by H B Auld, Jr.

Modern-day desperados, Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow, were shot to death in an ambush on a back road of Louisiana, 92 years ago today, May 23, 1934.

Bonnie and Clyde had been on the run from lawmen for a couple of years, dashing from one bank to another across middle America. They had killed several highway patrolmen and civilians from Texas to Missouri and elsewhere. 

Lawmen everywhere tried to track them down to stop their violent crime spree.  As they high-tailed it from one murder to another, they also committed robberies and kidnappings, gaining widespread attention in newspapers and were portrayed as public enemies in a romanticized depression-era America of the early 1930s. 

A posse of six officers had tracked them to West Louisiana and hid in ambush just outside of Gibsland, Louisiana, just eight and a half miles from my dad’s hometown of Arcadia, Louisiana. The law officers:

• Frank Hamer: Former Texas Ranger captain who led the posse and tracked the Barrow gang.

• Henderson Jordan: Sheriff of Bienville Parish, Louisiana, who had local jurisdiction and orchestrated the trap.

• Prentiss Oakley: Deputy to Sheriff Jordan who fired the first shot in the ambush.

• Ted Hinton: Dallas County Deputy Sheriff who personally knew the outlaws and wielded an automatic rifle.

• Bob Alcorn: Dallas County Deputy Sheriff who accompanied Hinton.

• Maney Gault: Former Texas Ranger and Hamer’s hand-picked partner for the manhunt.

The pair of outlaws were finally ambushed near where my dad grew up in Bienville Parish (County), Louisiana. Dad had just turned 20 years old the previous day. My uncle, Ernest Murphy, and his brother, King Murphy, raced to the nearby death scene and shot photos of Bonnie and Clyde, still inside their stolen 1934 Model 40 B Ford Deluxe sedan (often just called a Ford V8) It was famously riddled with well more than 100 bullets by the law enforcement posse. The high-speed, powerful flathead V8 was Clyde’s favorite getaway car.

My wife and I visited the scene of the ambush years later on November 5, 2011. There in Gibsland, Louisiana, we visited the Bonnie and Clyde Museum, and talked at length to Linton J. “Boots” Hinton, the son of one of the lawmen who killed Bonnie and Clyde that early pre-dawn Wednesday and curator of his local museum. 

According to “Boots” Hinton, the six lawmen were hiding on each side of Louisiana Highway 154 and had set up a ruse to stop the outlaws for their ambush. Boots Hinton ran the museum and regaled us with stories from his dad, Deputy Ted Hinton, one of the lawmen who finally brought Bonnie and Clyde down.

Boots had written a book entitled “AMBUSH,” about the end of Bonnie and Clyde and sold it at the Museum. Boots posed for a photo with me that afternoon (see photo of Boots and me above in front of the Museum. He would not allow any cameras inside the Museum, but he autographed my book for me.)  Boots was just four months old when Bonnie and Clyde were shot by his dad and the posse. Boots Hinton died five years after our visit, in the birthplace of my dad, nearby Arcadia, Louisiana. Boots was 82 years old when he died on December 5, 2016.

Rest in Peace, Linton J. “Boots” Hinton, and thanks for all of the stories.

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