Shooting the German POW (I don't recall that the war was over; I'd have to check his book) was sabotage by an enemy in time of war. If Germans had found a US POW doing that, he'd be in deep sauerkraut. He might have been shot more formally, but might very well have been shot.
I don't weep for the Arab thief in camp in N. Africa, either.
I met him twice. In San Antonio in 1979, we were both guests at a press lunch provided by Ruger. I didn't sit at his table (I DID sit with some other men you'd know, including Col. Rex Applegate) but did talk to Askins for awhile before lunch was served.
He was reasonably polite but seemed a little boastful and openly offered to smuggle arms into Rhodesia, which was being embargoed by the USA. I can't say more about that here, but it did strike me as not being terribly discreet.
I asked about Spanish guns, as he had been US military attaché in Spain and was very familiar with guns made there, especially around Eibar and Elgoibar. He said that they were really about as good as US brands, certainly in a practical sense. (I don't fully agree, but that's another story.)
On another occasion, we talked at the NRA convention. He seemed amused that my press badge read Dallas Morning News, for which I once wrote a gun column and also wrote freelance. I was also with a gun mag, but they only used one publication on the press badge. He was cordial.
A mutual acquaintance told me that Askins enjoyed shooting animals just to see them fall down, but I can't confirm that, and he may have been repeating something he had been told by a third party.
Personally, I found him personable and witty, although I can't repeat on this board some of what he said. Some of you have read his remarks about Hispanics, and I can confirm that he used ethnic terms. But so did most men I know, especially of his generation.
I enjoyed his colorful prose for several decades and miss it now, when it's fashionable to condemn him. PC people find a lot of fault with him, but most younger people today have been raised differently. I won't say more.
I didn't know until now that he may have murdered a witness , nor was I aware that he shot people just for fun. He seemed to kill fairly often, but he was in a dangerous business. A lot of lead got thrown along the Rio Grande in the years when he was on the USBP.
His son was named Bill, not Charles III. He worked for a time for the NRA, but I have not heard of him in years.
I asked Askins why he wrote those silly articles in which he declared the .45 ACP and the .30/06 obsolete or said that the Walther PP was a great military sidearm. He laughed and said that if readers were mad, they'd write to the editor. If they liked an article, they were far less likely to write. He wanted the editor to know that his material was being read. He was serious and I think he was right.
There's so much negative comment about him now that I believe some is probably true. But my own experience of him, if sparse, was okay.
Oh, wait: I saw him again whole covering the sale of the remaining Churchill, Atkin, Grant, and Lang guns at Abercrombie & Fitch. The firm was closing and their assets were being sold. Buyers came from various places, including a kilted Scot who offered stag hunts on his home turf. Some of you may have read my article about this event in, "Guns." We were busy, so didn't talk much then.
He supposedly said something about Jack O'Connor's grave, but I don't think I believe it. For one thing, I think Jack's remains were scattered from the air over mountains where he loved to hunt.
(Askins was unhappy that O'Connor had replaced his father as gun editor at, "Outdoor Life.")
One thing you could say for Askins: his prose had a lot of vitamins! It was generally interesting to read.
