Bonnie and clyde part I

Clyde Barrow and Bonnie Parker were nothing like the characters portrayed in the film Bonnie and Clyde. They were illiterate, unfeeling killers, who spread terror through Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, Missouri and other states, stealing and earning a reputation as lethal killers who enjoyed taking lives. Lawmen quickly learned that to attempt to reason with them was to invite dearth. For a period of about two years, 1932–34, the Barrow gang, never more than five or six members, became the terror of the Southwest. They preyed upon small store owners, filling stations, and travelers driving along remote roads. They lived in the country for the most part, renting small, cheap cabins, often sleeping in the cars they stole. They were thieves with high-powered weapons.

The reckless manner, in which the Barrows operated, their utter disregard for the law, and their contempt for their own violent ends, pointed to only one rationale that held the band together – they intended to be killed as they had killed, with the gun, inside a storm of violence. In short, the Barrows were fanatically suicidal. Both Clyde and Bonnie recorded their almost every moment together, taking photographs of each other, writing long letters to their families in which they portrayed themselves as persecuted, misunderstood, young people and sending even longer missives (and even poems) to the newspapers-letters that glorified their robberies.

Clyde was an expert killer who practiced his marksmanship (искусство стрельбы) every day he lived outside of prison, firing all manner of weapons: submachine guns, shotguns, rifles, automatics and revolvers. He taught Bonnie to fire all these weapons too, and she, in turn, devised a special trick pocket for Clyde, one where his right trouser was zippered so that he could carry a sawed-off shotgun next to his leg and then, employing the break-away zipper, whip the gun out and fire in one motion.

Born in Texas, on March 24, 1909, Clyde was one of eight children, and early on he aped (стал подражать) his older brother Ivan Marvin Barrow, called Buck, a troubled and unruly boy who taught Clyde how to steal turkeys and later cars. By the age of ten, Clyde was impossible for his parents to handle; he was an incorrigible petty thief and a runaway.

In January 1930, after robbing a few stores, Clyde walked into Marco’s Café in Dallas where he met a twenty-year-old blonde-haired waitress, Bonnie Parker. Since that time they spent time together practicing their marksmanship, and Bonnie soon became an expert with automatics, pistols, and submachine guns.

There were robberies, a lot of them. Mostly Bonnie drove the car and Clyde ran into cafes or grocery stores, quickly cleaning out the till while holding proprietors and customers at bay with a shotgun or a pistol. He would then dash outside and leap into the already moving car Bonnie was driving.

1. How big was the Barrow gang?

2. What was the intention of the gang that held the members together?

3. How and what for did Clyde use his trick pocket?

4. What was Clyde’s background?

5. Where did Clyde meet Bonnie Parker?