Back in the 80s I went to a boat ramp ... I was driving truck w/ boat trailer, dad was bringing the boat to meet me. Only rig there so I parked on the ramp, then walked up the shore throwing rocks 'n' stuff. A truck pulled up and parked. No trailer so I didn't go back to move out of the way. There's a pile of heaped cobbles ... basketball sized rocks ... in the center of the parking lot making it a sort of circle drive. I was a third of the way around, them a little closer to our truck than I was. 3 guys got out. They came toward that "island" of rock ... one went on each side (thus one of them clearly cut me off from our truck) and one right over the top. I wasn't looking right at them, just keeping an eye out. When they got to about 15 yards, I reached down and pulled the S&W .357 which was shoved cross-draw in my belt out, thumbed the hammer back, and started as if I was drawing a bead on a sea gull. They swapped ends and went back to their truck. That 8-3/4" barrel looks mean. (It is.) Before I could walk back to the truck, dad motored down with the boat. As he was lining up on the trailer they headed for him. He jumped over the side onto the ramp with the anchor rope in his hands and his S&W K frame swung out into view. They turned around and went back toward their truck. As they passed about 30 feet away from me I heard one of them say "that mother f**ker has a gun. all these mother f**kers have guns. What are we going to do?" They got in the truck, sat there a couple minutes and I kept an eye on them as we tied our boat down to the trailer, then they drove away.
I always wondered what would have happened to me minus that gun, or to dad if I hadn't been there and he hadn't been armed himself. Beating? Robbery? Murder?
Made a believer out of me.
Tom
Great incident report after so many years.
