January 22, 2012 - 16:42 AMT
Bonnie and Clyde guns auctioned for $210,000

Two guns believed seized from gangsters Bonnie and Clyde in 1933 after a deadlyMissouri shootout with police sold for a combined $210,000 at an auction on Saturday, January 21, in Kansas City to an unnamed online bidder.

The bidder paid $130,000 for a .45-caliber Thompson submachine gun, known as a "Tommy gun" in gangster slang. The same bidder paid $80,000 for an 1897 12-gauge Winchester shotgun.

The guns were seized after a police shootout with Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow in Joplin,Missouri, on April 13, 1933. Police raided an apartment where the couple was hiding out. Bonnieand Clyde escaped, but two officers died in the shootout.

A police officer later gave the weapons to Mark Lairmore, a Tulsa police officer, and they remained in the Lairmore family, according to a Mayo account of the guns' history. A great-grandson of Lairmore, also named Mark Lairmore, said the family no longer saw a need for the guns, which had been in a police museum in Springfield, Missouri, from 1973 until late last year,Reuters reported.

Bonnie Elizabeth Parker (October 1, 1910 – May 23, 1934) and Clyde Chestnut Barrow (March24, 1909 – May 23, 1934) were well-known outlaws, robbers, and criminals who traveled theCentral United States with their gang during the Great Depression. Their exploits capturedthe attention of the American public during the "public enemy era" between 1931 and 1934.Though known today for his dozen-or-so bank robberies, Barrow in fact preferred to rob smallstores or rural gas stations. The gang is believed to have killed at least nine police officers andcommitted several civilian murders. The couple themselves were eventually ambushed and killedin Louisiana by law officers. Their reputation was cemented in American pop folklore by ArthurPenn's 1967 film Bonnie and Clyde.