I find it extremely hypocritical that while this man is condemning Bonnie and Clyde as terrible people, he is quite happy to make money from them. Just like the so called lawmen who killed them then robbed their personal effects. Bonnie and Clyde are portrayed in popular culture as one dimensional, cold blooded killers who went on a crime spree to escape the depression. I have recently discovered that there is more to the story than this. Clyde did get imprisoned for robbery when he was 19. In prison he was treated brutally and raped by a fellow prisoner. He killed this prisoner and another prisoner who was serving life took the blame. On his release he managed to find work but each time there was a robbery the police would turn up where he worked and he lost his job. This was of course the depression era and jobs were hard to come by. So in the end he gave up. This is no doubt what set him on the path to becoming a robber and outlaw. Clyde was driven by a desire for revenge on the prison and it's brutal prison guards who beat men with baseball bats, sometimes to death. His last act was to return to the prison and release 5 inmates (which he had promised to do). One of the inmates was Henry Methvin. Methvin's father did a deal with the police to set up Bonnie and Clyde in exchange for a pardon for his son. Clyde only killed if it was a case of him or them. There is no evidence that Bonnie shot anyone. She had her leg badly burned when their car overturned and was a cripple after that. Bonnie and Clyde robbed only 2 banks. They normally robbed large gas stations as Clyde reasoned that they could afford it. In fact Bonnie and Clyde were just 2 small time robbers who did not attract a lot of attention. It was only when the police found their underdeveloped photos and had them developed and the newspapers then published them that they became folk heroes. They became scapegoats and were blamed for many things which they were not responsible for. Bonnie said that often bank managers would rob their own banks and blame it on Bonnie and Clyde. It is appalling that the policemen who were sent to hunt them down helped themselves to their personal effects. Some of these were recently auctioned by the family of one of the policemen, which included Bonnie's ring and a letter written by Bonnie and signed by Clyde. These personal effects should have been returned to the family. It is ironic that the auction raised $100,000 and no doubt the films, documentaries and books about them will have earned a lot of money. Far more than Bonnie and Clyde ever made by robbing gas stations. This happened during the depression era and Bonnie and Clyde captured the imagination because they were a young couple in love who flouted the law.. Propaganda was used in order to turn the public against them i.e. they were accredited with things they did not do and Clyde was accused of being a rapist and a homosexual. A witness claimed that he saw them kill 2 policemen and Bonnie said she saw their heads bounce like rubber balls. Bonnie's sister Billie Jean said that it was impossible for this man to have witnessed this from his house. However, another witness said he saw a man do this. The killer was Henry Methvin, who misinterpreted Clyde when he said 'let's take them'. Clyde intended to kidnap them but Methvin interpreted this as killing them. The police had done a deal with Methvin's father who agreed to set up Bonnie and Clyde in return for a pardon for his son, so they covered this up. They were no doubt responsible for the witness who claimed that the killings were the work of Bonnie and Clyde. I watched a fascinating interview with Billie Jean, the sister of Bonnie. By all accounts Bonnie and Clyde were kind people. According to the book 'Go Down Together' by Jeff Guinn, when Bonnie was working as a waitress, she often gave free food to those who could not afford to pay. She was pulled up for this many times but continued to do this. This indicates that she was a kind person, not the nasty, cold-blooded killer she is portrayed. The manner of their death was horrifically brutal. Because Clyde had killed police, it seemed that the police were not content with killing them, they wanted to destroy their bodies as well. Bonnies left breast was ripped off. The embalmers had a lot of work to do to repair the bodies as they were displayed to the public before burial. I would say that poverty and the brutal prison system were ultimately responsible for what happened to Bonnie and Clyde. They are condemned as ruthless killers - however, Clyde only killed when it was either them or him. There is no condemnation of the brutal prison wardens who beat men to death - they just got away with it. Nor the policemen who prevented Clyde from keeping a job or robbed from the pair. Indeed Boots Hinton was the son of one of the posse who killed Bonnie and Clyde - yet runs a museum about them. I do feel that condemning Bonnie and Clyde without looking at the full facts is hypocrisy.
"...... a case of him or them......" Scrap your report. There never should have been a case of him or them. He chose that ! Tell me if your ancestor died at their hand that you would empathize and romanticize them in this way ?! Thought not !
yeah lets all make Bonnie and Clyde out to be the perfect, caring, young American couple that were chased, persecuted, and eventually unjustifiably gunned down by police who had been after them for almost 2 years just because they did nothing. Geezuz H. Khrist!!!
Gun downed? Slaughtered is more like it. Overkill. No doubt they killed when confronted. Not like the psychos, trans whatever's today who kill children & innocent people & leave a " manifesto" whining about their pitiful lives..
They were NOT "TERRIBLE PEOPLE"! This KID was BRUTALLY RAPED in PRISON for PETTY CRIMES! Prison system back then was BRUTAL!! He SWORE he'd NEVER go back there EVER AGAIN! Could ya BLAME HIM? He was BEYOND DIRT POOR & commited some MORE PETTY CRIMES! Stupid, perhaps, but you werent in his shoes! She went with him cuz she loved him. These were BABIES when this all began! Just 22 & 23! They lived a HORRIFIC life, MOSTLY livin in the woods & drivin around all damned day! I dont CONDONE what they did, but I can understand it! (a little bit)
