Most cops, and many armed citizens, remember the 1963 incident in Los Angeles involving Officers Campbell and Hettinger. Two scumbags got the drop on one of these plainclothesmen, and ordered the other to surrender his weapon or they’d kill his partner. The second officer complied. The two were kidnapped and driven to a rural area. Campbell was murdered there; Hettinger managed to run away and escape, but suffered the psychological tortures of the damned over the incident. It was memorialized in Joseph Wambaugh’s best non-fiction book, “The Onion Field,” named for the spot where the killing took place. The incident inspired a widespread rule in law enforcement: never give up your gun.
A similar incident occurred the following year in Gwinnett County, Georgia that resulted in three times the death toll but apparently never became national news. On a back road called Arc Road a gang of chop-shopping car thieves collided with three local lawmen. One of the thugs was an ex-cop turned bad. The chain of events went like dominoes, with each officer in turn giving up his service revolver at gunpoint to prevent the others from being murdered. It was to no avail: the cops were manacled with their own handcuffs and cold-bloodedly executed.
Read “Arc Road” by Tony Tiffin, who meticulously researched the triple cop-killing for years. One of the lessons that came out of the Onion Field and was reinforced by the atrocity in Gwinnett County was the value of a hidden backup weapon. Most officer survival experts agree that in the California case, there would have been ample opportunity to turn the tables on the two kidnappers if either officer had been armed with a second weapon; sadly, neither were. In the Georgia case, only one of the three murder victims had a backup gun, but it was a single-shot .22 derringer he had unloaded earlier in the evening to show a brother officer and he had neglected to reload it.
Today, a majority of police departments allow and encourage their field personnel to carry a second weapon securely concealed on their person, and some even issue the backup gun and require its wear on duty. Order “Arc Road” – and for that matter, “The Onion Field” – from Amazon. Back in the Seventies when I was feature editor for Indiana Trooper magazine I interviewed the state policemen who had survived a similar incident. The perp snatched the .357 from the holster of one trooper, held him hostage, and convinced the second to give up his gun or he’d murder the first. The second trooper acquiesced. A third trooper arrived, and had a Smith & Wesson Model 60 .38 snubnose in his hip pocket. In the shooting that followed, one of the hostage troopers was wounded in the arm but the third trooper shot down the would-be cop-killer with the backup gun. Altogether, a much better outcome.
Ralph Davis, Jerry Everett, and Jesse Gravitt were the men who died helpless and handcuffed in the dirt of Arc Road. Let their sacrifice be a lesson to all who go in harm’s way.
I’m always suprised how little anyone advocates a back up gun.
Outdoorsmen have a saying ‘One is none, two is one’.
In other words anything can break. Never have one of something you are betting your iife on. I wouldn’t dream of hiking carrying just one flashlight.
In the British police we had a cunning plan for an unarmed force tackling gunmen: dying.
Least we knew when we died the reaction would be massive.
We had 3 london police killed in 1966 by Harry Roberts. An unheard of and unrepeated event. I was in the police in the 80s and the older cops told me what it was like.
The London police went berserk. This was when the police was riddled with corruption. Senior officers were going on holiday with gangsters. There was a detective in every station who would release prisoners on demand.
All that instantly vanished. The same gangsters who thought of coppers as their friends, were being bounced around the cells nightly and asked ‘Where’s Harry Roberts?”
When they said they didn’t know, they were told they had better find out, because they weren’t going to survive many more nights like this.
Complaints simply threw away everything they received and the government never lifted a finger. They knew if they did; the entire forces resignations would be on the desk the next day.
Eventually they found him. He’d had the sense to realise no one would shelter him and camped in the woods. But there is very little of that in London.
Never ever give up!
Agreed, no place in America for political violence.
Because we have free speech (yeah…right)
Well, there’s still the elections(yeah…right)
And if the elections fail, we can protest the integrity of an election (yeah…right)
And the courts still work (yeah…right)
And an independent press that does investigative journalism (yeah…right)
We can still pray, even during flu season (yeah…right)
…well, there’s still that other thing…what was it? Can’t remember it but I think it rhymes with ‘the suck-wind amendment’. No wonder they keep going after that too.
Painfully sad. I remember each case and the seemingly senselessness of each. We all need to be reminded from time to time. Ditto carrying 24/12 even in our home. Thank you
May God rest their souls, and may the police officers of today learn from their sacrifices.
I am sometimes asked (by family or friends who ALREADY know I carry) why I carry a backup gun.
I tell them, first if I’m going to go armed I might as well be WELL-prepared for “other” contingencies ~ once you’re carrying, go all in!
But for examples, I usually start with these reasons:
~ I may be in a situation that I can more surreptitiously pull from an ankle than the more obvious hip-reach ~ such as at a cafe table.
~ A situation may arise that I need to hand off a gun to an UNarmed companion, such as my wife or friend who doesn’t have a CCW to allow “vacation travel”.
~ A “NY reload” may be faster than clearing a bad malfunction if my primary fails (or less likely, run out of ammo)
~ I could have the primary firearm knocked away or otherwise lost in a hands-on
~~ and ask how many more reasons they might need.
And if they say they “just can’t imagine…”, then I suggest they read the stories and work on their Recognition (not imagination” of the Reality.
My brother lives in a small resort town and he says he wouldn’t want to “live like that” with all that riff-raff. I point out to hime that the people in the crime stories hears on the local news “from the Big Cities” also “drive to visit in HIS quaint little town.”
Be as prepared as you CAN be, and stay vigilant.
It’s not just a lesson for law enforcement. If a BG disarms you, ties you up, or takes you to a secondary crime scene, it won’t be to your benefit.
Knew a man who was working as an ADA doing murder prosecutions in Detroit. He said that when he started carrying 3 guns, he knew it was time to find another line of work.
Mas, did they ever arrest the perps who killed these officers ? If the did, I expect they got the chair in GA at that time !
They were arrested and suitably punished.
During my career as a deputy sheriff, in addition to an ankle gun I carried a ”back-up back-up” gun in the pocket with the armor plate for my bullet resistant vest. One is none, two are one, three are one with a back-up! And I often carry one of my guns all the time at home on my isolated ranch. I started doing that when my children were young and their friends were always over playing at the ranch. It gave me ready access to a gun without having to do get one from a locked location, and I did not find it uncomfortable to wear all the time- after all it was so much easier than wearing all my equipment at work! The kids all learned to respect weapons. I started the kids out with BB guns but required the same gun safety rules as with the “real” guns that many of them later learned to use.
What I’ve noticed recently in the social media world is this trend to not only discourage backup guns, but alot of discouragement against extra ammunition lately. I know the social media EDC trends are mostly minimalist, but i think a second firearm is good, as is an extra magazine. I view a secondary handgun as basically just an extra magazine, but with a gun wrapped around it. A second gun seems much much more valuable than an extra magazine, so I prioritize the second gun over the ammo as i strap on my gear for the day. I also advocate for a large and powerful flashlight over the trending micro lights of today. Its great to have a little keychain or credit card style light as a backup light, but i prefer for people to have something that you can blind or strike an attacker with. You don’t have to hide the light like you do the pistols, so i dont see any benefit in reducing the lights size. I think there may be an ego factor in the minimalist EDC style, almost like a “i dont need your 16 rounds of 9mm to solve the problem, im so good i can do it with 7 rounds of 380 and have leftovers to boot” mindset. That’s just my impressions without having discussed it with anyone, thought I’d throw it out here. Oh and I dont consider capacity in the firearm to be a substitute for a second gun or magazine.
I think that back-up gun was sometimes called a “New York reload.”
A friend of mine was a hospital CEO in Miami, and often had to travel to some bad areas. He carried two S&W lightweight snubbies, one in each front pocket.
I go by the saying, “The only time you can have too much ammo is when your swimming.” 😉
Ilsa, if you have not done so already, you should be able to set up a game camera or two, with photoelectric lights, so that you can view activity on the ranch in real time on your iPhone as you drive or move around on foot or horseback, especially at night. Too likely we are entering a day when more properties will be swarmed, especially at night, by groups of uninvited visitors. A strategically placed, bullet-proof stone observation building or tower, about 12’ by 12’, made specifically as a refuge for you, might not be out of the question. I caretake one ranch frequently and sometimes have wished that I had a miniature Scottish castle there to retreat back to temporarily, especially on the darkest nights when patrolling around to check on the livestock, and some kind of undefined disturbance involving teenagers or whatever, starts up.
I prefer to carry 2 firearms everywhere, in urban areas a very accurate 8-shot, single-stack compact semi-auto 9 mm, and a just-as-accurate spurless compact 5-shot .38/.357 revolver. Depending on situations, either weapon could get first deployment. I do like the concealment aspects of both, and 13 shots without reloading, with the possibility of dual wield, seem adequately competitive. In rural environments lately I will either have my 7-shot Mossberg Model 590 12-gauge with 18 and 1/2 barrel loaded with slugs and/or buckshot, or my .45 Colt single-action Ruger with some hand-cannon loads, plus the afore-mentioned double-action revolver in reserve. If I were a peace officer I would likely carry a high-capacity semi-auto, possibly 9mm or .40 S & W, and a 9mm double-action spurless revolver. I hope everybody is following Dan Bongino this week, and reflecting on how the tricky leftist radical criminals, especially any in our government, plan to disrupt society some more this year. Please keep your powder dry for defense, but always control your emotions, and do not act from anger or hasty judgement.
I can recall without difficulty one evening when I was at leased pasturage. The light was dim and as I was walking across a field heading for my truck, a pickup drove up the drive and then stopped when they saw my truck. They’d had to open a closed gate to gain access. Given the light and my background, I doubt they could see me. Maybe they could. Would have been about 200 yards.
I quickly realized the 6-18 power scoped heavy barrel .223 I was carrying to eliminate ground hogs/other vermin wasn’t a viable defensive tool under those conditions….unless they were very, very stupid. In daylight, I’d have been fine.
After some consideration- maybe they could see my silhouette, likely not- they left. Last time I only had one gun there. Besides having a gun, it has to be the correct tool for the job under varying conditions.
When Ayoob speaks, I listen (or should that be when Ayoob writes, I read 🤔?). Anyway, my copies of “Arc Road” and “The Onion Field” arrived yesterday.
The tactical environment may dictate otherwise, but one might consider, when faced with a gun held on a hostage, feigning initial compliance and then, gun still in hand, moving to cover. From that point, you now present the BG with a dilemma: does he shoot his cover/hostage? If the BG shifts his point of aim to you, it may present the hostage with the opportunity to grab the BG’s gun hand.
This is much easier to propose from an armchair than to do in practice. But, it is almost always a bad move to give the BG another hostage. A second hostage is expendable to prove the BG is serious and therefore increases the likelihood that someone will get shot. A significant percentage of BGs should realize that shooting their only hostage actually worsens their position and motivates their armed opposition to violence and vengeance. You can even point this out to the BG who is slow to recognize this dynamic. Generally it is best to keep your gun and move to a position of tactical advantage if circumstances permit. There are exceptions to this rule.
I fully admit that I am proposing this approach for purposes of discussion, having never been in such a predicament.
My wife knows that as a hostage, feigning a fainting spell may be helpful, once I have hand on gun in preparation for “surrendering” it. Or vice versa. She understands that I would not want her to give up her gun in such a situation.
Partners, police or otherwise, would do well to have a plan and perhaps even a code phrase to prepare each other for executing the plan, be it a grab for the gun or ducking out of the way.
On the other hand, if it looks like a simple robbery, and the BG is unaware that I am armed, he can have my wallet and watch and if he exits, I’ll never clear leather. It all depends upon whether I think he intends to simply rob—or if he seems the type to dispose of witnesses.
Pray none of us ever needs to make that call.
Although I’ve been carrying a snubbie for BUG, I’ve recently considered a G26 since I carry a G19 and extra mags already.
What is the consensus on same cartridge and mags vs 9mm auto & 38 revolver combo?
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