Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters So...how bout Charles Askins, Jr.?

A different time, but killing people for fun wasn't part of the equation 100 years ago. Or any other time unless you're a sicko.

As for his claims, I haven't read his books, so I don't know that he didn't, so I can't answer yes or no. I have read what others say who have read his books and his lust to kill, which is so universally noted by those people, it can't be discounted. I don't think he himself discounted it, in fact. This wasn't back in the Dark Ages or during the reign of Vlad the Impaler, it was 60 or so years ago. So the "different time" thing just doesn't have any weight.

Perhaps the saddest thing is he apparently WAS unrepentant, which pretty much insured his place in hell.

I'm surprised that anyone would defend this guy in the face of all those who knew him who called him an asswipe. Apparently the ability to write a paragraph gives immunity from criticism.

Good post, Gene.

I am more surprised that you continue to post something as a fact that you admit that you in fact do not know if it is true or not. Now that is ass wipe stuff, righ there

I haven't continued to post any falsehood as a fact. It was reported here, by a man who has been in those circles where this rumor was widely believed by folks who knew Atkins. (We're talking about killing the parents of the baby, and the baby). He, himself said he killed 27 men and someone said he didn't count Mexicans on this number hereported he enjoyed it, sought it out for the pleasure of killing humans. He reported every thing alleged in this post except the baby (and possibly its parents.) So, say we don't put them in the talley. That's still a lot of death on his hands. I never read in any of his articles where he actually shot one when he was in fear of his life.

Where is that posted, Gene


Here ya go I'll make it easy for you

There's a big difference between rumor and admitted/confessed fact. Putting credence in rumors is sewing farts to a moonbeam.

Historically, gunmen of the old West didn't kill all that many people. For example, historians agree that Hickok probably killed half a dozen men, Billy the Kid perhaps 8 or 10, and Bill Langley probably fewer than 5, despite the wild claims of dozens of corpses littering the landscape at the hands of these men. The rumors of murders done were rooted in the fanciful dime novels of the day, and propagated by envious souls who had nothing better to do than tell tall tales. Langley was hanged, and both Hickok and William Bonney were shot to death. Most gunmen died violent deaths, of course.

Langley is known to have had numerous bad actors roaming Texas claiming to be him, and his "rumored" tally of murders was inflated three or four times higher than the actual number of murders he committed. Such imposture is thought to have inflated the death tally of other gunmen, too, including Wes Hardin.

It is entirely possible that Wyatt Earp committed vengeance killings after his brothers were shot in Tombstone, but the killings he admitted to were all within the loose limits of his authority as a lawman. Rumors, schmumors.

It is worth noting that like Askins Jr, the most prolific murderer of the American West, John Wesley Hardin, confessed to the killings of 40-odd men. Some folks scoff at that number, but at least one of his biographers, a noted Western scholar whose name escapes me at the moment, believes the number was actually higher than his 42 or 43 claimed kills. Hardin was not a sworn peace officer, but his role in the Taylor-Sutton war/feud was arguably as righteous and as lawful as the killings committed by the Sutton Regulators... the difference between outlaw and lawman in Reconstruction Texas was largely a matter of who your allegiance was to. In other words, there were some great similarities between Askins and Hardin.

Hardin admitted to his homicidal tally, as did Askins. Hardin believed in taking every advantage in a gunfight, including back-shooting and ambush, as did Askins.

Wyatt Earp never admitted to those things. I'm not saying he was as pure as the driven snow, but I think it's hard to say he was in the same class of killer as Charlie Askins Jr. Hardin was, but not Earp.

I'd say that Wyatt Earp was little different than Charlie or any number of the old gun fighters


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wyatt_Earp#Cowboy_revenge

How does making Wyatt Earp look bad make Charles Askins look better?

First off I didn't make Wyatt look bad. Facts are factas and history is history.
Not trying to make Charlie lokk good or bad, but the old days were vastly different than today and Charlie wasn't much differrent than many of the old timers

Earp hunting down his brothers' shooters is far different from what is described to have been done by Col Askins.

"Eye for an eye" vs. killing for pleaseure AND bragging about it place the two men in completely different catagories IMHO.

Askins sounds like a serial killer that had a badge.

How do you know that Earp didn't enjoy the revenge murder?

There was about 80 years difference in Wyatt Earp's time than in Charles Askins time. Second, so far as is known, Earp didn't kill people for pleasure. Revenge, maybe, after his brother was killed and another was crippled, but not for sport.

Charlie wasn't much different from Jeff Dahmer, for that matter. It's a matter of what's acceptable in the view of history that's important. Wyatt Earp passed the test, Charles Askins apparently has not.

Killing people for sport has never been widely acceptable in a relatively civilized society.

Niether Earp nor Askins were ever convicted of murder or manslaughter. Dahmer was a canibla Askins was not, bad comparison. I am not sure were you get the Killing Men for sport.
I am not defending Askins, but let's not assume what we do not know

Article By Ayoob

On another night, Askins used the Remington autoloading shotgun, loaded with the 00 buckshot he called "blue whistlers." He recounted:

"They came out of the shadows and, as it was brightest moonlight, I could see every manjack had a long gun in his hands. We let them get up to within nine paces of us and I fired the first shot.

"I had the old Remington with its 9shot magazine and I knocked down the first two rannies in as many shots. I then switched my attention to the other three who did not like the heat. They ran back into Mexico, a distance of about 60 yards and opened fire.

"An interesting facet of this little exchange was that the lobo in the lead had an old Smith & Wesson .44 Russian. Despite the fact that he had a load of my 00 buckshot through his middle and one of the boys had hit him spang on the breastbone with a .351 slug, he dropped to his knees behind a cottonwood sapling and kept right on shooting.

"The .44 Russian is a single-action and this bravo had to thumb the hammer back for each shot. He got off three rounds before a second charge of my buckshot ended his career,

"Quite as interesting, really, was the second gunman who had a Westley Richards 10 gauge loaded with Winchester High Speed #5 shot. We had killed him before he could touch off either barrel. A most happy circumstance since the distance between both parties was only nine steps. I have the Westley Richards today, a memento of lively times long past." [2]

Today, Johnnie Cochran would be hired by the families of the deceased to sue Charlie and the whole Border Patrol for opening fire on the heavily armed gang without warning. Yet doing as they did undoubtedly saved multiple Patrolmen from being killed or maimed. As the saying goes, "Things were different then."

Isn't that precisely what you've been doing?

Being GUILTY and being convicted are two different things. Ask OJ.

Agree with Gene's previous post 100%. The degree of crime since Roman law has often hinged on motivation. Revenge, while not a Christian ideal, is completely different from pleasure or killing indiscriminately. Thus killing in War is different than murder although the actual act may have been the same - killing.

the person who plays fair in a gun fight more often than not ends up dead

Ayoob Article

Weapon Retention

Weapon retention is the art and science of retaining control of your firearm when a criminal tries to disarm you and turn your firearm against you. Plan A is to execute a technique and peel the offender off the gun. If that can't be achieved, Plan B is to shoot him.

There wasn't much in the way of gun retention techniques in Charlie's time, and Plan B was his Plan A. He made it work more than once. He recounted the following in our American Handgunner Annual in 1988:

"I got to my feet and made a run at this coyote and just as I reached him, I tripped and fell down. This bastardo, as quick as a cat , grabbed my gun, which I had drawn, and standing over me commenced to tussle enthusiastically to get it away.

"I had no illusions as to what he'd do if he succeeded. He had thoughtfully wrapped his hands around the cylinder and while I had my finger on the trigger I could not fire the weapon because he would not permit the cylinder to turn.

"Very energetically I rolled up on my shoulders and kicked this sonofabitch in the belly. It broke him loose from my pistol. He wasted no time. He ran for the river which was only 30 steps away. I saw him very clearly against all the lights of Juarez and I let him run until he was in the Old Rio Grande up to his knees.

"I held the gold bead front sight in the white-outlined rear notch and put the gold right in his back just at the belt line. On the shot he pitched forward as though spanked with a baseball bat.

"Three days later the BP Chief told me, 'They dragged a dead Mex out of the river of the Socorro Headgates yesterday. The U.S. Consul in Juarez told me.' I didn't say anything. I wasn't any too proud of the fact that I had stumbled and the wetback had almost killed me with my own gun. (A customized Colt New Service .44-40.)"

Allowing the opportunity to get shoot is not at all good

Ayoob Article




If Askins killed only for please, then why was his last in 1957?