Three Rights Make a Left

THE REAL “BAD BOB” (Part 7) The Final Shootout (Part 2)

On January 26, 1945, while intense fighting was still going on as WWII raged in both Europe and in the Pacific, Rafe Wallace was on Horseback near his home off of Campbell Road two miles north of Lone Oak, Texas with his shotgun across his saddle. According to Rafe’s daughter Mary, the Hunt County Sheriff had advised her father to carry a gun after Rafe reported an incident where “Bad Bob” Barnett had claimed a distinctive looking mule that belonged to Rafe as his own. Everyone in Lone Oak feared Bob, even people who liked him, and Rafe knew he could well be the next victim of Bad Bob’s quick temper as well as his quick trigger.

Bob carried a large caliber pistol on the seat whenever he drove his Willis Overland Touring Car. On this particular day Bob was on his way to town when he drove by Rafe Wallace’s house down the road from his own. As he drove past Rafe, he reportedly grabbed his pistol and drew but Rafe had his shotgun across the saddle of his mount and only had to lift the shotgun to the ready to fire. It was Rafe who shot first hitting Bob with one fatal blast. It is said that Bob’s foot came off of the clutch and his car lurched forward, rolled through a barbedwire fence and out into a field where the Touring Car rolled to a stop and “Bad Bob” fell. He was thought to be dead before he ever hit the ground.

Locals have said that Rafe only spent about 45 minutes in the tiny Lone Oak Jail, and when he was released several townspeople came to the jail to thank him for his heroism for standing up to the man who had so little regard for human life.

After his death Bob Barnett’s body was laid on the table in the same dining room where his son is said to have died years earlier. His body is buried in the Lone Oak Cemetery with a caption that says, “We will always miss you.” In his article in True West Magazine, entitled “Recollections of Livestock Larceny”, Sam L. VanLandingham observed, “Others may have missed Bob, but he would have been better off if he had missed others.” An obvious reference to the people “Bad Bob” or “Backshooter Bob” is reported to have killed.

On April 9, 1945, a Hunt County District Court ruled that Bob Barnett’s death was a case of self-defense. It was official; no charges were ever filed against Rafe Wallace. But, according to his daughter Mary Rafe Wallace, the pain and guilt of what her father had to do never went away. She said, “He was never proud of what he did, and he didn’t like to talk about it.”

Rafe was known and loved by a lot of people around Lone Oak. People have said that he rode his horse everywhere even in his later years into his 90s. He died on January 15, 1998, at the age of 96.

Now my wife Lori and I live in the home that Jim Barnett built for his son Bob Barnett in 1892. Mary Rafe Wallace (named for both her mother and father) lives across the road and owns the old Jim Barnett homestead where her mother grew up. Years ago, a fire took the main house and now all that is left is the kitchen, dining room, a few small barns, and a scary looking storm cellar.

Lori and I love our old home on almost 10 acres two miles north of Lone Oak. And so far, there are no signs that it is haunted.

“Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil. Thy rod and thy staff they comfort me.” Psalms 23:4