The Postcard
A postcard that was published by Carter & Co. of 17, Terminus Road, Eastbourne. The swans have obviously been added later in order to add interest to the photograph.
The card was posted in Eastbourne using a ½d. stamp on Wednesday the 5th. October 1904. It was sent to:
Miss E. Simmons,
'Craiglea',
St. John's Road.
Local.
The message on the divided back of the card was as follows:
"Hope you have not got
this view.
Kit is going for a holiday
on Friday, so call in on
Thursday evening as I
will come out, all being
well.
Hope you have heard
from C.
Love from G."
Hampden Park
Prior to 1901, the land now called Hampden Park was part of the Ratton Estate owned by Lord Willingdon.
Ratton is mentioned in the Domesday survey of 1087, and for a long time the woodland and lake had been a decoy attracting wildfowl for the estate kitchens.
By the end of the 19th century the lake had probably fallen into disuse. Lord Willingdon agreed to sell 78 acres (320,000 m2) to Eastbourne Corporation on condition that a new main road, Kings Drive, was built from Eastbourne to Willingdon.
Hampden Park, named after Lord Willingdon’s grandfather, Viscount Hampden, was opened by Lord Rosebery on 12 August 1902, and was the first Corporation-owned park in Eastbourne.
Hampden Park itself is a large pleasant space with a fair sized lake. There is a park cafe called Lakeside Cafe, a children's playground, outdoor tennis courts, playing fields and plenty of routes for joggers and strollers, as well as a large area of sports fields.
Its main inhabitants are the grey squirrel, and several species inhabit the lake, notably mallard ducks, Canada geese, mute swans, moorhen, herons, gulls and rock pigeons.
In 2011 there was a large pond enhancement program carried out on the Decoy Pond. This was funded by Eastbourne Borough Council and a large grant obtained from the Lottery Fund by The Friends of the Hampden Park.
Ted Hinton
So what else happened on the day that the card was posted?
Well, the 5th. October 1904 marked the birth in Tulsa, Oklahoma of Ted Hinton.
Ted Cass Hinton was reared in Dallas, Texas, and became a Dallas County deputy sheriff, the youngest of the posse that ambushed and killed Bonnie and Clyde near Gibsland, Louisiana, on the 23rd. May 1934.
Hinton had become a Sheriff's Deputy in 1932 following the election of Dallas County Sheriff Richard A. "Smoot" Schmid. A baseball player, Hinton passed up a chance to join the Cleveland Indians because he did not want to spend time away from his wife and young son.
On the day of the ambush Hinton, then aged 29, was assigned by Schmid to accompany Deputy Sheriff Bob Alcorn because Hinton knew Clyde Barrow, and could identify him.
Ted Hinton was also formerly acquainted with young Bonnie Parker while she was working in Marco's Cafe in Dallas. Because of her good looks, many of the male customers would flirt with her. Hinton was always gentlemanly, and treated Bonnie with respect. Hinton admitted in a later biography that he had a crush on Bonnie, which made it difficult for him as one of the men on the team sent to kill her and her lover, Clyde.
Hinton and Alcorn were assigned by to assist Frank Hamer and his assistant Maney Gault in a shoot-to-kill order against Bonnie and Clyde.
The Ambush and Deaths of Bonnie and Clyde
By May 1934, Clyde Barrow had 16 warrants outstanding against him for multiple counts of robbery, auto theft, theft, escape, assault, and murder in four states. Hamer, who had begun tracking the gang in February, led the posse.
He had studied the gang's movements, and found that they swung in a circle skirting the edges of five mid-western states, exploiting the "state line" rule that prevented officers from pursuing a fugitive into another jurisdiction.
Barrow was consistent in his movements, so Hamer charted his path and predicted where he would go. The gang's itinerary centered on family visits, and they were due to see Methvin's family in Louisiana.
Unbeknownst to Hamer, Barrow had designated Methvin's parents' residence as a rendezvous in case they were separated. Methvin had become separated from the rest of the gang in Shreveport.
Hamer's posse was composed of six men: Texas officers Hamer, Hinton, Alcorn, and B.M. "Maney" Gault, and Louisiana officers Henderson Jordan and Prentiss Morel Oakley.
On the 21st. May, the four posse members from Texas were in Shreveport when they learned that Barrow and Parker were planning to visit Ivy Methvin in Bienville Parish that evening. The full posse set up an ambush along Louisiana State Highway 154 south of Gibsland.
Hinton recounted that the lawmen were in place by 9 pm, and waited through the whole of the next day (May 22nd.) with no sign of the perpetrators.
At approximately 9:15 am on May 23, the posse was still concealed in the bushes, and almost ready to give up when they heard a vehicle approaching at high speed. In their official report, they stated they had persuaded Methvin to position his truck on the shoulder of the road that morning.
They hoped that Clyde Barrow would stop to speak with him, putting his vehicle close to the posse's position in the bushes. The vehicle proved to be a Ford V8 with Barrow at the wheel, and he slowed down as hoped.
The six lawmen opened fire while the vehicle was still moving. Oakley fired first, probably before any order to do so. Barrow was shot in the head, and died instantly from Oakley's first shot, and Hinton reported hearing Parker scream.
The officers fired about 130 rounds, emptying each of their weapons into the car.
Bonnie and Clyde had survived several bullet wounds over the years in their confrontations with the law. However on this day any one of several of Bonnie and Clyde's wounds could have been the cause of death.
According to statements made by Hinton and Alcorn:
"Each of us six officers had a shotgun and an
automatic rifle and pistols. We opened fire with
the automatic rifles. They were emptied before
the car got even with us.
Then we used shotguns. There was smoke
coming from the car, and it looked like it was
on fire.
After shooting the shotguns, we emptied the
pistols at the car, which had passed us and ran
into a ditch about 50 yards on down the road.
It almost turned over.
We kept shooting at the car even after it
stopped. We weren't taking any chances."
The noise was literally deafening - all of the posse temporarily lost their hearing.
Film footage taken by one of the deputies immediately after the ambush shows 112 bullet holes in the vehicle, of which around one quarter struck the couple.
The official report by parish coroner J. L. Wade listed 17 entrance wounds on Barrow's body and 26 on that of Parker, including several headshots to each, and one that had severed Barrow's spinal column.
Undertaker C. F. "Boots" Bailey had difficulty embalming the bodies because of all the bullet holes.
The deafened officers inspected the vehicle, and discovered an arsenal, including stolen automatic rifles, sawed-off semi-automatic shotguns, assorted handguns, and several thousand rounds of ammunition, along with fifteen sets of license plates from various states. Hamer stated:
"I hate to bust the cap on a woman,
especially when she was sitting down,
however if it wouldn't have been her,
it would have been us."
Word of the deaths quickly spread when Hamer, Jordan, Oakley, and Hinton drove into town to telephone their bosses. A crowd soon gathered at the spot. Gault and Alcorn were left to guard the bodies, but they lost control of the jostling, curious throng; one woman cut off bloody locks of Parker's hair and pieces from her dress, which were subsequently sold as souvenirs.
Hinton returned to find a man trying to cut off Barrow's trigger finger, and was sickened by what was occurring. Arriving at the scene, the coroner reported:
"Nearly everyone had begun collecting souvenirs
such as shell casings, slivers of glass from the
shattered car windows, and bloody pieces of
clothing from the garments of Bonnie and Clyde.
One eager man had opened his pocket knife,
and was reaching into the car to cut off Clyde's
left ear."
Hinton enlisted Hamer's help in controlling the "circus-like atmosphere" and they eventually got people away from the car.
The posse towed the Ford, with the dead bodies still inside, to the Conger Furniture Store & Funeral Parlor in downtown Arcadia, Louisiana.
Preliminary embalming was done by Bailey in a small preparation room in the back of the furniture store, as it was common for furniture stores and undertakers to share the same space.
Henry Barrow identified his son's body, then sat weeping in a rocking chair in the furniture section.
The population of the northwest Louisiana town reportedly swelled from 2,000 to 12,000 within hours. Curious throngs arrived by train, horseback, buggy, and plane. Beer normally sold for 15 cents a bottle but it jumped to 25 cents, and sandwiches quickly sold out.
H. D. Darby was an undertaker at the McClure Funeral Parlor, and Sophia Stone was a home demonstration agent, both from nearby Ruston. Both of them came to Arcadia to identify the bodies because the Barrow gang had kidnapped them in 1933.
Parker reportedly had laughed when she discovered that Darby was an undertaker. She remarked that maybe someday he would be working on her; Darby did in fact assist Bailey in the embalming.
Controversy
Hinton wrote a book called Ambush in 1977, which was published in 1979, two years after his death, in which he maintained that Ivy T. Methvin was forced to lure Bonnie and Clyde into the ambush site by Frank Hamer.
The original story was that Methvin had agreed to plot the ambush if his son Henry Methvin received a pardon. Hinton claimed that a deal was reached by the members of the Posse whereby the last surviving member would tell this version of events after all others had died. This member happened to be Hinton. His version of events is however disputed.
Aftermath
Hinton remained a deputy sheriff until 1941. An accomplished pilot, he gave flying instructions to new recruits in the Army Air Corps just prior to World War II. Hinton subsequently owned a motel, trucking company and restaurant.
Hinton and his wife had at least one child, former Dallas County Deputy Linton Jay "Boots" Hinton (January 1, 1934 – December 5, 2016), who had since 2004 operated the Bonnie and Clyde Ambush Museum in Gibsland, Louisiana. He also served as a Specialist 3 for the United States Army during the Korean War.
The Death of Ted Hinton
Ted Hinton died on the 27th. October 1977 at the age of 73 in Dallas. He was laid to rest with his wife at the Sparkman-Hillcrest Memorial Park Cemetery in Dallas.