Bonnie and Clyde’s never-before-seen photo album revealed with fugitive lovers’ poem foretelling their own death in cop shootout

BONNIE and Clyde’s never-before-seen photo album shows the fugitive lovers’ poem foretelling their own death in a cop shootout.

Primarily dating from 1933 and 1934, it includes images of the murderous fugitives on the run.

The pair are seen embracing in several black and white photos, while a staunch-looking Clyde poses holding a gun.

Others show Clyde Barrow's brother Buck, his wife Blanche and other members of the notorious Barrow gang.

The album belonged to Clyde's older sister Nell Barrow before passing into the hands of his nephew after she died in 1968.

He has now decided to sell the photos and a scrapbook of their poetry, which had been languishing in a box in his garage, with US based Heritage Auctions.

They are tipped to sell for a combined £23,000 ($30,000).

The couple turned a green leatherette 1933 Yearbook into a journal , in which to write poetry.

Heritage Auctions says: “The common theme is their life of crime and doomed efforts to elude capture.”

All the poems were written in pencil, and includes a 16-stanza poem by Bonnie Parker, outlining the couple’s “story”.

One fascinating poem, penned by Clyde in September 1933, shows a compassionate side to the fugitive as he pleads for “forgiveness” for what they've done, even describing himself and Bonnie as "sinners".

He says that they didn't want to harm anyone, but if they needed to have a shootout to escape a town alive “that's the way it would have to be”.

The poem also contains a chilling prediction that he and Bonnie would soon be “buried side by side”.

A mere eight months after it was written, on May 23, 1934, cops killed the pair in a dramatic shootout.

The poem reads: "As we travel down the highway not knowing where it will end. Never very much money, not even a friend.

"We don't want to hurt anyone, but we have to steal to eat, and if it's a shootout to live then that's the way it will have to be.

"We have kidnapped some people and tied them to a tree, but not so tight that after we were gone they could not get themselves free.

"We pray every town that we pass through to forgive sinners like Bonnie and Clyde, and please God just let us make it through this town to the other side.

"Some day we will go home forever, and they will bury us side by side.

"The grief that we have brought to our families will pass as the years go by."

Bonnie was known to write poetry and one of her offerings features in the sale.

One passage of hers, which slams the police, reads: "If a policeman is killed in Dallas and they have no clues for a guide.

"If they can't find the fiend, they wipe the slate clean, and hang it on Bonnie and Clyde."

Don Ackerman, specialist at auctioneers Heritage, said: "There are around 50 pictures of Bonnie, Clyde, or the two of them together.

“Other pictures are of gang members, some holding rifles or revolvers.

"Bonnie is known for having written poetry, but I don’t think any of it has been offered for sale.

"Clyde was not well-educated and is not known as a poet.

"The poems reflect the then-current lawlessness in the US and the terminology used is quite colourful and a window on the mindset of criminals being hunted down, not knowing which day would be their last.

"They knew they were doomed, but had no options. They did not want to give themselves up and face a life in prison or the electric chair.

"There has been a great deal in interest in Bonnie and Clyde since they were immortalised in film.