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LOT 3103
Historic Documented Browning Automatic Rifle Magazine and Five .30-06 Springfield Cartridges Attributed as Recovered from the Bonnie and Clyde “Death Car” with a Photograph of Items Recovered from the Car - There are certain names that are nearly synonymous with the “Public Enemy era” in the United States, marked by high
profile lawlessness and organized
crime. Some of these names include
Al Capone, John Dillinger, “Pretty
Boy” Floyd, “Baby Face” Nelson, and,
perhaps most notoriously, Bonnie
and Clyde. Bonnie Parker and Clyde
Barrow both grew up in the urban
slums of West Dallas, where they
met many of the later members of
the Barrow Gang, including Floyd
Hamilton, whose Winchester rifle can
be found in Lot 3101. The infamous
duo began their life of armed robbery
and murder in 1932, beginning small,
mostly robbing small businesses
and gas stations. In August of that
year, Clyde and Raymond Hamilton,
Floyd’s brother, were approached
by two police officers at a country
dance in Oklahoma, and the pair shot
the officers, killing one and seriously
wounding the other. This was the
first law enforcement officer killed
by the gang who eventually would
kill a total of nine, setting them on
a one way path leading them to
their graves. A raid on their Joplin,
Missouri, hideout in 1933 led to
many personal photographs of the
gang being posted in newspapers,
skyrocketing them to national fame.
After the raid, the gang roamed from
Minnesota to Texas, stepping up their
robberies to banks, and realizing that
their newfound fame made keeping
a low profile much more difficult
for them. In 1934, the noose began
to close around Bonnie and Clyde,
having sprung some of their gang members out of Eastham prison in Texas and embarrassing the Texas Department of Corrections. The department turned to former Texas Ranger Frank Hamer to track down and apprehend the pair. In April, Parker, Barrow, and another gang member opened fire on two motorcycle patrolmen, killing both, and solidly turning the public’s perception against them. These killings also led to large bounties being placed on the heads of both Bonnie and Clyde. Hamer had tracked the outlaws movements for months, found their patterns, and by May was ready to lay his trap in Louisiana. Hamer’s posse of six set an ambush along Louisiana State Highway 154 and waited for hours, some even saying they waited a whole day. At around 9:15 am on 23 May, a Ford V8 approached at high speed, slowing down slightly to take the bait the posse had laid. Before the car stopped, Hamer’s men opened fire, killing Barrow almost instantly and unloading their plethora of weapons into the vehicle. Bonnie and Clyde were both killed, bringing their crime spree to an end. When the posse searched the vehicle they found veritable arsenal including automatic rifles, sawed off shotguns, a plethora of handguns, magazines, and stocks of ammunition, much
of which had been acquired in raids on National Guard armories. A crowd gathered with the spread of the news and quickly turned into a looting mob, many struggling to grab anything they could as a souvenir.
A photograph included with the lot shows a man standing with a display of weaponry and ammunition that were recovered from the vehicle by law enforcement. Included documentation states that the BAR magazine, five bullets, and five casings in a stripper clip in this lot were items also recovered from Bonnie and Clyde’s car. The documentation from Sandy Jones of the John Dillinger Historical Society indicates that they were originally held as evidence by the F.B.I., the magazine still having an F.B.I. identification number scratched on it, before they were moved to the Texas Ranger collection in San Antonio and later privately acquired. The evidence identification number scratched on the magazine appears to be “B432217”, with another illegible number scratched on the opposite side. An included document from Newton & Newton Ltd. states that the .30-06 rounds were deactivated so they could be owned in the U.K. without a firearms certificate, and they are now included in the lot as five casings in a stripper clip with five loosely seated bullets. CONDITION: Fine, the magazine, bullets, and casings show typical patina and mild wear for their age. The photograph is very good with some mild edge/corner wear. This is an opportunity to own pieces of “Public Enemy era” history, with these items documented as recovered from the car that the infamous Bonnie and Clyde were killed in!
Provenance: The David Gainsborough-Roberts Collection.
Estimate: 5,000 - 7,500
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