Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow aren’t only the subjects of a chart-topping single from the early 2000’s by Jay-Z and Beyoncé. The real-life pair — infamous outlaws from the 1930’s that are well covered in the history books of today — lived life on the edge, committing a string of robberies and other crimes that would land them in hot water across the span of their short lives. The duo would end up on the run from authorities for many years, shocking the world by their actions and leaving an incomparable legacy behind in the process.
Life On The Run The Iconic Story Of Bonnie And Clyde
A Sea of Bullets
It took no less than six officers to take down the infamous pair of bandits, in a shooting that resulted in both Bonnie and Clyde losing their lives. Two of the law enforcers involved, Ted Hinton and Bob Alcorn, recalled the events of that day in great detail after. The officers were each armed with shotguns, automatic rifles, and pistols. They emptied out the automatic rifles before the car even got anywhere near them until there was smoke coming out of the car. The shotguns were emptied next, followed by the pistols. The car rolled into a ditch about 50 years from where the policemen were stationed, and it almost rolled over. In order to make sure the duo was dead, the officers kept shooting, even after it had stopped.
A Sea Of Bullets
Bonnie, Clyde and the Silver Screen
After their death in Louisiana, the duo gained global fame for their story, which captured the imagination of the public and producers alike. A film adaptation of their lives was soon to follow. In 1967, Arthur Penn produced Bonnie and Clyde, which retold their entire lives through a fictional narrative. The movie became the basis for a Broadway play, which hit the stage in 2011 to an entirely new generation of fans. A mini-series was adapted in 2013, which starred Emile Hirsch and Holliday Grainger. In 2018, Netflix did their own adaptation of the story, starring Kevin Costner and Kathy Bates.
Bonnie Clyde And The Silver Screen
Bonnie’s Secret Marriage
Many people assume that Bonnie and Clyde were married, but the truth is that they never tied the knot. Not to each other, at least.
As it turned out, Bonnie was previously married to a man called Roy Thornton. She had a tattoo of his and her names on one of her knees, and she was wearing the ring of her wedding the day she died. Perhaps this shatters the illusion of Clyde being the “love of her life”, or perhaps her decision to leave her husband for him adds to the folklore attached to their story.
Bonnies Secret Marriage
Drawn To The Bad Boys
Bonnie and Roy had met back in high school, and the pair married a couple of days before she turned 16. Roy wasn’t exactly a good guy and was known for his abusive behavior. Tired of the physical altercations, Bonnie packed up her things as soon as the relationship crumbled for good, although the pair never formally filed for divorce. Some people argue that Bonnie had a “thing” for robbers, as in 1929 Roy was arrested on robbery charges. He served a prison sentence of five years for the misdemeanor, and the two of them never laid eyes on each other ever again.
Drawn To The Bad Boys
Clyde The Heartbreaker
When Bonnie met Clyde, she was only 19 and he was an escaped prison convict. It was like a love at first sight, and Bonnie was all too keen to escape the doldrums of her life for an adventure of a lifetime. What followed was more than she could have ever bargained for. While on the run together, the romance hit a new peak. A few weeks into the courtship, however, Clyde was arrested and he was back behind bars before the honeymoon period of their relationship was over.
Clyde The Heartbreaker
Jail Couldn’t Separate Them
For rational thinkers, a jail cell may be a deterrent and might lead to the end of a relationship. This wasn’t the case for Bonnie, who was determined to be with Clyde. She even went as far as to smuggle a gun into jail for him.
The gun helped Clyde and a few of his friends escape the jail, but it wasn’t long before he was caught and it was back to square one. He was sent to Eastham State Farm and sentenced to 14 years of hard labor.
Jail Couldnt Separate Them
Clyde’s Family History
Clyde was one of seven children, and if anything, being sent to Eastham reminded him that he was raised on a farm run by his parents. Strapped for resources, the family might not have had a lot of money, but they remained close to each other in spite of this.
A drought would lead to Clyde’s family being forced to abandon the farm altogether, moving to Dallas in Texas to start a new life. This would be the first of many big changes across his life.
Clydes Family History
Rejection Letter
At one time in his life, Clyde had ambitions to enlist in the U.S Navy. Unfortunately, it was not to be, and he was rejected on medical grounds. He had suffered from malaria or yellow fever in his youth, which made him a liability to the navy at the time. As can be expected, Clyde did not take too well to the rejection. Even before he had heard from them, he already tattooed the letters “USN” on his arm as a reminder of his goals. This would eventually serve as a reminder of his failed attempt for the rest of his days on earth.
Rejection Letter
Buck The Criminal
Clyde didn’t become a criminal mastermind overnight without any help. His older brother Buck was a major influence on his wheeling and dealing, introducing Clyde to petty theft when he was very young. Didn’t take too long for the adrenaline rush related to petty theft to wear off. In a short space of time, Clyde’s petty theft turned into grand theft auto and serious armed robberies. This was the start of many run-ins with the law that would ultimately lead to him losing his life.
Buck The Criminal
The Embarrassing First Arrest
Many people assume that Clyde’s first arrest was related to a serious crime. As it turns out, he was first arrested for failing to return a rented car, which he had first acquired to visit an old flame. The charges were eventually dropped, but Clyde was now well on the radar of local authorities.
The introduction of a permanent record meant that finding any kind of traditional employment would be next to impossible. A short while later, alongside his trusted big brother, he conspired to (and executed) the theft of a truck full of turkeys.
The Embarrassing First Arrest
Bonnie and Clyde: On The Run
Many years later, Bonnie and Clyde moved to Missouri to live with Buck and his wife. They were on the run and wanted for various offenses at this stage, including robbery, kidnapping and even murder. It seems blood does run thicker than water after all. It would be there that authorities would catch up to the pair, resulting in a shootout that left the duo unharmed, but resulted in the deaths of two cops. This would be the start of the end for them, as police were now happy to catch them dead, rather than alive.
Bonnie And Clyde On The Run
A Precarious Roll of Film
When escaping the scene, Bonnie and Clyde left behind images through a roll of film that was found at the scene. Newspapers were quick to publish these images, adding to their iconic status and giving historians more insights into their lives as a whole. Photographs from this roll were splashed all over newspapers in the US, and overnight they became a national sensation. Everyone was talking about this elusive couple and speculating on what they might do next.
A Precarious Roll Of Film
The One Possession Clyde Adored
Running from the law often involves giving up personal possessions, especially if you’re trying to escape from a tricky situation. If you have to leave a scene right away, you can’t be thinking about everything you’ll grab with you. Your only thought it is to escape at all costs.
Upon discovering their stolen car, authorities found Bonnie’s magazines and Clyde’s guitar. The guitar was something that had always been taken with him, but in this particular case, he hadn’t had an opportunity to grab it before fleeing. He even went as far as to ask his mother to try and retrieve it from arthritis, which was never going to happen of course.
The One Possession Clyde Adored
The Barrow Gang
The duo not only committed their own crimes, but they showed some managerial skills as well. They started the Barrow Gang, which consisted of other outlaws and would eventually help them on their quest to evade authorities over time. Some of the gang members now notorious in the pages of history include Clyde’s brother Buck and his wife Blanche, Henry Methvin, Joe Palmer, Ralph Fults, Raymond Hamilton and W.D Jones. While not the biggest gang in the word, it certainly was a powerful group when all heads were put together.
The Barrow Gang
The Demise of the Barrow Gang
Following a violent shootout with authorities in 1933, Clyde’s brother was fatally wounded and pronounced dead on the spot. The Barrow Gang was now starting to get smaller by the day.
In the ensuing scuffle, Blanche was captured and arrested. That left the gang two members short, and ultimately made Bonnie and Clyde even more vulnerable in their quest to evade capture.
The Demise Of The Barrow Gang
Their Dying Wish
When Bonnie and Clyde died following the pelting of bullets from police to their car, it became national news. Their funerals in Dallas amassed crowds into the thousands. Some publications even shared “special editions” to commemorate the occasion. Bonnie & Clyde had wanted to be buried together. It would be Bonnie’s mom that had the final say, however, and because of her own disapproval and contentious relationship with Clyde, she decided to have them buried apart.
Their Dying Wish
The Couple “Beautified” For Hollywood
Warren Beatty and Faye Dunway portrayed Bonnie and Clyde in the 1967 film about their lives on the run. The actor and actress averaged 6 feet when combining their heights, which was nothing like the real-life pair, who were notoriously short. In the depression era, the average person was anywhere 5’3” and 5’8” tall. Bonnie came in at a measly 4’11” and Clyde just made the mark at 4’5”. This was one of the many ways that Hollywood glamorised the pair, and it would be this “beautification” that made them part of pop culture for decades to come and to this very day.
The Couple Beautified For Hollywood
Clyde’s Toes
As you can imagine, Clyde survived a great ordeal in the labor camps. In a bid to get out of having to do nearly unbearable hard labor, he cut off two of his toes, hoping this would be enough to get him excused. As it were, his mother was negotiating his release with a court judge, and a few days after he cut off his own toes, he was released on parole. Clyde subsequently walked with a limp in the remaining days of his life, and the loss of his toes meant that he couldn’t drive while wearing shoes either.
Clydes Toes
Bonnie The Writer
When Clyde left the labor camp in 1932, he was undeterred and returned to his gang to start robbing banks and other businesses. This time around, Bonnie joined for the fun. It was around this time that she discovered a hidden talent that didn’t involve crime.
After a failed robbery landed Bonnie a stint in jail for two months, Bonnie started putting pen to paper and discovered that she had a knack for writing. This led her to start writing poetry about her life with Clyde, which to this day gives historians much insight about the internal workings of her mind at the time.
Bonnie The Writer
Trying To Turn Things Around
You can’t mention Clyde’s history without mentioning the one time he tried to redo his life by starting a job at a glass factory in Dallas. While there, he faced constant harassment from police, which in turn upset his employer, and resulted in him being laid off. There’s just no winning for some guys.
As with most ex-cons, the long arm of the law makes it nearly impossible to start over, even if you’re looking to lead a clean and honest life. This was the case for Clyde, but experts doubt whether an ordinary life would have sustained him for long enough to keep him out of trouble.
Trying To Turn Things Around
Bonnie The Intellectual?
It’s slightly strange that Bonnie ended up living a life of crime, when she was an honors student at high school and well known as someone who had major aspirations. While her short-term goal was to become an actress, she had a knack for putting pen to paper and this talent would go unnoticed for years at first. In one of her final pieces of writing, Bonnie penned a poem titled “The Story of Bonnie and Clyde”. It would eventually be published posthumously around the country, and the rest as you might say, is history.
Bonnie The Intellectual
Growing Up a Parker
Growing up in the Parker household, Bonnie chased the spotlight from a young age. She was a regular in talent shows and school pageants and many believed that her charismatic nature would lead her to fame one day. Never one to miss an opportunity to tell her friends she would be a big name one day, Bonnie was regularly telling them that she had big dreams. Little did she know that infamy and immortality awaited her in a couple of years.
Growing Up A Parker
More Than Just a Guitar Player
Although Clyde lost his beloved guitar at some point in his escapades, he always had dreams of becoming a musician. His love for music was present from an early age, and he taught himself how to play the saxophone as soon as he was old enough to try. When Bonnie and Clyde died in the shootout from police, investigators found a saxophone in the trunk of the car. While Clyde didn’t have his beloved guitar, at least his saxophone saw him through in the last couple of days of his life.
More Than Just A Guitar Player
Mr. Parker’s Death
Bonnie lost her father when she was just four years old. Naturally, this impacted the entire family in a major way. The absence of a father figure would later lead her to some so-called “bad boys” in the quest to find love and partnership. At the time of her father’s death, Bonnie’s mother didn’t have many choices, and their primary source of income was now gone. The family moved to a poorer neighborhood, moving in with Bonnie’s grandparents while her mother figured out what they were going to do for money.
Mr Parkers Death
Manipulating The Police
When she was initially arrested in conjunction with crimes related to Clyde, Bonnie told authorities that Clyde and the Barrow Gang had kidnapped her. The police didn’t flinch at her story and she was free to go shortly after. After her release, she got straight back to doing what she does best — committing crimes with Clyde. They got better in what they were doing as time went on, eventually even crossing state lines to chase the loot.
Manipulating The Police
Not As Heartless As You Think
There’s no denying that the pair of lovers were criminals. The title comes with their long list of transgressions. They weren’t however completely rotten at the core. Clyde, for example, avoided killing anyone as much as it was possible to do so. His modus operandi was usually to kidnap people and then pay for their silence. There are some reports that suggest that when it came to releasing the captives, Clyde would even go as far as to giving them money so they could find their way back to safety.
Not As Heartless As You Think
A Partner In Crime
W.D Jones was not only one of their gang members. He became Bonnie and Clyde’s “partner in crime” so to speak, joining them in stealing food and cash where possible. Usually, they would enjoy and share their findings in their stolen car of choice. The trio stole cars and switched their license plates right away to avoid alerting authorities. If they had some spare cash laying about, they would rent a room, but privacy was usually reserved for their biggest heists, which yielded the biggest earnings.
A Partner In Crime
Personal Items Recovered
After their deaths, authorities discovered many personal items related to the pair. Many personal photographs were recovered, shedding some light on their life on the run.
One picture showed Bonnie holding a handgun and smoking a cigar. W.D Jones was well known as a cigar smoker, so theorists speculate that this was only done for the picture, possibly with his cigar. The personal picture is appreciated by fans all over the world today.
Personal Items Recovered
Simple Pleasures
Bonnie and Clyde enjoyed a good pack of cigarettes whenever possible, and their brand of choice was always Camel. While Bonnie liked to dabble in the odd glass of whiskey, Clyde insisted on sobriety in order to remain alert at all times.
Clyde never wanted to be “caught with his pants down”, so to speak. This type of diligence and self-discipline is commendable, and likely served him well in a few of the situations he had found himself up against it, with authorities closing in on them.
Simple Pleasures
The Most Important Rule To Follow
When you’re on the run from the law, the most important rule to follow is to ensure that you cut all ties to you at once. More often than not, this is what lands people into hot water while trying to stay undetected. Bonnie and Clyde realized this all too well, especially when it came to their loved ones, who they loved dearly.
Even in times when it seemed like an impossibility, the pair found a way to pay impromptu visits to their family members. After a while, the Texas rangers caught on to them doing so, and this would eventually lead to Bonnie and Clyde being tracked down once and for all.
The Most Important Rule To Follow
Coke Bottle Message
When trying to visit his family, Clyde would place a small note inside a coke bottle, which featured details about their meeting point. He would then drive past the home and throw the bottle out of the car window, being careful not to alert anyone of his doing so.
As it were, Clyde’s family were not averse to seeing the couple, even though they were considered delinquents of society. The family regularly checked for the message in the bottle on their front law, meeting up with the pair if possible to do so without raising any suspicion.
Coke Bottle Message
Breaking The Law For Family
Petty theft, bank robberies and kidnappings don’t exactly paint a picture of a wholesome couple on the right side of the law. Many believe that Bonnie and Clyde robbed and stole for their own gain only, which is not entirely the truth.
While we can’t exactly call them Robin Hood, their goal was to take care of their loved ones financially. Clyde even had plans to buy a plot of land for his parents in Louisiana, which would have been like a game-changer for them.
Breaking The Law For Family
A Slippery Slope
When you’re on the run, often you have to make choices that go against your moral compass, or even just in the opposite direction of your own common sense. For Bonnie and Clyde, who never had an intention to do more than steal, bringing harm to people was the last thing they thought they would resort to doing.
When he was caught in the act of robbery and with little other choice to make, Clyde shot a police officer and the owner of the store in a bid to make an escape. His fellow Barrow Gang members also started killing cops in their daily antics as a result. This was a moment where everything went beyond the point of no return.
A Slippery Slope
An Ambush at Methvin’s
When Methvin was captured for the death of a police officer in Oklahoma, Bonnie and Clyde decided to hide in plain sight, taking refuge at his father’s farm. Methvin’s father knew he had a bargaining tool to use with the police, so in a bid to get a more lenient sentence for his child, he helped to arrange an ambush with the police for 23 May 1934.
The sting was set up in a particular way, with Methvin’s father appearing to be stuck on the side of the road with a broken down vehicle. As the couple approached him, they stopped to help him, but as soon as they were about to get out of the car, the authorities surrounded them and to the surprise of Methvin’s father, opened fire.
An Ambush At Methvin
Frank Hamer Gains Credibility
Texas ranger Frank Hamer had been the official in charge of leading the ambush. After months of tracking, this operation was his time to shine. He did not reveal to Methvin’s father that Bonnie and Clyde would be gunned down in the process.
Betraying Methvin’s father would mean very little once Bonnie and Clyde were killed. This was Hamer’s moment of fame and he was going to make sure that whatever went down that day, that the pair did not live to tell the tale after.
Frank Hamer Gains Credibility
Riddled With Bullets
The car they had been in that day is proof of the severity of the ambush. Riddled with bullet holes, it is proof that the authorities opened fire violently and gunned the pair down to the best of their abilities. It was never a fair fight. The car still stands to this day, preserved as it was found on that iconic date.
Exhibited at Whiskey Pete’s Casino just outside Vegas, the car itself is open to view by the general public and is somewhat of a national treasure now. One look at the pictures will show that Bonnie and Clyde stood no chance that day.
Riddled With Bullets
An Unbelievable Scene
Hundreds of bullet holes were left after the shootout, which many observers note to have been an execution, rather than a confrontation. A coroner later found 17 bullets in Clyde’s body, and 26 in Bonnie’s. While these are the official numbers, many more went flying that day. The couple’s bodies couldn’t even be embalmed properly, as their wounds were so severe.
In some bizarre universal intervention, as it turns out, the undertaker’s assistance had once been the victim of kidnapping by the couple. He later talked about being offered $5 by the couple in exchange for being well taken care in the ceremony of their deaths.
An Unbelievable Scene
Missing Out On The Loot
If you look at their careers as outlaws, some might argue that Bonnie and Clyde died somewhat in vain. In the four years that they were on a crime spree, the fifteen banks they robbed often yielded minimal returns. Once, they stole less than $100 following a heist.
While always optimistic about their prospects for wealth and riches, their families never benefited all too much from their takeaways. What eventually happened was execution-style murders following what was a relatively tame crime spree amplified by the media as a whole.
Missing Out On The Loot
Trade of Choice
Petty theft was the name of the game for the dynamic duo, and their small robberies at grocery stores and gas stations will live on in infamy. Many analysts argue that they did this purely for survival, which is a reflection on society at the time, rather than their ambitions to be millionaires. A life on the run was all they could do to ensure that their trade of choice did not land them in a jail sail more often than they hoped it would.
More complicated robberies, like those involving banks, are often harder to trace for law enforcement. Had Bonnie and Clyde been more professional, they may well have been resided to a different fate than what actually happened. All their choices and efforts served to further upset enforcement officials, leaving them killed and with very little show for their time on the run.
Trade Of Choice
Nothing In Life Comes Free
The pair lived a life in the fast lane, which many people dream of, especially if they are stuck in a traditional corporate role. While exhilarating and adrenaline-inducing, this kind of life doesn’t come without a cost. On one of their outings, Bonnie suffered a severe acid burn to her leg. Clyde had been driving them and didn’t notice a bridge that was under construction ahead.
A terrible accident followed, and Bonnie couldn’t walk over the period of a couple of months. She had to be carried around everywhere. The car battery had spewed acid after the collision had taken place, and Bonnie burnt her leg right down to the bone in some places. Naysayers may have called this karma, while supporters would argue it’s just part of the territory.
Nothing In Life Comes Free
The Beloved Bonnie and Clyde
All things considered, the public fell in love with Bonnie and Clyde, and it would be their charisma that helped the pair creep into the hearts of the nation long after their deaths. While nobody openly approves of murder, the couple’s free-spirited nature is one that is the envy of most people who feel trapped in their own lives. Their love story adds a unique, relatable angle to things as well. Jim Wright, a speaker from the House of Representatives, once commented that growing up in Texas and Oklahoma, they were the envy of the country. While most people did not approve of their antics, the combination of beauty, fame and wealth was sure to make anyone feel just a little bit jealous in comparison.
The Beloved Bonnie And Clyde
Memorializing the Couple
A public infatuation with Bonnie and Clyde continues to this very day. When the press announced their deaths, people grieved for the loss. The crime scene was swarmed, and many tried to get their hands on a souvenir in the process. It seems that ordinary people are not as far removed from petty theft similar to the pair, after all. Arriving at the coroner’s office, crowds gathered to catch a glimpse of the blood-stained bodies of Bonnie and Clyde. Onlookers later referred to the moment as surreal. People were clutching at the bodies trying to get their hands on parts of their clothing, hair and more. Authorities would later state that they thought people had gone completely mad. Someone even went as far as offering $30 000 to Clyde’s father for his dead body, which he turned down immediately.
Memorializing The Couple
Remembering Two Cultural Icons
All these years later, the tombs of Bonnie and Clyde are still visited by tourists, fans and enthusiasts alike. Forever known as the outlaws who won the hearts of the people, the duo will forever be immortalized in their incredible, iconic story. Beyond their crimes, a story of love exists, and while it may have been perceived happiness, Bonnie and Clyde gave people reason to believe in unconditional love again. Many people search their entire lives to find someone to share that kind of connection with. The couple embodies hope for millions of people around the world to this day. Bonnie and Clyde may have been buried separately, but their tombstones are eerily similar in terms of design. Clyde’s reads “gone but not forgotten”, while Bonnie’s features a beautiful poem. Even in death, the couple still finds a way to connect to each other, making them one of the most star pairs in the history of the world.
Remembering Two Cultural Icons