Eighty years after their Depression-era robbery-and-murder spree captivated the country, Bonnie and Clyde continue to fascinate crime and history buffs.
At least that’s the hope of a Missouri family selling a pair of rare weapons believed to have been seized from the outlaw couple’s Joplin hideout in 1933. The weapons are owned by the great-grandchildren of a Tulsa, Okla., police detective who was given them by a cop involved in the April 13, 1933, raid. The .45-caliber, fully automatic Thompson submachine gun — better known as a Tommy gun — and 1897 Winchester 12-gauge shotgun had spent the past 40 years in relative historical obscurity.
Two law-enforcement officers died in a shootout at the Joplin apartment where the couple and members of the Clyde Barrow gang were holed up, but they all escaped. The raid netted a camera that produced widely distributed photos of the criminal lovebirds, cementing the image of Bonnie Elizabeth Parker as Barrow’s cigar-chomping, gun-toting moll. Both were killed about a year later by police in Louisiana.
The Associated Press
