Frank Hamer, The Wild West Lawman Who Took Down Bonnie And Clyde
Public DomainFrank Hamer also took on the Ku Klux Klan and broke up lynch mobs.
Frank Hamer has, at times, been called the “greatest lawman of the 20th century.” He was most notable for ending the crime spree of Bonnie and Clyde, but his work as a lawman extended far beyond that.
Born on March 17, 1884, in Fairview, Texas, he grew up working in his father’s blacksmith shop and, later, on a ranch, honing skills as a marksman.
In 1905, his keen instincts led him to capture a horse thief while he was working as a cowboy on Carr Ranch, which caught the attention of local law enforcement. One year later, Hamer enlisted as a private in the Texas Rangers under Captain John H. Rogers’ Company C. Hamer’s initial time with the Rangers was brief, though, lasting for only two years.
By 1908, Hamer had quit to work as the City Marshal of Navasota, Texas, where he remained for roughly three years. Despite the short run, Hamer brought the lawless city to order by pursuing the racist group called the White Man’s Union, which had basically been running the town.
Over the next few years, he enforced the law in Houston and then in Kimble County before rejoining the Rangers — and then quitting, once again, to work as a special inspector for the Cattle Raiser’s Association of Texas. A year later, he was back with the Rangers as part of Company F in Brownsville.
Joe Holley/Texas Ranger Hall of Fame and MuseumFrank Hamer riding his favorite horse.
After a brief confrontation with State Representative José Tomás Canales over charges against the Rangers for racial violence, Hamer rose through the ranks to become a senior captain and spent the better part of the next decade fighting against the Ku Klux Klan and saving people from lynch mobs.
He retired from the Rangers again in 1932, but this time for a rather strange reason. He told the press, “When they elected a woman governor, I quit.” At the time, Miriam A. Ferguson had been elected as the governor of Texas.
But soon afterward, Hamer was back in the law game, this time as a special investigator for the Texas Prison System, tasked with bringing down the notorious criminal duo Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow. Hamer assembled a posse of officers and tracked the pair’s movements across the central United States, and after a long pursuit, on May 23, 1934, Hamer and his team ambushed Bonnie and Clyde on a rural road in Bienville Parish, Louisiana.
The posse fired about 130 rounds of ammunition into the vehicle, ensuring the couple’s demise, and Hamer cemented his legacy as a top-tier lawman.
He retired from law enforcement in 1949, but he was only able to enjoy his retirement for a short time before suffering a heat stroke in 1953. He survived, but his health never fully recovered and he died in 1955 at age 71.
