Henry D. Humphrey was a well-liked honest fellow who did repairs and odd jobs
at the local high school and farmed with a team of mules. He was fifty-one when
he became a lawman.
He had been urged to run for town marshal of Alma by some local businessmen and
was elected to a term beginning on May 1, 1933. He kept his day job because the
town marshal in a town of eight hundred was primarily a night watchman and because
the job paid only fifteen dollars a month.
Just before two o'clock on Thursday morning, June 22, two men captured Marshal
Humphrey while he was making his rounds in downtown Alma. They took his pistol
and flashlight and bound him with baling wire.They then broke into the Commercial
Bank building by way of a back window, laid the marshal on the floor, and went
to work on the four-thousand pound safe containing thirty-six hundred dollars.
At the time of the robbery, no one knew the Barrows were in the area. When their
presence became known three days later, some townspeople speculated that the gang
might have robbed the bank. Walter Patton Jr, a long-time Alma resident and Marshal
Humphrey's nephew, says that the safe was eventually recovered from Hollis Lake
southwest of Van Buren.
His father, who worked for the bank, was called in to open it. All the money was
still inside, and the safe was put back in service. To this day no one knows who
robbed the bank that Thursday morning. Before the day was over, however, the town
of Alma had ordered for Marshal Humphrey, a steel bulletproof vest. It was to be
delivered in about a week and would protect against pistol rounds and shotgun
pellets. It would come too late.
Buck Barrow and W.D. Jones left the Dennis Tourist Camp in the Ford sedan sometime
before noon on Friday, June 23. There were two reasons for the trip. First, they
were almost broke. Bonnie's care, medicine, and their room and board for the last
nine days had taken almost all their cash.
Bonnie's burns (from the Wellington car wreck) were far from healed, and Clyde
did not like to leave her, so the job of raising some money fell to Buck and W.D.
About 5:30 P.M. Buck let W.D. off in front of their chosen target, the Brown
Grocery at 111 West Lafayette, and drove around the block to the Mt. Nord area to
wait. Jones netted twenty dollars from the register, and thirty-five cents from the
bag boy. He stole the delivery truck, which he had to start by pushing it down the
hill, and drove around the block to meet Buck.
They were last seen in the Ford sedan driving south on U.S. 71 at a high rate
of speed. The Fayetteville police placed calls to surrounding communities, including
Alma, since it was at the intersection of U.S. 71 and U.S. 64. If the bandits stayed
on U.S. 71, they would pass through the town. The call to town reached Marshal Humphrey
at the AHC service station run by his son Vernon. He was given the license number and
asked to look for the getaway car last seen headed his way.
Vernon Humphrey would have gone with his father, but he could not leave the station
unattended. Ansel M "Red" Salyers offered to drive Marshal Humphrey in his maroon Ford
four-door. Red worked for the electric company but was also a Crawford County deputy
sheriff.
The Marshal was carrying a Smith & Wesson .38 revolver which belonged to his
brother-in-law, Walter Patton. He had borrowed the pistol because the bank robbers
had taken his city of Alma weapon. Saylors carried a Winchester 30-30 he had taken
in trade for a man's electric bill. It was about 6:20 P.M. when the two men left the
AHC in Salyer's car.
Buck Barrow had driven the dangerous curves of U.S. 71 between Fayetteville and Alma
in about fifty-five minutes. At 6:25 P.M. he passed Salyer's car. He would have had a
clear road back to the Dennis Motel had it not been for the slower-moving blue Chevy
that had just disappeared over the crest of the hill ahead. By the time Buck saw the
car, it was too late.
Driving with all the windows down on that 102-degree day, Salyers and Humphrey
easily heard the crash when Buck rear-ended Wilson's car. As soon as they could,
they turned around and rushed back to the scene. As they approached, Marshal Humphrey
saw the license plate (1933 Indiana 225-646) and told Salyers that it was the one
they were after.
Wilson had just managed to crawl out of his wrecked car when the officers' car
drove up and turned to block the road. Buck picked up Clyde's sawed-off shotgun,
and W.D. took a BAR (Browning Automatic Rifle), a .30 caliber machine gun-Clyde's
automatic weapon of choice. When Wilson saw the two armed men, he wisely ran away
into the cane field next to the road.
Whether Marshal Humphrey shouted a challenge is not certain, but as soon as he
appeared out the right-handed door, Buck shot him full in the chest with buckshot,
blowing him into a ditch by the side of the road. Salyers, who was somewhat shielded
by the car, was left with his Winchester to face the pair alone. After a few seconds,
there was a break in the bandits' fire.
Buck's shotgun had jammed or was empty, and he was in the process of throwing it back
in the car and getting his own Winchester Model 1912 16-gauge pump. Knowing they would
kill him if he stayed, Salyers ran toward a house over one hundred yards to the west.
W.D. could not hit the running man, but managed to put bullets into and through the
house itself, into the barn beyond the house, and even into a strawberry field several
hundred yards away, where Walter Collum was working.
Salyers reached the safety of the house's rock chimney and began to reload his
rifle's 7-round magazine. Meanwhile, Buck and W.D. ran for the lawman's car, since
it was the only one that would still run. One of the gunmen went to the wounded
marshal and took his pistol, while the other got in and started the car.
Salyers resumed shooting from the house. In spite of hits from the deputy's rifle,
W.D. and Buck drove back north up U.S. 71, fireing at a passing motorist, B.C. Ames
of Fort Smith, on the way. By Monday morning, the 26th, the press had the story.
The morning "Southwest American" ran the headline, "The Barrow Boys Shot Marshal".
By the afternoon deadline, the "Fort Smith Times Record", had pictures of Buck,
Clyde, and Bonnie. They also had another scoop. Now it was murder. Marshal Henry
D. Humphrey died at 10:15 that morning.
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