Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire I just watched The Highwaymen

My grandparents had land and a farm. They had just sold their crops and put the money in the bank($300). Day or so later the banks closed , they lost the money and couldn't pay the morgage, lost their land. For the next fifteen years they were sharecroppers. They hated banks for the rest of their lives.

Book, Texas Ranger. All about Frank. Been quite a while since I read it and don't remember a lot. Movie was probably based on the book?

Saw an M-1 carbine in the mix at the end. I don't think they were produced in 1934.

Go Back and look ok again. Bet is was a 1907 Win. Self loading rifle.

It was pretty good. They overplayed the “old man” thing. Hamer was just a month or two past 50 when they got Bonnie and Clyde. He wasn’t really retired either. He and bunch of others had quit the Rangers fairly recently in protest of Ma Ferguson.

Go to the dead cops in Grapevine scene. Look at those metal fence posts and how tight that fence was. I’m pretty sure those posts would have been locust or bois d’arc in 1933 and that fence wouldn’t been that tight. And of course, there was the standard movie trope where Bonnie racked the action on a Remington Model 11.

If you were in your 50's in the 1930's you were an old man.

Any place you can see it besides Netflix???

Col Askins house is now HQ for the San Antonio Geneological and Historical Society. Before they got it, it was briefly used as a church.

The Colonel's son, Bill, lives in San Antonio, sells real estate and airplanes. He has an impressive estate in the North SA area and didn't need his Dad's house. It was too much house for his sister, so they sold it.

The Col. bought it, didn't build it. Back then is was in a relatively rural area, they rode ther horses around the neighborhood. It's no longer rural...


https://txsaghs.org/about.php

DF

Except that he was in his 40s for most of the time covered in the movie.

there is one place in Arizona showing it in a theater. "limited release"

The story Gault told about killing 54 Mexican Bandits in one night near Candelaria seems entirely made up. I’m surprised that Hamer’s Son didn’t object to it being in the script. The “ Manos Arribas “ ( hands up ) command being given AFTER shooting the bad guys is part of Ranger lore and has been attributed to different events.

It is still a well done movie in my opinion.

I'll take your word for it.

Nope it’s true. It was part of “The Plan of San Diego” which was sort of a Mexican rebel/bandito insurgency to take back the Southwest during WW I. The town and the fight were actually in Mexico.

Yep and Frank had a Remington Model 8



This shows a lot of the guns.


IMFDB Movie Gun Data Base

I enjoyed the movie and take it for what it is, entertainment. I have read quite a bit about Texas and the struggles it went through to become a state. There was no end to the riff raff, bandits, thieves, murders, racial injustice, lynching's, raiding and killing Comanche hostiles and corrupt politicians. Often, the only way one survived it all was by shooting their way to safety.

I don't doubt for a second that some Texas Rangers in those days, bent, broke and ignored the law and that some were corrupt. For sure, by todays standards many would of went to jail for their actions. I also believe that for several reasons Texas was unique in many ways, as it was often fighting against Mexican bandits, Comanche Indians, who were terrifying to go up against in battle and feared by other Indians and the endless stream of desperados coming in from the states thinking they could hide out in Texas and continue their evil ways.

There is a book about Frank Hammer written by John Bossenecker that gives a much bigger picture of who the man was and what he did in his career as a Texas Ranger. He started off with the Rangers when they wore cowboy hats and rode horses and served through the transition years from horse back to automobiles and suits and ties and had very little support when confronted with dangerous situations. Unfortunately, we may never see a movie portraying what he went through in real life. He was involved in so much more then Bonnie and Clyde and I personally don't blame him one bit for not always exposing him self and others to further risk by saying, "hands up", or what ever when the response was going to be incoming fire.

One thing is for sure, he was not the least bit shy about confronting rough men with a slap along side of the head or pressing a trigger. His sweet little wife was also not afraid to drop the trigger on her little pistol and shot her first husband and shot at bad guys trying to shoot Frank. They were a good match for each other. I believe he was in over 50 gunfights and wounded many times. Was he a man killer, absolutely and good at it. Did all of them need killing, I doubt any of us will ever know as we were not there and the truth fades with time and the blood long ago disappeared into the Texas dirt.

Of this I am sure, had I been a Texas Ranger at the same time he was I would of wanted him as my partner. He was one to "Ride the River" with!

I thought that was a USA Cavalry engagement. Was Hamer involved ?

In the Boessenecker book, I think the number killed in the described incident was six, not fifty-four. This is from memory as I haven't read the book in several years.

Saw the car when I was a kid. They had it at the County Fair and you payed $.50 cents to look at it. I’d just seen the movie with Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway, and I was impressed!

I can't say that Hamer never shot up 54 sleeping Banditos near Candelaria but the story in the movie did ring a bell - especially the "manos arriba" part.

I read this biography of Hamer a couple years ago: https://www.tbr.txstate.edu/archives/fall-2016/texas-ranger.html

Go to the web site and you'll see a description of an entirely different story with Hamer saying "manos arriba". The Mexicans were bootleggers and they were fully awake. And it was 6 dead - not 54.