Bonnie and Clyde heist in Ponchatoula
If this crime was perpetrated by another couple, who were they?
Last week, my wife and I visited the “Bonnie and Clyde Ambush Museum” in Gibsland, Louisiana. The place leans into the gore and sensationalism of their murder more that I like. Afterall, the police officers who killed the couple acted as judge, jury, and executioners. In Louisiana, that’s against the law.
That said, the visit reminded me of this incident…
ON SEPTEMBER 1, 1932, two bandits with shotguns forced W. E. Mount, president of the Merchants & Farmers Bank of Ponchatoula, into his car along with his two daughters. Ruby and Clarabelle were eleven and twelve years old.
What followed was a running gunfight past Springfield, a roadblock of three hundred armed citizens and deputies, and four days of searching through Livingston Parish swamp. The kidnappers were never caught.
Mount told the sheriff his captors were two young men. Several people near the roadblock said otherwise. They insisted the driver of the green sedan was a woman.
One witness, Springfield…
