of the garage. She saw the police car parked there and saw one of the officers behind it firing into the garage. Bonnie fired at this man, but missed him.”
In Fugitives, Clyde’s sister Nell says Bonnie told her she fired shots in Joplin, but that admission is part of another long, flowery monologue that sounds suspiciously like something editor Jan I. Fortune might have embellished or invented for dramatic effect.
Yet W. D. Jones in his 1968 interview with Playboy was also definite: “During the five big gun battles I was with them [which included Joplin], she never fired a gun.” Bonnie’s mother, Emma, and sister, Billie Jean, were adamant that Bonnie didn’t fire even one bullet from the time she met Clyde until her death.
Later, months after Joplin, Bonnie probably did fire a gun during a robbery attempt that went awry. But it is also likely she didn’t pick up a gun and shoot at a policeman in Joplin. Things were happening fast there. Afterward, none of the apartment windows were reported broken, so Bonnie would have had to open one of them to fire through. That would have taken a few more seconds, and if she’d shot at one of the policemen, probably Tom DeGraff, he certainly would have fired back. No damage to the apartment interior or exterior from bullets was ever mentioned—all the shots from Wes Harryman, McGinnis, and DeGraff were aimed at Clyde, W.D., and Buck in the garage.
W.D. was there, and Clyde’s sisters weren’t. In 1968, W.D. had no reason to lie in an effort to protect Bonnie’s memory. It’s also possible Bonnie might have exaggerated her actions that day when telling the story to Marie and Nell later on. Weighing all the evidence, to me the most likely conclusion is that Bonnie didn’t fire a gun in Joplin.
Much of the general information about the Barrow Gang in this chapter is gleaned from Blanche Barrow’s memoir. Blanche had a knack for capturing small details of the gang’s daily life. The section on American media in 1933 and its creation of a glamorized legend regarding Bonnie and Clyde is mostly based on interviews with Cissy Stewart Lale, Jim Wright, Jonathan Davis, Sandy Jones, Archie McDonald, Buddy Barrow Williams, and John Neal Phillips.
Whenever Blanche, Cumie, and Buck’s sisters Nell and Marie came to visit him: Cumie Barrow unpublished manuscript; Marie Barrow Scoma with Davis unpublished manuscript, pp. 57, 70.
Cumie never liked having women other than her daughters: Buddy Barrow Williams and Jonathan Davis interviews; Blanche Caldwell Barrow, My Life with
Bonnie and Clyde, p. 22.
The day after Buck returned: Ibid., pp. 24–31.
Clyde talked about a new plan he had to raid Eastham prison: In her memoir, Blanche says Clyde was planning this raid to free Raymond Hamilton, but that can’t be right. In late March 1933, Raymond still hadn’t been sentenced for the murder of John Bucher; he wasn’t back in Huntsville yet, and Clyde had no way of knowing if he would be assigned to Eastham once he got there.
they paid a hefty $50: Blanche Caldwell Barrow, My Life with Bonnie and Clyde, p. 49. The gang rented the apartment for one month, and decided to give notice and vacate after two weeks. Clyde told Buck and Blanche they could have the leftover deposit money, “about twenty-five dollars.”
Harold Hill, who lived in an adjacent house: Brad Belk interview.
Playing house was a new experience: Blanche Caldwell Barrow, My Life with Bonnie and Clyde, pp. 44–45.
Clyde preferred death to prison: Buddy Barrow Williams interview.
all five of them continued to live: Jones confession; Blanche Caldwell Barrow, My Life with Bonnie and Clyde, pp. 44–48.
Clyde wanted a new car: Jones confession.
a little girl named Beth: Marie Barrow Scoma with Davis unpublished manuscript, p. 90.
Joplin had been a hotbed for bootleggers: Rick Mattix interview.
Clyde and Bonnie had a terrible fight: Blanche Caldwell Barrow, My Life with Bonnie and Clyde, pp. 48–49.
He finally convinced his big brother: Marie Barrow Scoma with Davis unpublished manuscript, p. 91.
April 13 was a Thursday: The description of the day, and the gun battle, comes from a variety of sources—Brad Belk intervi
ew; Phillips, Running with Bonnie and Clyde, pp. 125–29; Blanche Caldwell Barrow, My Life with Bonnie and Clyde, pp. 51–57; Marie Barrow Scoma with Davis unpublished manuscript, pp. 91–94; Jones confession; Steele with Marie Barrow Scoma, The Family Story of Bonnie and Clyde, pp. 78–79; Cumie Barrow unpublished manuscript; Knight with Davis, Bonnie and Clyde, pp. 77–80; Ramsey, On the Trail of Bonnie and Clyde Then and Now, pp. 100–13; Fortune, ed., Fugitives, p. 114.
So Clyde trimmed a thin tree branch: Jones, “Riding with Bonnie and Clyde.”
at dawn the fugitives found themselves in Shamrock: Blanche Caldwell Barrow, My Life with Bonnie and Clyde, pp. 58–59.
Smoot Schmid ordered deputies Bob Alcorn and Ted Hinton: Hinton, Ambush, pp. 39–47.
Several glittering rings and sets of earrings: Knight with Davis, Bonnie and Clyde, p. 79. Blanche Barrow believed the cops mistook the glass baubles she and Bonnie bought at Kress’s for real diamonds.
That made it easy to trace the car: Although Clyde was in the habit of frequently switching license plates so the cars he stole couldn’t be traced back to their owners, he apparently didn’t bother this one time.
Decent women puffed decorously on cigarettes: Cissy Stewart Lale interview. One widespread legend is that in the original photo, Bonnie held a rose rather than a cigar between her teeth, and someone in the photo lab superimposed the cigar instead to make the photo more shocking. But that would certainly have tested the era’s photo processing technology and besides, in his Playboy interview, W. D. Jones said Bonnie borrowed one of his cigars for the gag photo.
Many Depression-era newspapers subscribed: William J. Helmer and Rick Mattix, The Complete Public Enemy Almanac (Cumberland, 2007), p. 303; Potter, War on Crime, p. 93.
publishers in Texas weren’t the only ones: Cissy Stewart Lale interview.
editors of the crime magazines didn’t hesitate: Rick Mattix, Cissy Stewart Lale, Jonathan Davis, and Jim Wright interviews.
in the minds of many Americans they elevated Clyde and Bonnie: Jim Wright and Archie McDonald interviews.
With their celebrity came controversy: Rick Mattix and Jim Wright interviews.
over the course of the next several months: Jonathan Davis, Bill Sloan, John Neal Phillips, and Rick Mattix interviews.
Their whole image was one of glamour: Jim Wright interview.
Chapter 16: Shooting Stars
Harold Caldwell, a board member of the small but excellent Collingsworth County Museum, is well versed in the events there on June 9–10 involving the Barrow Gang. Museum director Doris Stallings also has considerable insights, many of these based on interviews with now deceased observers (and two participants!) and access to several key items left behind, and now on permanent display at the museum. Between them, Caldwell and Stallings offer a new, more illuminating explanation of what happened to Clyde and Bonnie in and around the small West Texas town of Wellington just before 10 P.M. on June 10, 1933.
Blanche Caldwell Barrow’s My Life with Bonnie and Clyde continues to be a valuable source of information, though it is always necessary to filter from Blanche’s testimony her frequent descents into self-righteousness and equally infinite self-pity. As historian John Neal Phillips, who knew Blanche well, likes to emphasize, she was a woman who “liked to get people going at each other.” But she was also there with the gang during some particularly critical moments.
The unpublished manuscripts by Cumie Barrow and Marie Barrow Scoma with Jonathan Davis inform us of how the rest of the Barrow family reacted during this first phase of Clyde and Bonnie’s national fame. Bonnie and Clyde: A Twenty-first Century Update and On the Trail of Bonnie and Clyde Then and Now do an admirable job of reporting specific events. This chapter does contain one significant disagreement about a date, which will be included in the notes that follow.
In 1933, Miss Sophia Stone of Ruston, Louisiana: Knight with Davis, Bonnie and Clyde, p. 83; Marie Barrow Scoma with Davis unpublished manuscript, p. 96; Ramsey, On the Trail of Bonnie and Clyde Then and Now, pp. 115–17.
She said later they were dressed shabbily: Jonathan Davis interview.
Clyde informed the two exactly who their captors were: Blanche Caldwell Barrow, My Life with Bonnie and Clyde, p. 61.
Even in a bad mood, Bonnie was too social: Knight with Davis, Bonnie and Clyde, p. 84.
Clyde ordered Stone and Darby to get out: Blanche Caldwell Barrow, My Life with Bonnie and Clyde, p. 62.
On their way through Hope: Ibid., p. 63.
Stone was eager to supply reporters: Ramsey, On the Trail of Bonnie and Clyde Then and Now, p. 117.
it seemed likely W.D. would make his way back to West Dallas: Knight with Davis, Bonnie and Clyde, p. 84. In their unpublished memoirs, both Clyde’s mother, Cumie, and sister Marie insist Clyde brought W.D. back to West Dallas immediately after the Joplin shootout with the goal of removing the impressionable teenager from a life of crime. After that, Marie writes, an unnamed man joined the Barrow Gang for a short time and participated in the Ruston car theft and kidnapping. After Clyde brought W.D. home, they write, the teenager moped around West Dallas, getting into trouble—Cumie says he was picked up by the cops for some minor transgression and sentenced to a few weeks on a county work farm—and spending much of his free time at the Barrow service station trying to see Clyde again and talk his way back into the Barrow Gang. This hardly meshes with what we know about Clyde and W.D.’s relationship. Clyde found him to be a handy member of the gang, always subservient and available for the smallest errands. Blanche, who was involved in the Ruston events, writes in her memoir that W.D. became separated from the rest of the gang. This seems to be one instance when Clyde’s mother and sister either subconsciously or deliberately “misremembered” to make Clyde look good. Far from being unwilling to corrupt a younger boy, he was glad to make use of W.D.
Their visit was kept short: Cumie Barrow unpublished manuscript; Marie Barrow Scoma with Davis unpublished manuscript, p. 97.
They weren’t staging these robberies: Blanche Caldwell Barrow My Life with Bonnie and Clyde, p. 65.
there is no record of them sneaking into a department store: Archie McDonald interview.
they’d hand money over to L.C. and Marie: Marie Barrow Scoma with Davis unpublished manuscript, p. 98.
L.C. purchased many of Clyde’s snappy suits and hats: Ibid.
Other famous criminals like Dillinger and Pretty Boy: Sandy Jones and Jonathan Davis interviews.
Now such families might very well recognize the gang: Orville Hancock interview.
Bonnie chewed on pieces of lemon peel: Bill Sloan interview.
They’d seen her posed pictures: Orville Hancock interview.
he and Buck cased the place: Blanche Caldwell Barrow, My Life with Bonnie and Clyde, p. 66; Ramsey, On the Trail of Bonnie and Clyde Then and Now, pp. 119–21; Knight with Davis, Bonnie and Clyde, pp. 84–85.
She later told her family that she’d missed deliberately: Fortune, ed., Fugitives, p. 121.
She could have gone back to her father: John Neal Phillips interview.
They snatched up all the money they could: Ramsey, On the Trail of Bonnie and Clyde Then and Now, pp. 122–29; Knight with Davis, Bonnie and Clyde, p. 85. Blanche wrote in her memoir that the take was only $100, clearly because she wanted to give the impression that every moment of her time with Bonnie and Clyde was spent in a state of near-starvation-level poverty. Much of it was, but not all, and certainly not after the robbery in Okabena.
Clyde and Buck lost their tempers: John Neal Phillips interview; Blanche Caldwell Barrow, My Life with Bonnie and Clyde, p. 71.
Blanche, sitting between them, recalled later: Blanche Caldwell Barrow, My Life with Bonnie and Clyde, pp. 72–77.
Nell Barrow remembered that she and Artie: Fortune, ed., Fugitives, p. 117.
Nell also wrote that Blanche took the cab to the family service station, not Jack’s house.
Blanche thought those three had taken advantage of her absence:
Blanche Caldwell Barrow, My Life with Bonnie and Clyde, pp. 78–80.
Cumie brought red beans, corn bread, and fried chicken: Woolley, Mythic Texas, p. 137.
Photos were snapped: Jonathan Davis interview.
Clyde and Buck gave the other Barrows: Blanche Caldwell Barrow, My Life with Bonnie and Clyde, p. 80.
As a birthday gift: Marie Barrow Scoma with Davis unpublished manuscript, pp. 99–100.
Everyone teased Blanche about her tight new pants: Fortune, ed., Fugitives, p. 117.
A teacher at her high school: Marie Barrow Scoma with Davis unpublished manuscript, p. 100.
Then he asked his mother to contact the Joplin police: Ibid., p. 99.
Then Emma Parker asked Bonnie to walk down the road: Fortune, ed., Fugitives, pp. 122–23.
Cumie had no better luck with Buck: Cumie Barrow unpublished manuscript; Fortune, ed., Fugitives, p. 122.
Bonnie’s younger sister, Billie Jean, apparently came along: The Truth About Bonnie and Clyde as Told by Billie Jean Parker.
On June 2, a jury finally passed sentence: Phillips, Running with Bonnie and Clyde, p. 134.
Clyde and Buck apparently had only one disagreement: Blanche Caldwell Barrow, My Life with Bonnie and Clyde, p. 87.
Then late on the night of June 10: In her memoir, Blanche recounts two different rendezvous, one immediately after she had her reunion with her father and then a second set for the night of June 10. Nobody else mentions two rather than one—this is an instance where it might have happened, or else Blanche could be mistaken. Either way, Bonnie, Clyde, and W.D. set out from West Dallas, probably on June 8, to meet with Buck and Blanche on the bridge between Erick and Sayre on June 10.