from the old sixgunner.com files

We tend to admire them- the Man Killers. Not because they possess the quality of Nobility but because they Might possess it. Not because they are heroes-they have all the stuff of heroes but rarely live up to the role in the cold light of day. They Might turn their propensity toward mayhem to noble purpose -in the Real World- the Here and Now they seldom do. Nevertheless, they become the stuff of legend at short remove and, in the fullness of time, take on legendary stature. So it was, and still is, with Great Uncle Frank Cumpston.

On one of his fairly rare visits to the Frank Cumpston farm, my father watched Frank shoot the head off the dinner chicken with consummate ease. Aunt Gertrude had announced chicken for supper where-upon Frank snatched his thumb-buster off the table and handily decapitated one of the pullets in the yard.

I first heard about him at an early age- I didn’t learn about the " drinking uncle" for years to come, but the "shootin’ uncle played a major part in dinner table discussion. When I finally met him, he was well past his shooting days-hands crabbed up with the rheumatoid arthritis that runs in the family. He disapproved of me mightily. I was thirteen years old – a " bad age" and, "too heavy on his feet-not good for a boy to be ‘too heavy on his feet.’"

As we left the Texaco Station, my dad remarked that Uncle Frank had a bit of a different viewpoint of things. " Uncle Frank has killed a lot of men. Nobody is sure quite how many but there have been quite a few." He went on to explain that Uncle Frank was as generous as the day is long but did not well tolerate any perceived slight and, in his youth , had been very quick on the shoot.

He was a source of mixed family pride even though grandfather Fredrick Bernard Cumpston ‘ carried a pistol for him" for several years- a period of time when each was careful to move to opposite sides of the street when they encountered each other in the small town of Blooming Grove, Texas. One time, he had checked a prisoner out of the Corsicana County Jail to help dig a well on the farm. The prisoner returned to the county seat in a dead condition with a number of bullet wounds proceeding from top to bottom as if an impolite discussion had begun when the Ward of Navarro County was nearing the completion of his assigned task. This event went far toward recommending Uncle Frank to the City Fathers of Blooming Grove, Texas when it seemed prudent to appoint a town constable.

It was 192?. Prohibition was in full bloom with the result, predictable to all with any semblance of rational thought, that crime was rife in the land. The jails were full, the deacons were sitting in the Amen Section of a Sunday and waddling down the street with the Bullhead Clap on Monday afternoon. The punks from Corsicana were racing down main street with owl heads in their back pockets and blood in their eyes. It was a scene without president in Sinclair Lewis’ America and something had to be done. The council met with the agenda of bringing law and order to the community. The chief order of business was the promotion of Frank Cumpston to the position of town constable with the fore-gone conclusion that he would be elected upon approval. It was this occasion that made Grandaddy Fred a pistol packer. He told the council that they knew full well that Frank was a hot-blooded killer and the only reason they were appointing him was to get somebody shot.

This did nothing to prevent Frank’s appointment but it did cause him to remark that he would shoot his brother Fred at the first opportunity. A local judge advised Fred to "Arm and Inquire" and to shoot Frank at the first opportunity-him having made a serious threat and any subsequent events to be considered ‘ paid for" under the common law. The practical outcome of this was an armed truce that lasted for many years and a strain on family relations that lasted forever after.

In the fullness of time, Constable Cumpston did manage to fulfill the prophecy Fredrick set forth in that council meeting. A gaggle of punks from Corsicana sped into Blooming Grove one night and, seeing Frank on the board- walk screeched to a halt with the driver saying, " Hey, lets go take that old man’s pistol away from him." When the driver stepped down from the A-Model Ford, Frank centered a round on his chest and dropped him to the street. The sequence of events to this moment would have gone un-remarked except that Frank, perceiving that his potential tormentor was still alive, proceeded to empty the revolver into him. This earned Frank five years in the State Penitentiary at Huntsville, Texas where, as a law enforcement officer, he was set to work in the front guard station in charge of admitting and releasing prisoners.

In later years Frank continued to display the shootist mentality. On one occasion, he returned to the farm to find a gentleman of the African American Persuasion busily rifling the homestead. Frank took up a position in the barn and the two of them began exchanging shots hammer and tong and were having a wonderful time until the Law showed up and made them stop.

Last month, I was contacted by a cousin, still residing in Blooming Grove, Navarro County Texas. He invited me to the Campbell Family Web Site in hopes that I would be able to contribute some data to the family genealogy. I learned that the Legend of Shooting Uncle Frank continues to this day. This cousin owns a Bread and Breakfast establishment in the town and local legend has it that it is haunted by the unquiet spirit of a man killed by Uncle Frank in the hay day of his law enforcement career.

Marc Anthony had it right. " The good men do go down to the grave with them while the evil lives on." In the realm of the shootist, the legacy often becomes legend and time redeems a memory of the singularity of their natures that might not have been apparent or appreciated by their contemporaries.

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Ele era velho.
Ele era corajoso.
Ele era feio.