In_Cold_Blood_Essay

Alejandro Macias July 25, 2011 AP English In Cold Blood Essay Everyone knows Richard Hickock and Perry Smith brutally murdered the Clutter family from the start, but the real question is “What events led them to slay these beloved Clutters'” Was it their childhoods, jealousy, or just an act of temporary insanity' These are all great answers, but only one is correct. The correct answer for Smith’s evil doings was his dreadful childhood. Everything started from the beginning when Perry’s parents were in the rodeo business and they had to survive off of berries and condensed milk while on the road. The six of them traveled in a pick-up truck. Finally when they retired from rodeo they stopped and settled near Reno, Nevada. “Nevada Ranch where the family when a final battle between the parents, a terrifying contest in which horsewhips and scalding water and kerosene lamps were used as weapons, had brought the marriage to a stop.”(Page 184) It’s really heartbreaking that right when the family tries to pick themselves up and start new lives “Tex and Flo” have to expose the radiation of violence to their children and mutating their little childish brains to be able to withstand the fact that their parents are always savagely beating each other like this when insanely bothered. When the family lived in Fort Bragg, California, sometimes the father of the four would unleash his anger at his children as punishments for their sins. “After I finished crying my anger mounted gain, and during the evening when the B.B. gun was behind the chair my brother was sitting in, I grabbed it & held it to my brother’s ear and hollered BANG! My father (or mother) beat me and made me apologize. My brother used to shoot at a big white horse ridden by a neighbor who went to our place on his way to town. The neighbor caught my brother and I hiding in the bushes and took us to dad & we got a beating & brother got his B.B. gun taken away & I was glad he had his gun taken away!”(Page 274)This shows that Perry’s father tried to raise his children to become well-mannered and respectful people but didn’t think that with this awful experience would traumatize them forever and affect their future. With his unkind father always gone, Perry’s mother had lots of free time. “I remember my mother was “entertaining” some sailors while my father was away. When he came home a fight ensued, and my father, after a violent struggle, threw the sailors out & continued to beat my mother.”(Page 273-274) That’s when SHE crossed the line and took the kids with her to San Francisco. There little Perry broke the law and was running wild in San Francisco unsupervised. “In Frisco I was continuously in trouble. I started to run around with a gang, all of which were older than myself. My mother was always drunk, never in a fit condition to properly provide and care for us. I run as free & wild as a coyote. There was no rule or discipline, or anyone to show me right from wrong.” (Page 275) During his “Tarzan” moment, he was “sent in and out of detention homes many many times for running away from home & stealing”.(Page 275) Abandoned by his mother was sent to an orphanage… Where he was treated like a Jew at a concentration camp. He was being tortured and pounded on every day by the orphanages’ very own nuns. “I had weak kidneys & wet the bed every night. This was very humiliating to me, but I couldn’t control myself. I was very severely beaten by the cottage mistress, who had called me names and made fun of me in front of all the boys. She used to come around at all hours at night to see if I wet the bed. She would throw back the covers furiously beat me with a large black leather belt.”(Page 275) This demon of the cottage would spitefully take all of little Perry’s self-esteem and pride, chomp on it, and “spit” it back in the boy’s face. This lady had nothing to worry about because she had already sold her soul to the devil. “Every night was a nightmare. Later on she thought it would be very funny to put some kind of ointment on my penis. This was almost unbearable. It burned something terrible.”(Page 275) Thank god that Perry’s father regained custody of the children and took back Perry with open arms or could it have been such a good thing….' His father took Perry back with open hands but with closed ears. The little criminal was rough on the outside but extremely sensitive on the inside. He lasted a couple of weeks with his father then left because he said that his father never listened to his problems or didn’t really care about them. This crushed Perry’s heart, so at the age of sixteen he enrolled in the army. But in the army everything only became worse. “I began to get into fights. I threw a Japanese policeman off a bridge into the water. I was court-martialed again in Kyoto, Japan, for stealing a Japanese taxicab. I was in the army for almost four years. I had many violent outbursts of anger while I served time in Japan and Korea.” (Page 276) After he was relieved, he was on his way to the home of his father. But fate stopped him from reuniting with his father and skid his motorcycle on the highway. The accident caused him to get medical attention because he was “crippled”. When he was released, he went straight to prison “for grand larceny, burglary and jailbreak.”(Page 276) This brought him no where closer to his father. He was supposed to go with his dad after release but instead went to go work in Las Vegas. The correct answer for Hickock’s unnatural actions was that he just wanted some thrill in his life, being raised as a great kid and all and temporal insanity. Richard had a good life and amazing parents who covered for him every time he did anything wrong. He lived with his parents, was good at high school sports, finished high school, got married, had children, and had a well-paid job as an engineer. He had everything but some terrible things that happened to him in the past were “I had an automobile wreck with a company car. I was in the hospital several days with extensive head injuries.”(Page 278)He never thought wrong from right. An example of this theory was when Capote shows evidence that Hickock intended to rape Nancy Clutter and then get rid of her. Lucky for Nancy, Smith protected her from the sick hands of Richard Hickock. Another obsession that controlled Dick was that he just wanted to rape, rob, and go off to Acapulco for his own desires to cuddle with prostitutes and live the Life. The correct answer for Smith was his bad childhood and Hickock’s reason was temporal insanity. This awful pair shall never be forgiven and their souls shall be punished for all eternity. They both had no right to destroy this family who definitely had an excellent life ahead of themselves.