THE AMERICAN FRONTIER tales of BILLY THE KID HIS FRIENDS, LOVERS, MOTHER MURDER TRIAL +TO DIE like a CHEYENNE MAN +F ROM ROBBERY TO ROPE WITH THE RUGGLES brothers +THE WILD AND WOOLLY town OF WHITE OAKS AUTUMN 2022 HISTORYNET.COM
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38 THE KID’S MOM By Melody Groves Catherine McCarty Antrim did all she could for both her sons—Billy and Joe 46 THE TRIAL OF BILLY THE KID By David G. Thomas Did Billy kill Lincoln County Sheriff William Brady? A jury in Mesilla said, ‘Guilty’ 52 66 WHITE OAKS’ THE NIGHT DARK ROOTS THE RUGGLES BROTHERS MET By Josh Slatten ‘JUDGE LYNCH’ The Kid and other outlaws blackened the name of the New Mexico Territory town By Matthew Bernstein The California stagecoach robbers reunited 2 WILD WEST A U T U M N 2 0 2 2 in jail and then faced a ‘necktie party’ 58 ‘I WILL DIE LIKE A MAN’ By Dennis Hagen The charge by Cheyenne warriors Head Chief and Young Mule was heroic—and suicidal
D E PA R T M E N T S 4 EDITOR’S LETTER 8 LETTERS 10 ROUNDUP 16 INTERVIEW 10 By Candy Moulton W. Michael Farmer’s deep research leads him to write histories and novels 18 WESTERNERS Wisconsinite John Deitz’s long fight for property rights made him a folk hero 20 GUNFIGHTERS & LAWMEN By Brandon Dickson Exactly where Billy the Kid victim Bob Olinger is buried remains a mystery 32 22 PIONEERS & SETTLERS RECOLLECTIONS By Ramon Vasconcellos OF THE KID Caribbean-born William Leidesdorff made his mark in pre–Gold Rush California By Mark Iacampo In the 1930s old-timers shared memories 24 WESTERN ENTERPRISE of Billy the Kid that may surprise you By Jim Winnerman 72 James Eads lived along the Mississippi River as a boy and bridged it as an adult DUKE’S SON REMEMBERS 26 ART OF THE WEST By Dave Lauterborn By Johnny D. Boggs Ethan Wayne strives to honor the legacy of his father, Western star John Wayne Author and illustrator S.D. Nelson spotlights Lakota culture in his books for kids 30 INDIAN LIFE By Mike Coppock Cahokia and other Mississippian cities rose and fell before Columbus landed 76 COLLECTIONS By Linda Wommack An engaging museum in Fort Worth recalls American film icon John Wayne 78 GUNS OF THE WEST By George Layman The first hammerless lever-action rifle, the Savage 99 was prized by hunters 80 GHOST TOWNS By Tom Straka and Doug Page Piedmont, Wyoming, owes its legacy in part to charcoal-producing beehive kilns 82 REVIEWS Author Melody Groves picks her favorite New Mexico–related books and films. Plus reviews of recent books, including 1876, the Year of the Gun and Yellowstone National Park: The First 150 Years 88 GO WEST Billy the Kid is finally behind bars in New Mexico’s Old Fort Sumner Cemetery ON THE COVER This issue features articles about Billy the Kid’s mother, Catherine McCarty Antrim; tales from people who knew—or claimed to have known—the Kid; Billy’s murder trial in Mesilla, New Mexico Territory; and his grave in Fort Sumner. This colorized version of the only authenticated photo of the Kid is framed by the picturesque Organ Mountains, the southern New Mexico range so named by Spanish travelers who thought its peaks resembled a pipe organ. (HistoryNet Archives, iStock Photo/Robert Waltman, photo illustration by Brian Walker) A U T U M N 2 0 2 2 WILD WEST 3
EDITOR’S LETTER A CLASSICAL OUTLAW In The American Songbag, his 1927 anthology of American folksongs, poet In the spring of 1881 TOP: MARK THOMPSON, MINNESOTA LEGISLATIVE REFERENCE LIBRARY Carl Sandburg wrote, “Jesse James is the only American bandit who is classical, who is Judge Warren Henry to this country what Robin Hood or Dick Turpin is to England, whose exploits are so close Bristol sentenced Billy to the mythical and apocryphal.” Sandburg was about half right. There is one other Ameri- the Kid to death after a can outlaw from roughly the same period as Jesse James who also rates as classical—Billy murder trial in Mesilla, the Kid. Not that the Kid was much of a bandit (mostly he stole cattle) compared to Jesse. New Mexico Territory. But if we call Jesse James the American Robin Hood (yes, a mighty big stretch) or the But it took Lincoln County American Dick Turpin (the English highwayman who himself was no Robin Hood–like Sheriff Pat Garrett to end figure), then we could conceivably call Billy the Kid the American Oliver Twist (yes, Oliver the escaped Kid’s killing stole a few things in London, but he was basically a good kid) or the American Jean Valjean days once and for all. (the protagonist of Victor Hugo’s Les Misérables who suffered so much injustice in Paris). Wild West editor On the other hand, we might simply view Jesse and Billy as two all-American bad boys Gregory Lalire’s who more than 140 years after their deaths are still the Old West outlaws who fascinate us historical novel The most. “They personify the rebellious spirit against authority,” Bill Markley wrote in the Call of McCall is due feature “Billy & Jesse,” in the December 2021 Wild West. “Though the two were inarguably out in July 2022. His criminals and killed people, many Americans still overlook their crimes, only seeing the earlier novels include romance of the rebel.” In the current issue, among other articles related to Billy, we hear in “Recollections 2021’s Man From of the Kid” (P. 32) from a few people who knew him and did see the romance of the rebel. “He was very Montana, 2019’s fond of children,” one woman said, who also recalled Billy had a little dog that “would jump up on the Our Frontier Pastime: Kid until he would laughingly pull his gun and begin firing into the ground” causing the dog to “playfully 1804–1815 and follow every puff of dust, yelping joyfully.” Another woman recalled, “I never saw anything ugly about 2014’s Captured: him or in his manners.” Still another judged, “The Kid had been led into evil paths and, through kindness From the Frontier Diary of Infant Danny Duly. ‘HE WAS VERY FOND and friendliness of hospitality, might be led His short story “Half- back into the straight and narrow way.” way to Hell” appears in the 2018 anthology OF CHILDREN,’ In the spring of 1881 in Mesilla, New Mexico The Trading Post and Territory, though, Billy the Kid was deemed Other Frontier Stories. ONE WOMAN SAID anything but a well-mannered, child-friendly, dog-loving, misguided young fellow. That April 9 a jury convicted him of the murder of Lincoln County Sheriff William Brady, and four days later Judge Warren Henry Bristol sentenced him to hang “by the neck until his body be dead.” While most people know Billy later escaped, only to be shot down by Lincoln County Sheriff Pat Garrett, on July 14, 1881, few know the details of his trial. Las Cruces, N.M., historian David G. Thomas provides those in “The Trial of Billy the Kid” (P. 46). Yes, the Kid was involved in the killing of Sheriff Brady during the Lincoln County War, but Thomas suggests what occurred in Judge Bristol’s courtroom in Mesilla could be “viewed today as a mockery of justice.” Also in this issue we have an article about Catherine McCarty Antrim (see P. 38). It is a fact that every outlaw had a mother. The mother of Frank and Jesse James, forceful, hard-nosed Zerelda Samuel (Dr. Reuben Samuel was her third husband), had part of her right arm blown off in 1875 during a Pinkerton National Detective Agency raid on the James/Samuel farm in Missouri. She defended her sons to the end of her days, dying in 1911, 29 years after Jesse and four years before Frank. Billy’s mother, who married William Antrim in Santa Fe on March 1, 1873, was of a different sort, whose “charity and goodness of heart were proverbial.” Apparently without much help from her husband, Catherine raised Billy (called Henry at that time) and his brother Joe in Silver City, New Mexico Territory. She died of tuberculosis on Sept. 16, 1874. Billy didn’t seem to be a bad kid (or student), but he ran afoul of the law for petty theft in September 1875, shimmied up a chimney to escape the Silver City jail and took off for Arizona Territory, where he killed his first man on Aug. 17, 1877. Billy then fled back to New Mexico Territory, where he became a cowboy and a rustler and a legend in Lincoln, Fort Sumner and other locales such as the outlaw hangout White Oaks (see P. 52). By the way, the fictional Jean Valjean died relatively content as an old man. Not so the real Billy the Kid. 4 WILD WEST A U T U M N 2 0 2 2
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MICHAEL A. REINSTEIN CHAIRMAN & PUBLISHER Artist/author S.D. Nelson draws AUTUMN 2022 / VOL. 35, NO. 2 S.D. NELSON inspiration from his mother and grandmother, both hailing from the GREGORY J. LALIRE EDITOR Standing Rock Indian Reservation. DAVID LAUTERBORN MANAGING EDITOR GREGORY F. MICHNO SPECIAL CONTRIBUTOR Visit our WEBSITE JOHNNY D. BOGGS SPECIAL CONTRIBUTOR FOR ONLINE EXTRAS JOHN KOSTER SPECIAL CONTRIBUTOR JOHN BOESSENECKER SPECIAL CONTRIBUTOR WildWestMag.com BRIAN WALKER GROUP DESIGN DIRECTOR The Only Authenticated MELISSA A. WINN DIRECTOR OF PHOTOGRAPHY Photograph of Billy the Kid While countless purported photos of Billy the PAUL FISHER ART DIRECTOR Kid have surfaced over the years, there remains ALEX GRIFFITH PHOTO EDITOR only one authenticated image of the young man who rode to everlasting infamy in New Mexico DANA B. SHOAF MANAGING EDITOR, PRINT Territory’s Lincoln County. In this online feature MICHAEL Y. PARK MANAGING EDITOR, DIGITAL author Richard Weddle imagines how that fas- cinating tintype of the most infamous outlaw in CLAIRE BARRETT NEWS AND SOCIAL EDITOR the American West came to be. CORPORATE Extended Interview With W. Michael Farmer KELLY FACER SVP REVENUE OPERATIONS “I’m often asked where the fiction ends in MATT GROSS VP DIGITAL INITIATIVES my novels and the history begins,” author W. Michael Farmer says. “I believe histori- ROB WILKINS DIRECTOR OF PARTNERSHIP MARKETING cal novel story lines should follow the history JAMIE ELLIOTT PRODUCTION DIRECTOR as closely as possible, because historical fiction hooks and helps hold the reader’s ADVERTISING interest into what happened and helps them ask good questions about the history. I put MORTON GREENBERG SVP ADVERTISING SALES [email protected] out the nonfiction book [tied to a novel] so RICK GOWER REGIONAL SALES MANAGER [email protected] the reader can understand where the history begins and the fiction ends and has a clear TERRY JENKINS REGIONAL SALES MANAGER [email protected] understanding of the novel’s background.” DIRECT RESPONSE ADVERTISING More about S.D. Nelson “As a boy,” says S.D. Nelson, a Standing Rock NANCY FORMAN / MEDIA PEOPLE Sioux Tribe member who paints, illustrates and [email protected] writes books for young people, “I discovered that the prairies of Dakota are only earth and © 2022 HISTORYNET, LLC sky. All is buffalo grass and clouds, forever. It is a land of brutal beauty, where terrible SUBSCRIPTION INFORMATION: 800-435-0715 OR SHOP.HISTORYNET.COM battles were fought—hand to hand—and where at twilight the song of Sister Meadow- WILD WEST (ISSN 1046-4638) is published quarterly by lark will make your heart cry.” HistoryNet, LLC, 901 North Glebe Road, 5th Floor, Arlington, VA 22203 HISTORYNET Periodical postage paid at Tysons, Va., and additional mailing offices. postmaster, send address changes to Love history? Sign up for our free weekly e-newsletter at: historynet.com/newsletters WILD WEST, P.O. Box 900, Lincolnshire, IL 60069-0900 List Rental Inquiries: Belkys Reyes, Lake Group Media, Inc. Let’s Connect Like Wild West on Facebook 914-925-2406; [email protected] Canada Publications Mail Agreement No. 41342519 Digital Subscription Wild West is available via Zinio and Canadian GST No. 821371408RT0001 other digital subscription services The contents of this magazine may not be reproduced in whole or in part 6 WILD WEST A U T U M N 2 0 2 2 without the written consent of HistoryNet, LLC PROUDLY MADE IN THE USA
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LETTERS THE KID An with Billy the Kid as Regulators during the Lincoln County War. In 1878 ‘OUTLAW’? cousins Frank and George Coe were at Blazer’s Mill and the shootout with Buckshot Roberts. George lost a finger. I shook a hand that shook that hand. Your informative magazine has lots of We are that close to those who rode into the sunset. I live in Las Cruces near stories about incidents that are not well the Butterfield Overland Mail Trail and one of its stagecoach stops —now the known, but boy, oh boy, you got it wrong renowned Mexican-American restaurant La Posta in old Mesilla. I often see with your December 2021 cover that calls another Butterfield site, on Overland Avenue in downtown El Paso. In 2021 Jesse James and Billy the Kid ICONIC near Organ, N.M., I met and chatted with a man named Butterfield. Yes, related. OUTLAWS. As far as Billy is concerned, that’s 180 degrees from the truth. Carefully analyze Billy’s life, please. From a As a kid reading the book Buffalo Soldier, by William Heuman, I never teenager, having to kill Windy Cahill in Fort Grant, Arizo- imagined I would live near Fort Selden, one of their posts. The adobe walls still stand. And na Territory, to avenging the murder of his employer John this is where Douglas MacArthur ”learned to ride and shoot” long before World War II. Tunstall in Lincoln County, New Mexico Territory, his actions were about bringing justice where there was none. I know an old Westerner whose great-grandfather had a farm at Hondo, near Lincoln, N.M. One night Billy the Kid knocked on the door and asked if he could stay in the barn The Santa Fe Ring decided who was guilty and who overnight with a wounded friend. In the morning Billy knocked again, said thanks and went free. Sheriff William Brady, James Dolan and Law- handed the farmer a silver dollar. Years later the farmer asked his family to bury him with rence Murphy were all corrupt and in cahoots to take that coin. In the old gold mining town of White Oaks, in its old school, I met two docents advantage of the populace. Then you have Lt. Col. Nathan who attended the school in the 1920s. Back then they knew a woman called the “Cattle Dudley assisting these three corrupt individuals, in spite of Queen of New Mexico”—Susan McSween of Lincoln County War fame. She and her hus- the fact the military was forbidden to interfere in civilian band lodged Billy and other Regulators in their house. I shook a hand that shook her hand. matters. Billy’s trial in Mesilla wasn’t fair. The jury con- sisted of some men who spoke Spanish and no English. Yes, we are that close to the history we read about in Wild West. Judge Warren Bristol gave his instructions in English, and Gold miner George Hearst mined at Pinos Altos, N.M., where his widow funded of five possible indictments he allowed the jury to consider construction of the Hearst Church. Long story short, the horse-drawn hearse that only one. The judge told the jury that just the fact Billy was carried Sheriff Pat Garrett to his grave in Las Cruces was eventually displayed in the there when Sheriff William Brady was killed was enough old Hearst Church for years. The hearse has returned to Las Cruces (now at the New to find him guilty. Never mind there were several others Mexico Farm & Ranch Heritage Museum), and the sheriff’s descendants return here too. involved. And then Governor Lew Wallace reneged on his At a recent Pat Garrett Western Heritage Festival I was privileged to meet a “DNA twin” word to pardon Billy. I do not consider Billy the Kid to descendant of the tall, lanky sheriff who was also known as “a man of few words.” For have been an outlaw. He just happened to have found him- example, one night in Fort Sumner in 1881, when Billy the Kid walked into a dark room self fighting against an organized cabal of corrupt persons. and asked the identity of a visitor, the visitor didn’t say a word. Billy had recently killed two lawmen, so Garrett knew he could be No. 3. His gun did speak. With a great-grandson Humberto C. Martinez of the famous lawman I enjoyed a day trip to Garrett family sites around Alto. We Chaparral, N.M. happened to meet a lady related to a man who went to the scene of the abovementioned shooting. As I’m aware of debates over the Kid’s death, I asked this lady how her relative The editor responds: You are right about the corruptness of the was certain the dead man was Billy. With casual candor she said, “He knew him.” Santa Fe Ring, and also about Billy’s murder trial (see related story, P. 46). But even though he didn’t rob banks and trains Mike Jackoboice like Jesse James, and even though he wasn’t such a badman in Las Cruces, N.M. many respects (and was hardly the worst participant in the Lincoln County War), Billy the Kid did rustle cattle and kill dear wild west readers Deputies Jim Bell and Bob Olinger, among other crimes. As author Bill Markley writes of the two cover boys in “Billie & Beginning with this issue, Wild West is moving to a quarterly publication schedule. Jessie,” his December 2021 cover article, “Though the two were But worry not: We will extend existing subscriptions, so you’ll get all the issues inarguably criminals and killed people, many Americans still for which you paid. We’ve made exciting improvements, with other surprises overlook their crimes, only seeing the romance of the rebel.” in the works—all in the aim of giving our valued readers even more than before: • We’ve redesigned our website to make it more compelling, active and easier to More KID STUFF search. Two million users visit every month. Check us out at Historynet.com. Born a Midwesterner in the 1950s, I grew up watching • And we’re offering a subscribers-only Wild West email newsletter that includes Gunsmoke and The Lone Ranger. Now I’m enjoying my 25th year as a Westerner. As a longtime subscriber to fresh material not available elsewhere. Soon subscribers will also have exclusive Wild West, I appreciate learning where wild Westerners access to special online content with the insight, excitement and quality you lived and died. Every once in a while you bump into a expect from Wild West. descendant. Moving to New Mexico in 1997, I boarded • Lastly, we’re going to digitize all back issues of Wild West going back to our debut a plane and happened to sit next to 82-year-old Louise issue in 1988. This unprecedented resource will soon be available to subscribers. (née Coe) Runnels. She spoke of fellow Coes who rode We’ll keep you up to date. If you aren’t a subscriber, go to Shop.Historynet.com and sign up today so you don’t miss a thing. If you are a subscriber, thank you—and stand by for great things to come. Please reference the terms and conditions of your subscription for more details. Send letters by email to [email protected]. Include your name and hometown. 8 WILD WEST A U T U M N 2 0 2 2
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ROUNDUP On April 26, 1901, Thomas Edward Ketchum, later known as “Black Jack,” is fitted for a rope atop the gallows in Clayton, New Mexico Territory. The clumsy execution was successful, but Ketchum lost his head in the process. 10 MOST INTERESTING CHARACTERS IN NEW MEXICO TERRITORY 1Davy Crockett: No, not that Davy nothing but his six-shooter and gun belt. County sheriff in 1896, he was tasked with HERITAGE AUCTIONS Crockett. A reputed bully in Cimarron, Allison homesteaded near Cimarron, tracking down the murderers of Colonel this Davy—either a grandson or grand- where on Nov. 1, 1875, he prevailed in Albert Jennings Fountain and his 8-year-old nephew of the Alamo legend—gained a shootout at the St. James Hotel, killing son, who’d gone missing earlier that year. infamy for having murdered three U.S. Francisco “Pancho” Griego. He never did—officially, anyway. Garrett 9th Cavalry buffalo soldiers at the bar himself was murdered en route to Las Cruces of the St. James Hotel in 1876. Acquitted, 4 Black Jack Ketchum: Outlaw Tom on Feb. 29, 1908. His killer(s) were never but fined $50 for having carried a gun in “Black Jack” Ketchum partnered with brought to justice. town, he rampaged through Cimarron, older brother Sam, robbing businesses and often riding his horse into saloons and firing trains. The brothers later joined the notor- 6 Lew Wallace: Author of the best- into the ceiling. Townspeople soon tired ious Hole-in-the-Wall Gang. In 1899 Tom selling 1880 novel Ben-Hur: A Tale of his antics. On Sept. 30, 1876, Sheriff foolishly attempted to rob the same train at of the Christ, Wallace was also the gov- Isaiah Rinehart and posse shot and killed the same spot brother Sam had held it up ernor of New Mexico Territory (1878–81) Crockett after the bully refused to surrender. weeks earlier (to Sam’s demise). This time who promised Billy the Kid a pardon and the engineer recognized Tom and shot him then reneged. Wallace then served (1881– 2 Billy the Kid: Orphaned at 13, from his horse. Captured and convicted, 85) as U.S. minister to the Ottoman empire. William Henry McCarty struggled Black Jack went to the gallows on April 26, The only fond memories he had of New to live in the adult world. Slight in stature, 1901, in Clayton, which had never hanged Mexico, he admitted, was the time he de- he compensated with his pleasing person- anyone before. The rope proved too long, voted to painting landscapes in an alley ality, charming wit and, when pushed, and as Ketchum had gained weight in behind the Palace of the Governors when his gun. A natural leader, he hung around prison, his head snapped off when his not busy writing. Lincoln and became a Regulator. The Kid’s body dropped through the trap. All of him short life ended on July 14, 1881, when is buried in Clayton’s cemetery. 7 Doña Tules: A woman of refine- shot by Lincoln County Sheriff Pat Garrett.. ment and fashion, María Gertrudis 5 Pat Garrett: Best known as the Barceló was a prominent saloon owner and 3 Clay Allison: Known for extreme Lincoln County sheriff who killed Billy professional gambler in Santa Fe. Known violence, and implicated in many the Kid, Garrett was also a buffalo hunter, as Madame La Tules, she was charming vigilante jail break-ins and lynchings, bartender, Texas Ranger captain, promoter with a sharp business acumen and became the notorious gunman reportedly once of irrigation schemes near Roswell and U.S. an influential member of society during the rode through Mobeetie, Texas, wearing customs inspector. Appointed Doña Ana Santa Fe Trail heyday. Tules reportedly 1 0 WILD WEST A U T U M N 2 0 2 2
contributed freely to families in need, WOMMACK WINS ROUNDUP the Catholic Church, charities and the SIX-SHOOTER government. She still died with a fortune WEST on Jan. 17, 1852. Linda Wommack writes the Collec- WORDS tions department in each issue of 8 Colonel Albert Fountain: Wild West and sometimes contrib- B_hng]Ebg\\heg An attorney in Mesilla, Fountain utes feature articles. One of those, <hngmr\\hg& was perhaps best known for having rep- “Tom Horn’s Smooth Schoolmarm,” onelbg`[rZg resented Billy the Kid in 1881—though which ran in the February 2021 bgm^kgZepZk' he lost, and the Kid was convicted of issue, has captured the Wild West Bbgjnbk^]ma^ murder. Following a stint in the Union History Association’s 2022 Six- \\Znl^'Lhf^hg^ Army during the Civil War, Fountain Shooter Award for best general pZlk^lihglb[e^ settled in Texas where he served in the Western history article. The school- _hkma^[ehh]la^] state Senate and as lieutenant governor. marm of the title is Missouri-born bgmaZm\\hngmr' In 1873 he moved to Mesilla, where Glendolene Kimmel, who came to Wyoming to teach and at B_hng]mphiZk& he served as a lawyer, probate judge age 22 became smitten with 40-year-old frontiersman turned mb^lbgma^Û^e] and court clerk. He founded the Me- paid assassin Tom Horn. “While it would be a short-lived hg^a^Z]^][r silla Valley Independent newspaper and liaison for Horn,” writes Wommack, “the romantic notion re- TEZpk^g\\^VFnk& the Mesilla Valley Opera House, known mained with Kimmell for quite some time, perhaps to her dying iar%TCZf^lV today as the Fountain Theater. On Feb. 1, day.” After Horn was convicted in Cheyenne for murder, Kim- =heZgZg]TChagV 1896, he and son Henry disappeared mel claimed he was innocent and did all she could to save him Kbe^r%ma^hma^k near White Sands. They had been am- from execution, but he went to the gallows on Nov. 20, 1903. [rT:e^qZg]^kV bushed, but their bodies were never Colorado-based Wommack previously earned a Six-Shooter F\\Lp^^g';hma found, and no one ever paid for the crime. in the same category for her article “Confidentially Told in aZ]]hg^fZgr Browns Park,” which appeared in the June 2019 Wild West. mabg`l\\hgmkZkrmh 9 Juan Maria (Giovanni) Another name familiar to Wild West readers, special contrib- eZp[hmap^k^ Agostini-Justiniani: This utor John Boessenecker, also received a Six-Shooter this obheZmbg`ma^eZp' eccentric son of Italian nobility left year, for his book Wildcat: The Untold Story of Pearl Heart, F\\Lp^^gBÛkfer home in his late teens to wander France the Wild West’s Most Notorious Woman. It comes on the heels [^eb^o^Z\\m^] and Spain and later trekked all over of two WWHA awards he received in 2021—for best book \\hgl\\b^gmbhnler South, Central and North America. (Ride the Devil’s Herd: Wyatt Earp’s Epic Battle Against the West’s Fnkiar%=heZg At age 62 he walked with a wagon Biggest Outlaw Gang) and best general Western history article Zg]Kbe^r_hk train from Kansas to Las Vegas, New (“They Shoot Cowboys, Don’t They?” adapted from Ride the k^o^g`^Zg] Mexico Territory, and then south to Devil’s Herd and published in the October 2020 Wild West). i^klhgZe`Zbg Mesilla. Considered a mystic by many, —Special Agent El Ermitaño (“The Hermit”) reportedly NEW KID BOOK Frank W. Angel healed people and prophesied. Living wrote this in his in a cave in the nearby Organ Moun- Australian historian and writer James Oct. 3, 1878, tains, he promised Mesilla residents B. Mills has spent much of his career ÛgZek^ihkmhg he would light a fire every Friday eve- researching the American West. His the death of John ning to signal he was fine. On April 17, special focus has been on infamous Henry Tunstall 1869, not seeing the fire, investigating outlaw William Henry McCarty, who and the violence villagers discovered he’d been killed. became best known as Billy the Kid in New Mexico His murder also remains unsolved. and was gunned down at age 21. In the M^kkbmhkrl December 2020 Wild West Mills wrote two articles about Lincoln County. 10 Sadie Orchard: Strong- Billy the Kid and the Lincoln County War—“They Called willed Sarah Jane “Sadie” Him Bilito” and “Hombres Valientes in the Lincoln County Creech Orchard (1859–1943) wore War.” Mills’ focus in the first was on how Hispanos (South- many hats in the gold and silver mining westerners of Spanish descent) viewed the Kid; many camp of Kingston in the 1880s. Flam- considered him a good-hearted loyal friend rather than boyant Sadie established a brothel on a ruthless outlaw. In the second Mills tells us how Nuevo- ironically named Virtue Street, owned méxicanos played key roles in that 1878 factional war in and drove a stagecoach line, ran a hotel New Mexico Territory. Mills expands on those themes in and restaurant, and rode horses as well his new book Billy the Kid: El Bandido Simpático, due out as any man. A philanthropist, she helped August 15 from the University of North Texas Press. build a church and aided those stricken during a smallpox epidemic. F^eh]r@kho^l A U T U M N 2 0 2 2 WILD WEST 1 1
ROUNDUP SEE YOU LATER... KURT RUSSELL BING RUSSELL BURT REYNOLDS BOB UTLEY tiring from the NPS, OPPOSITE BOTTOM: CALIFORNIA STATE LIBRARY he devoted himself to WESTERN Tombstone (1993) and The U.S. Post and Robert Marshal “Bob” writing books (more HERITAGE has appeared in other the Making of the Utley, 92—among the than 20), including AWARDS V Western films, includ- American West was foremost Western au- 2020’s The Last Sov- Burt Reynolds (1936– ing The Hateful Eight deemed best non- thors and historians, ereigns: Sitting Bull and 2018), Neil Oliver and Bone Tomahawk fiction book; Power perhaps best known the Resistance of the Free “Bing” Russell (1926– (both 2015). of the Dog, directed for his works on the Lakotas. (For a list of all 2003) and Bing’s by Jane Campion, for frontier Army and his his books visit robert- son Kurt Russell This year’s inductees best theatrical motion biographies of George utley.net.) In 2015 Ut- were inducted into into the Hall of Great picture; and 1883, Armstrong Custer, Billy ley was inducted into the National Cowboy Westerners were Frank created and directed the Kid, Sitting Bull the Western Writers of & Western Heritage Boardman “Pistol Pete” by Taylor Sheridan, and Geronimo—died America Hall of Fame. Museum’s Hall of Great Eaton (1860–1958), for best fictional drama. on June 7, 2022, in Western Performers a lawman, scout and For the full list of hon- Scottsdale, Ariz. Born FREDERICK during the Oklahoma settler who inspired the orees visit national- in Bauxite, Ark., on NOLAN City museum’s West- mascots at Oklahoma cowboymuseum.org. Oct. 31, 1929, he was ern Heritage Awards State University, New raised in Pennsylvania Historian and author last April. Reynolds Mexico State Univer- CHIRICAHUA and Indiana. For six Frederick William starred in TV Westerns, sity and the University PASS V summers (1947–52) he “Fred” Nolan, 91, died notably Gunsmoke of Wyoming; and In an effort sponsored worked as a “historical on June 15, 2022, in (1962–65), as well rancher Gerald Tim- by the Cochise County aide” for the National Chalfont St. Giles, En- as such Hollywood merman, who with his Historical Society Park Service (NPS) gland. Born in Liver- Westerns as Navajo brothers owned and (CCHS), Arizonans in Montana at what pool on March 7, 1931, Joe (1966), 100 Ri- operated ranches in (including Chiricahua was then called Custer Nolan began research- fles (1969) and Sam South Dakota, Nebras- Apache Joe Saenz, Battlefield National ing the American West Whiskey (1969). Bing ka, Colorado, Texas above) gathered last Monument (present-day at age 21 and in 1954 Russell had a recurring and Oregon. Wran- spring to dedicate Little Bighorn Battle- co-founded the English role as Deputy Clem gler Award winners a bronze plaque field National Monu- Westerners’ Society. Foster on Bonanza included Tracey Han- ment). He went on to The West of Billy the and appeared in virtu- shew, whose “Here a career in the NPS, Kid (1998) is perhaps ally every Western She Comes, Wearin’ serving from 1957 to ’64 the best-known of TV series of the 1950s, Them Britches!” (in the in Santa Fe as historian his works, which in- ’60s and ’70s. Kurt Winter 2020 issue of of the Southwest region clude The Billy the Kid Russell co-starred Montana: The Maga- and then as chief his- Reader (2007) and The with Tim Matheson in zine of Western His- torian in Washington, Lincoln County War the 1976 Western TV tory) was chosen as D.C., until retiring (2009). His article series The Quest, por- best magazine arti- in 1980. Utley played “The Hunting of Billy trayed Wyatt Earp in cle; Cameron Blevins, a role in the develop- the Kid” ran in the whose Paper Trails: ment of the National June 2003 Wild West Historic Preservation and is available online Act of 1966. After re- at Historynet.com. FAMOUS LAST WORDS ‘I am going—my time has come’ —Just after dawn on Sept. 26, 1820, Daniel Boone, 85, spoke these words to those `Zma^k^]Zkhng]abl[^]ZmlhgGZmaZglahnl^bgpaZmphne][^\\hf^=^ÛZg\\^%Fh' Ma^g%pbmaGZmaZgZg]=Zgb^el]Zn`am^kC^fbfZahe]bg`ablaZg]l%ma^_Zf^]_khgmb^klfZg]b^]' 12 WILD WEST A U T U M N 2 0 2 2
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ROUNDUP commemorating INDIAN More than 50 marked In Episode 2 his become California’s the 1869 Battle of ASSIMILATION V or unmarked burial mother, Kathleen Sonoma County. Chiricahua Pass. In the 19th and 20th sites have been iden- (Catherine in real life; Though dedicated That October 20 centuries the U.S. tified to date. “Each see related feature, that fall, the post clash pitted Captain government sepa- of those children is a P. 38), and sons Billy wasn’t completed Reuben F. Bernard rated American In- missing family member, and Joe reach Santa until 1814. While and 61 soldiers out dian children from a person who was not Fe. There she marries trade in otter furs did of Fort Bowie, Ari- their families, sent able to live out their William Antrim and, well for about three zona Territory, against them to more than purpose on this Earth as depicted in Epi- years (see “Missions, Chiricahua Apache 400 boarding schools because they lost their sode 3, the family Sea Otters and Cali- Chief Cochise and nationwide and worked lives as part of this relocates to Silver fornia Indians,” by about 100 of his to assimilate them into terrible system,” said City. In succeeding Daniel J. Demers, in warriors atop a rocky Anglo American so- Interior Secretary Deb episodes Billy meets the October 2012 mesa near Rucker ciety. At such board- Haaland (above left). a character named Wild West or online Canyon in southeast ing schools students Alias, a Mexican at Historynet.com), Arizona’s rugged were compelled to THE KID ON TV V friend named Segura, farming was largely Chiricahua Mountains. wear uniforms and Can’t get enough of Pat Garrett (the man unsuccessful. In 1833 Two soldiers and about cut their hair, encour- Billy the Kid? Want to who as sheriff killed the Russian-American 10 Apache warriors aged to abandon their actually see the Kid the Kid) and many Co. opened a new died in the fighting. Indian names, lan- instead of just read- other familiar charac- agricultural center, Though the five-hour guages and religious ing about him? Well, ters, for and against Slavianka, near the battle remains rela- practices and, ac- you’re in luck if you him, from the 1878 mouth of the Russian tively obscure and cording to a 2022 have access to the Epix Lincoln County War. River, midway be- ended in a draw, more Interior Department TV network. Its series tween Fort Ross and Medals of Honor (33) report, subjected to Billy the Kid, which RUSSIAN the Russian port at were issued to partici- “systematic militarized premiered last April, INVASION W Bodega Bay. Its suc- pating soldiers in that and identity-alteration was created by Mi- While Spain was cess at farming proved clash than to partici- methodologies.” The chael Hirst and stars busy trying to convert uneven, though stock pants in any other one- report reveals that Tom Blyth in the title California Indians raising did better. On day battle in the history between 1819 and role. While details to Christianity in the abandoning Fort Ross of the U.S. Army. 1969 there were 408 of Billy’s childhood latter half of the 19th in 1842, the Russians such federal schools remain sketchy, most century, imperial Russia sold their holdings for The plaque stands in 37 states, including historians believe he founded its first col- $30,000 to Swiss immi- on the grounds of the 76 in Oklahoma (for- was a kid from the ony in Alaska in 1784, grant John Sutter, best Chiricahua Desert Mu- merly Indian Territory), streets of New York though its interest was known for his role in the seum, on State Route 80 47 in Arizona and 43 City, and the first of purely commercial. California Gold Rush north of Rodeo, N.M., in New Mexico (both the series’ eight first- Then, in 1812, wanting six years later. Named along the Arizona of which became states season episodes, to develop an agricul- a California State His- border. CCHS Presi- in 1912). The study de- “The Immigrants,” tural base from which toric Park in 1909, Fort dent Bill Cavaliere termined that upward imagines his life in to supply its Alaskan Ross [fortross.org] cen- emceed the dedication of 500 American In- New York and the concerns, the Russians ters on a reproduction ceremony, which drew dian, Alaska Native beginning of his jour- began building Fort of the Russian-era fort some 200 onlookers and Native Hawaiian ney to infamy in New Ross in what would of 200 years ago. and included such guest children died while Mexico Territory. speakers as state Sena- attending the schools. tor David M. Gowan, state Representative Candie Sweetser, Chiricahua Apache Nation Attorney Gen- eral Bill Tooahyaysay Bradford, former Chiri- cahua Apache Na- tion President Saenz and Medal of Honor historian Michael C. Eberhardt. 14 WILD WEST A U T U M N 2 0 2 2
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INTERVIEW FACT MEETS LEGEND IN THE OLD WEST AUTHOR W. MICHAEL FARMER’S DEEP RESEARCH SOMETIMES LEADS HIM TO WRITE BOTH A HISTORY AND A NOVEL ABOUT THE SUBJECT AT HAND BY CANDY MOULTON Author W. Michael Farmer believes the story How did you approach writing lines of his historical novels should adhere to from Geronimo’s point of view? known facts, as such an approach “helps hold I put in hours of research into Apache culture the reader’s interest into what happened and and history. I read what George Wratten, the helps them ask good questions about the his- famous interpreter for the Army with Apaches tory.” At times that belief has led him to write in captivity, had Geronimo saying in English to, companion books—a history and a novel—on for example, Generals George Crook and Nel- the same topic. Farmer based his first novel, son Miles, Teddy Roosevelt and artist Elbridge Hombrecito’s War, on the unsolved 1896 mur- Ayer Burbank and at church services when he ders of New Mexico Territory legislator and decided to become a Christian. I learned what attorney Albert Jennings Fountain and his a terrifically complex and fascinating character 8-year-old son, Henry. To that historical plot- Geronimo was. I wanted my readers to under- line, however, the author added a fictional stand his humanity, why he thought the way he Apache character. More recently, Farmer published his history did, and to see things as he saw them. To tell his story from his point Geronimo: Prisoner of Lies, Twenty-Three Years as a Prisoner of War, of view was the most straightforward way to convey his humanity, 1886–1909 (2019), followed by his novel The Odyssey of Geronimo warts and all, and I wanted the history in the story to be accurate. (2020), and he is working on other books focused on Apache stories both historical and fictional. How do you rate Geronimo as a tactician? Geronimo was a brilliant and fearless tactician, but he some- What prompted you to research times made very bad judgment calls. For example, when he and and write about Apaches? Juh (chief of the Nednhi Chiricahuas, with strongholds in northern When I wrote my first novel, about the Fountain murders, I used Mexico) left San Carlos in September 1881, they had over 375 peo- a Mescalero tribal policeman character, Yellow Boy, as the prac- ple with them and crossed the border with the loss of two men, two tically invisible man who saved the child [Henry Fountain], women and three children while being chased by hundreds of cav- became his mentor and taught him much about the world. alry and Apache scouts from San Carlos. Six months later Geroni- To develop Yellow Boy’s character, I started researching the mo led the warriors who forced about 350 of Loco’s people out culture and history of the Mescaleros. It was an eye-opening of San Carlos and got them to the border while again being chased experience, especially when I realized how different Apache by hundreds of cavalry and Apache scouts, and again he lost no culture is from that of the Plains Indians. The deeper I got into more than five or six people. After they crossed the border, he let researching the Apaches, the more I wanted to know. In the them stop and rest, against the advice of Chato, Naiche and Kay- process I discovered that if you want to understand Apache tennae. Geronimo assumed the cavalry wouldn’t cross the border history, you must first understand their culture. (legally they couldn’t), but the cavalry crossed the border anyway and two days later attacked them in a seven-hour fight that killed What intrigued you about the Fountain murders? 14 warriors and several women. The next day the Apaches were What happened to the Fountains is a great mystery, and like ambushed by Mexican soldiers waiting for them at Aliso Creek. most folks in New Mexico, I was curious about their disappear- Most of the Apaches escaped after another long day of fighting ance. In the introduction to [his 1958 novel] Warlock Oakley between two parallel arroyos—one filled with Apaches, the other Hall said that the business of fiction is to find the truth, not the with Mexicans. But Loco lost nearly 40 percent of his people— facts. I decided to write a fictional story about the murders that most of them women and children—in the two days of fighting. might give me some insight into who the murderers were after I read [C.L.] Sonnichsen’s [1960] book Tularosa, which gave In 1886, after Geronimo and Naiche broke away from those [suspect] Oliver Lee the benefit of the doubt, whereas Leon who surrendered to General Crook in late March, they had 18 Metz, in his biography of Pat Garrett, claimed Lee was guilty. men and 22 women and children. The army under General I never intended to write a novel, just a story of maybe 10,000– Miles chased them across southern Arizona and northern Sonora 20,000 words for my own benefit that might give me a good for five months with 5,000 soldiers. The Mexican military chased idea of who the murderers were. I started writing and research- them with 3,000 soldiers in Sonora and Chihuahua, and there ing. When I finished the story, it was 18,000 words, and I had were numerous civilian posses on both sides of the border. The learned how much I enjoyed writing. Apaches didn’t lose a single warrior captured or killed during the five months before Geronimo and his warriors surrendered. 1 6 WILD WEST A U T U M N 2 0 2 2
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WESTERNERS TONY SAPIENZA COLLECTION DAM DEFENDER DEITZ Born in Winneconne, Wis., on April 3, 1861, John F. Deitz (or Dietz) is remembered alter- nately as an outlaw or folk hero in state lore due to his yearslong land rights dispute with the Chippe- wa Lumber & Boom Co. In 1904 he began demanding a toll for logs sluiced down the Thornapple River through the existing Cameron Dam, which abutted his property south- east of Winter, in northwest Wis- consin. Contesting his ownership claim to the dam, the lumber com- pany sicced the law on Deitz. The landowner successfully resisted arrest for six years, fending off lawmen and company men alike at gunpoint, though a deputy and two of Deitz’s own children were wounded during various confronta- tions. The press largely portrayed Deitz as a common man fighting corporate greed, while others saw him as little more than a trigger- happy lawbreaker. Things came to a head on Oct. 8, 1910, when a sheriff’s posse surrounded the family home, and a gun battle ensued. Deputy Oscar Harp was killed before Deitz surrendered. “John seems very self-assured, even though behind bars,” says Tony Sapienza, who bought this undated real photo postcard several years ago. “I found the little girl (his daughter?) interesting. Also note that part of the pinkie on his right hand is gone, and his left hand appears to be in a cast.” Charged with murder, Deitz was tried, convicted and sentenced to life imprisonment. In 1921 Wis- consin Governor John J. Blaine, bowing to public pressure, pardoned the “Defender of Cameron Dam.” Deitz died in Milwaukee three years later. The family farmstead and dam have long since disappeared. 1 8 WILD WEST A U T U M N 2 0 2 2
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GUNFIGHTERS & LAWMEN Bob Olinger poses beside a seated James Dolan, whose faction he sided with amid the 1878 Lincoln County War. In 1879 Sheriff Pat Garrett appointed Olinger one of his deputies. Two years later Billy the Kid killed the deputy. of information about Lincoln County War figures she knew personally. The Kid’s life story had another chapter after he killed Dep- uties Olinger and James W. Bell while escap- ing from the Lincoln County Courthouse on April 28, 1881. Not so Olinger. His body was reportedly taken to Fort Stanton and there in- terred without ceremony. Popular belief, old photos, magazine articles and local legend all suggest he is buried at the back of the old Fort Stanton Cemetery. If there ever was a marker on the slain deputy’s grave, it has long since disappeared. Ameredith Robert B. Olinger was prob- ably born in 1850 (other sources say 1841) in Carroll County, Ind. By 1856 his family had migrated west to Delaware, Polk County, Iowa, moving again in 1858 to Mound City, Linn County, Kansas Territory. After that came moves to Indian Territory (present-day Oklahoma), Texas and, in 1876, New Mexico Territory. While serving a stint as marshal of the rough-and-tumble Lincoln County town of Seven Rivers, Bob killed two men in gam- bling disputes on separate occasions. Olinger participated in the 1878 Lincoln County War as a member of the Lawrence Murphy–James Dolan faction. (Billy fought for the opposing faction headed by John Tunstall, Alexander McSween and John Chisum.) Months later Olinger gunned down one Bob Jones amid NO REST FOR a rivalry stemming from another gambling ‘BULLY BOB’ dispute, though county authorities dismissed a murder charge against him in October 1879. That same month Pat Garrett was elected Lincoln County sheriff and appointed Bob BOB OLINGER, THE TORMENTING DEPUTY one of his deputies. Olinger’s reputation as SHERIFF SHOT DOWN BY BILLY THE KID IN 1881, a “bully with a badge” mostly stems from his LIES IN AN UNMARKED NEW MEXICO GRAVE nasty treatment of the Kid while Billy was Garrett’s prisoner in Lincoln. Billy got his re- B BY BRANDON DICKSON venge that fateful day in April 1881 when he blasted Bob with his own shotgun, killing him ob Olinger is the bully we all love to hate. A favorite recurring instantly. The deputy faded into history, as did ROBERT G. MCCUBBIN COLLECTION/OLD WEST EVENTS scene in big-screen Hollywood Westerns depicts the contempt- the whereabouts of his grave. His end is where ible deputy getting his just desserts from the muzzle of a shotgun my curiosity began. wielded by Billy the Kid in Lincoln, New Mexico Territory, in 1881. After reading about Olinger’s probable Such depictions invariably focus on the lawman’s personality flaws. It’s worth burial location, I went on a hunt in Fort Stan- noting, however, he had managed to win the undying love of one Lily Casey, ton. Alert to my old enemies, snakes, I ex- to whom he was reportedly engaged at the time of his murder. An early resident of amined existing headstones in the old post Lincoln, Casey (married name Lily Klasner) fondly recalled their romance in her cemetery. While nothing definitive popped posthumously published 1972 memoir My Girlhood Among Outlaws, a veritable trove up, two distinctly different graves toward the 2 0 WILD WEST A U T U M N 2 0 2 2
GUNFIGHTERS & LAWMEN back of the burial ground stood out. They matched he remains buried at Fort Stanton. But where if not Left: This slab marks the the scant available information, so I thought it in Plot No. 69? Walter offered another possibility. spot outside the Lincoln would be an easy search. Little did I imagine it County Courthouse, in would turn into a monthslong investigation. Within a half mile of Fort Stanton are several Lincoln, N.M., where long-forgotten historic sites Walter has since redis- Olinger (misspelled on Along the way I crossed paths with several inter- covered and documented. Among them is a ceme- the marker) fell after the esting people. At present-day Fort Stanton Historic tery in use around the time Olinger was buried in Kid shot the deputy with Site, managed by the state, I spoke with Ranger spring 1881. Today only scattered stones remain to his own shotgun. Above: Javier Trost about Olinger’s grave. He in turn put mark its boundaries. It is a lonesome place, with a While it has long been me in contact with Kenneth Walter of the New beautiful view of the distant Sierra Blanca. Though thought Olinger is buried Mexico Department of Cultural Affairs, whose records are lacking, it’s possible Olinger was in- in the old Fort Stanton knowledge of Fort Stanton history is unmatched. stead buried there. If so, his body lies alongside Cemetery, a half mile from Walter has researched burial records, autopsy rec- dozens of others in unmarked, untended graves. the fort is this abandoned ords, maps, surveys, patient rolls, soldier deaths, Trying to find and identify his remains in that ghost cemetery. Might Olinger military burial removals, cemetery records and cemetery would take far more extensive research be buried here instead? just about everything else on paper about the and plenty of luck. Perhaps somewhere (in some- TOP: BRANDON DICKSON; ABOVE: DANIEL MAYER, CC BY-SA 3.0 site and its history. He’s also mapped and photo- one’s attic or a storage bin at Fort Stanton) there graphed almost every inch of the fort and sur- is a record book, report or survey that lists the rounding grounds. internees and their respective locations. While playing phone tag with Walter, I got a Meanwhile, the mystery of where Bob Olinger text from Steve Sederwall, a former lies remains unsolved. No matter where old Bob federal officer and onetime mayor rests—the old Fort Stanton Cemetery, the aban- of Capitan, N.M., who has long been doned cemetery discovered by Walter or another interested in the Billy the Kid story. location—it is undoubtedly an unmarked grave. (He once tried to prove the Kid had I hope to one day discover and mark the spot, not been killed in Fort Sumner, New for no matter his faults, the slain deputy deserves Mexico Territory, on July 14, 1881.) more than his legacy of meanness. It turned out Sederwall was also inter- ested in pinpointing Olinger’s grave. Agreeing that any lawman killed in the line of duty deserves a grave marker and should not be forgotten, we arranged to meet with Walter together. To that meeting Walter brought not only books, surveys, letters and reports with burial details but also documents specifying who was buried where in the cemetery. Complicating matters was the fact that in 1896 the Army had moved soldiers’ graves from recently deactivated Fort Stanton to Santa Fe National Cemetery, and records of that reinterment effort are spotty or nonexistent. Sederwall and I had noted widespread disturbance on the grounds of the post cemetery, but had Olinger’s remains also been moved? According to a map of the old Fort Stanton Cem- etery, Olinger rests in Plot No. 69. But period records indicate an Army colonel was buried in that plot until reinterred in Santa Fe. Neighboring Plot No. 71 holds the remains of Murphy-Dolan gunman Charlie “Lallacooler” Crawford, who was shot on July 17, 1878, amid the five-day Battle of Lincoln (the climactic event of the war) and died a week later at the Fort Stanton hospital. But his grave, too, lacks a marker. Other records are con- tradictory and incomplete, and distances between graves do not match those shown on maps. Most likely the Army did not disturb Bob’s grave, and A U T U M N 2 0 2 2 WILD WEST 2 1
PIONEERS & SETTLERS In 1841 St. Croix native William Leidesdorff arrived in Yerba Buena (the town renamed San Francisco on Jan. 30, 1847) as captain of the merchant schooner Julia Ann. When his employer sold the ship, Leidesdorff himself became a merchant in the Mexican settlement. A SURPRISING FATHER OF SAN FRANCISCO WILLIAM LEIDESDORFF, OF DUTCH AND AFRICAN ANCESTRY, CAME TO PROMINENCE BEFORE THE CALIFORNIA GOLD RUSH BY RAMON VASCONCELLOS President James K. Polk’s journal entry of Jan. 20, 1849, describes how during a Cabinet meeting (which would be renamed San Francisco on Jan. 30, 1847), earlier that day members read dispatches sent east a recently declared citizen of Mexico and local businessman who in 1845, with Polk’s authority, was made sub-consul for by U.S. officials in the unorganized territory of that port city. Leidesdorff would prove an indispensable liaison California. “Several communications represent the increased in the near term. richness of the gold region recently discovered in California,” The appointment was unique on two fronts. First, the State the president noted. One dispatch Polk mentions came from a Department had never granted such a title, though Larkin be- “Mr. Larkin, formerly U.S. consul at Monterey.” When acting lieved he had the right to do so. Second, Leidesdorff, though as U.S. consul to Mexico prior to the Mexican War, Thomas light-skinned, was of Danish-African descent. Despite his repu- O. Larkin had instructions from the Polk administration to tation as both a respected citizen and business owner, disclo- support insurrection against the Mexican government but not sure of his ethnicity likely would have derailed his nomination provoke any such activity. or, once appointed, compelled him to forfeit his position. Prior to the war the president had made manifest the United Leidesdorff’s unblemished, short-term ascendancy to promi- States intended to acquire California. Furthermore, many Cali- nence in pre–Gold Rush California began when he arrived in BANCROFT LIBRARY, UC BERKELEY fornians supported annexation. If hostilities did arise, however, the port city of Yerba Buena in 1841. A native of the island of Larkin understood he would need to have established formal St. Croix, in the Danish West Indies (present-day U.S. Virgin communications with prominent officials, either in government Islands), born out of wedlock on Oct. 23, 1810, to a Danish or business, in proximity to the capital at Monterey. Among father and mulatto mother, he benefited from prevailing legal those he contacted was William Leidesdorff of Yerba Buena custom that demanded mixed-race offspring be afforded prop- 2 2 WILD WEST A U T U M N 2 0 2 2
PIONEERS & SETTLERS BANCROFT LIBRARY, UC BERKELEY erty and education through the settlement in Alaska, one of his Leidesdorff was born out father. It appears his father, man- ports of call when he captained of wedlock on Oct. 23, ager of a sugar plantation, ad- the Julia Ann), was too slow for 1810, to a Danish father hered to such social conventions, round-the-clock shipping. The and mulatto mother. He for when the grown son arrived would-be entrepreneur scrapped became a commercial in New Orleans, he proved quite the idea. success in pre–Gold Rush book-learned and highly literate. California and during the By 1834 Leidesdorff had filed During the Mexican War Lei- Mexican War played a naturalization papers in Lou- desdorff played a pivotal role key role in foreign policy. isiana and found work in New in foreign policy. In June 1846, Orleans as captain of a commer- as fighting broke out between On being cial vessel. His route took him Mexico and the United States, granted from New Orleans to New York, he provided key intelligence mexican then back south, with an over- to the United States about the citizenship land portage through Panama, to Bear Flag insurgents in Sonoma. in 1844, he Hawaii (then known as the Sand- Through Leidesdorff, Larkin received wich Islands) and on to Califor- was informed of Major John C. a 35,000- nia. On Leidesdorff’s arrival in Yerba Buena on Frémont’s return to California acre the schooner Julia Ann in 1841, his employer sold and the success of the Bear Flaggers in capturing grant the ship. Fishing about for an occupation, Leides- Sonoma. Believing Mexico City intended to drive on the dorff became a merchant in the settlement. Americans out of all Mexico, the rebels captured american Governor Mariano Vallejo and proclaimed the river near He was quick to prosper. Proceeds of tallow and short-lived California Republic. “[The rebels],” sutter’s hide sales generated by Leidesdorff’s mercantile Leidesdorff reported, “have 300 stand of arms, fort business enabled him to purchase land for specula- including rifles, muskets, carbines and pistols in tion and development. On being granted Mexican their garrison of Sonoma…[and] will use them with citizenship in 1844, he received a 35,000-acre grant terrible effect.” In a confidential June 17 letter he on the American River near Sutter’s Fort he named also cautioned Larkin that some in the revolt might Rancho Río de los Americanos after the river. be considered enemies of the United States and should be replaced. Leidesdorff and German-born neighbor Captain Leidesdorff seemed impressed with the gains Johann August “John” Sutter became commercial made by the insurgents and noted the detail and associates. So significant was the volume of their significance of the ensign they carried. “Their business that in partial payment of a $2,198 debt banner,” he wrote Larkin, “is a white field with owed to Leidesdorff in 1846 Sutter offered “se- a red border, a large star and a grisly [sic ] bear.” lected Indians…which will be of some service to The components he dubbed the “Flag of Young you.” Indian slavery was customary at the time in California” were later incorporated into the state parts of Mexican California, though it is unclear flag. In his memoirs Larkin reflected how import- whether Leidesdorff accepted the bondspersons ant Leidesdorff’s correspondences were toward in lieu of payment. keeping him apprised of events in northern Mexico at the outset of the war. By the mid-1840s Leidesdorff’s property hold- In the same 1849 journal entry mentioning Lar- ings in Yerba Buena had grown to 360 lots. Among kin, President Polk remarked how the discovery his more noteworthy real estate developments was of gold had fostered a “state of anarchy and con- the settlement’s first luxury lodging, the City Hotel, fusion” in California, and that in the absence of built in 1846 at the corner of Clay and Kearny government there was “no security for life, liberty streets. The hotel hosted prominent clientele as well or property.” Sadly, Leidesdorff, whose ranch bor- as the city’s first recorded celebration of Thanks- dered Sutter’s Mill, would not live to reap the fi- giving, in 1847, in what was at the time unofficially nancial awards stemming from this “anarchy,” for U.S. territory. he died of typhoid fever on May 18, 1848. In 1998, on the sesquicentennial of his death, San Francisco That same year Leidesdorff purchased from the officials memorialized him with a plaque recogniz- Russian American Co. a vessel with which he hoped ing his service as a city councilman and treasurer to provide the first steamship transportation be- and for having co-founded the city’s first public tween Yerba Buena and the Sacramento River school. A stretch of U.S. 50 bordering the site of Valley. No one had yet utilized steamships for his former 35,000-acre ranch is named the William commercial purposes in California, let alone sailed Alexander Leidesdorff Jr. Memorial Highway. one on San Francisco Bay. Unfortunately, a test run showed that Leidesdorff’s boat, the 37-foot- 11-inch Sitka (reportedly named after the Russian A U T U M N 2 0 2 2 WILD WEST 2 3
WESTERN ENTERPRISE ACROSS THE WIDE MISSISSIPPI JAMES BUCHANAN EADS SPENT HIS LIFE ON THE MIGHTY RIVER, AND HIS GREATEST ACCOMPLISHMENT WAS TO BRIDGE IT A BY JIM WINNERMAN s westward migration through not to mention dilute the dependence of commerce St. Louis resumed in earnest after on their steamboats. Meanwhile, Chicago interests the Civil War, the Mississippi River were lobbying for railroads to branch north through became an increasingly vexatious their city, required easements on the Illinois side impediment to the transport of people, wagons, of the river appeared prohibitive, and proposals animals and supplies to the expanding settle- for federal funding failed. ments beyond. The manpower required to un- The practical challenges of constructing a bridge load a train on the east bank, transfer cargo to a across “Old Man River” particularly intrigued self- ferryboat for the crossing and then load the cargo JAMES BUCHANAN taught civil engineer James Buchanan Eads. Born in onto a westbound train was time consuming and EADS Lawrenceburg, Ind., on May 23, 1820, and named expensive. Furthermore, the river was impass- for his mother’s cousin James Buchanan, the future TOP: LIBRARY OF CONGRESS; LEFT: MISSOURI HISTORICAL SOCIETY able when the water was low or frozen, sometimes delaying U.S. president, Eads grew up in St. Louis and had spent his life the transport of supplies for weeks. on the river. Before the war he had invented salvage boats with Since 1839 various entities had floated the idea of spanning which to recover cargo from sunken steamboats, and during the the river with a bridge at St. Louis. That discussion intensified war he’d designed a class of ironclad riverboats for the Union. when the Ohio & Mississippi Railroad (later absorbed by the In 1867, under the auspices of the newly formed Illinois & St. Baltimore & Ohio Railroad) reached East St. Louis in 1857 and Louis Bridge Co., Eads applied his book knowledge and experi- tracks fanned out from both banks of the river. Then the Civil ence to draw up plans. His proposal called for a bridge with three War intervened. The idea resurfaced in its wake, but planners graceful spans, each supported by four ribbed arches more than faced several obstacles. Riverboatmen were vociferous in their 500 feet long—twice the length of any complete bridge yet con- concern a bridge would impede safe passage on the Mississippi, structed. Furthermore, he proposed the first use of alloy steel in 2 4 WILD WEST A U T U M N 2 0 2 2
WESTERN ENTERPRISE James Eads (1820–87) spent his early life on FIFTEEN MILES OF MARCHING MEN, PRANCING HORSES AND DECORATED the Mississippi and in adulthood bridged the WAGONS HAVE DELIGHTED TWO HUNDRED THOUSAND SPECTATORS mighty river. On July 4, 1874, after a tireless seven-year construction project, officials and The bridge, the paper gushed, had been “christened the scientific feat of residents of St. Louis gathered to dedicate the the country…baptized with water from the four quarters of the republic.” landmark span in this Currier & Ives lithograph. The editors slavishly lavished praise on readers, proclaiming, “The genius and money of [St. Louis’] citizens have built a bridge the like of which the a major construction project and insisted on sink- world of capital and science never before dreamed of.” Eads’ name is con- ing the bridge foundations into bedrock. It would spicuously absent from the report. also be among the first large spans built using the cantilever principle. That construction approach In retrospect, the self-taught engineer was the obvious choice of a man to extends the deck of a bridge horizontally over the build the bridge. His love of and respect for the Mississippi was reportedly river while supported at only one end, allowing kindled during an 1833 steamboat passage with his family. While the vessel river traffic to pass beneath even as the bridge was made its way upriver, the young teen roamed from pilothouse to paddle wheel, being built. enamored with everything he saw. As it arrived in St. Louis, however, the steamboat caught fire and sank, losing it valuable cargo, including the Eads In 1868 Eads presented company directors with family possessions. James was forced to leave school and earn a living. Six a detailed report intended to quell any skepticism. years later, while working as a clerk aboard the steamboat Knickerbocker, Eads In it he delved into existing theories of stress and was forced to scramble to safety again as a snag ripped open the bow, claiming strain, materials and building methods, explaining that unlucky vessel and its cargo of lead. in depth the innovative concepts in his proposal. The report met with widespread approval from Recognizing there was money to be made salvaging lost cargo from such engineers and scientific journals worldwide, and sunken vessels, Eads began mulling ways to do it. By the tender age of 22, with Eads earned the necessary approval from Congress the help of investors, he had designed and built salvage boats and specialized to begin work. diving equipment he personally used to recover cargo from the fast-flowing river, a risky endeavor that brought financial success. In time he developed At the height of the project two dozen boats vessels and equipment with which to raise entire boats from the river bottom. and some 1,500 men were employed to build the bridge. Eads hit his first benchmark in early Feb- During the Civil War President Abraham Lincoln enlisted Eads to design ruary 1870 when the first caisson reached bedrock a class of ironclad warships for riverine combat. Eads’ seven gunboats proved some 95 feet underwater, an accomplishment sig- decisive in several battles along the Mississippi and Tennessee rivers, including naled with cannon fire and steamboat whistles. the pivotal Vicksburg campaign. After seven years of construction the 6,442-foot landmark span was dedicated on July 4, 1874, the Concurrent to his ambitious project to span the Mississippi, Eads worked 98th anniversary of American Independence. The on a plan to open the shipping channel at the mouth of the river south of New St. Louis Post-Dispatch trumpeted the ceremony Orleans. As the broad river emptied into the Gulf of New Mexico, deposited in banner headlines: silt continually choked the passage. Eads designed a system of jetties that narrowed the main outlet, enabling the fast-moving current to cut deep enough to grant vessels reliable year-round access to the river. That project had a mon- umental positive impact on trade in New Orleans with benefits realized to this day. In gratitude Louisiana authorities named the spit of land at the southern- most extent of the river Port Eads, today marked by a lighthouse and little else. One idea Eads had that never materialized was an alternative to the haz- ardous passage of ships around the tip of South America at Cape Horn. His innovative proposal was to transport ships by railway across Mexico’s 120-mile-wide Isthmus of Tehuantepec. The plans called for sliding a 350-foot- long flatbed car—with adjusting rams that formed a cradle to accommodate any hull—beneath a waiting ship in a 450-foot-long dry dock. Once the vessel was secured to the flatbed, powerful locomotives on three parallel sets of tracks would pull the ship onto dry land and across the isthmus. Through the mid-1880s Eads pressed both Congress and the Mexican government for approval to no avail. (The 1914 opening of the Panama Canal finally addressed the problem.) But the inventor remained undeterred. By the time of his death on March 8, 1887, Eads had filed more than 50 patents. In 1949, after 75 years of service, engineers used modern electromagnetic strain gauges to test the strength of the Eads Bridge. They determined that its designer’s estimated allowable load of 3,000 pounds per foot could be raised to 5,000 pounds per foot, and the graceful span over the Mississippi has remained in daily use ever since. Present-day St. Louis may be known as the “Gateway to the West,” but it was Eads who built a lasting bridge to the West. A U T U M N 2 0 2 2 WILD WEST 2 5
ART OF THE WEST S.D. Nelson (below, putting up meat the traditional way), an enrolled member of the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe, painted the acrylic-on-Masonite Hanbleceya— The Vision in 2021. It appears in Crazy Horse and Custer: Born Enemies (Abrams), his dual biography for young adult readers. BRINGING LAKOTA TOP: CRAZY HORSE MEMORIAL, THE INDIAN MUSEUM OF NORTH AMERICA; LEFT: COURTESY S.D. NELSON CULTURE TO LIFE AUTHOR AND ILLUSTRATOR S.D. NELSON the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe, Nelson has EDUCATES AND ENTERTAINS YOUNG READERS WITH lived most of his life off the reservation and works out of a home studio in Flagstaff, HIS COLORFUL PAINTINGS AND NARRATIVE STYLE Ariz. But, as the author puts it, “My blood roots run deep.” He learned about Lakota W BY JOHNNY D. BOGGS traditions from his mother’s family. riter, illustrator and former public school art teacher S.D. Nelson has devoted his talents to teaching young people about Lakota “As a boy I discovered that the prairies history, culture and traditions through such award-winning chil- of Dakota are only earth and sky,” Nelson dren’s books as Sitting Bull: Lakota Warrior and Defender of His People, says. “All is buffalo grass and clouds, for- Red Cloud: A Lakota Story of War and Surrender and the Lakota Story series, including ever. It is a land of brutal beauty, where terri- Black Elk’s Vision, Gift Horse and The Star People (Abrams Publishers). His latest offering is the 2021 double biography Crazy Horse and Custer: Born Enemies. Nelson draws inspiration from his own family heritage. His grandmother and mother were born and raised on the Standing Rock Indian Reservation, which straddles the central border of North and South Dakota. An enrolled member of 2 6 WILD WEST A U T U M N 2 0 2 2
TOP RIGHT: NATIONAL MUSEUM OF THE AMERICAN INDIAN, SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION; RIGHT: S.D. NELSON ART OF THE WEST Above: In his acrylic- on-board Sundancers —Wiwanyang Wacipi Nelson depicts a tradi- tional Sun Dance cere- mony. This illustration also appears in Crazy Horse and Custer: Born Enemies. Left: Nelson’s great-grandfather Wil- liam Presley Zahn poses with his wife, Kezewin (Nelson’s great-grand- mother), and their child- ren at the Standing Rock Indian Reservation circa 1899. The girl at far right is Nelson’s grandmother Josephine Zahn Pleets. A U T U M N 2 0 2 2 WILD WEST 2 7
ART OF THE WEST Above: In Victory at the Little Bighorn triumphant S.D. NELSON (2) Plains Indians sport some of the spoils of their June 1876 defeat of Lt. Col. George Custer and the 7th U.S. Cavalry, including horses, the uniform jackets of dead bluecoats and a regimental guidon. Left: Nelson depicts The End of Custer. The artist’s great- grandfather Zahn (see P. 27) was a foot soldier for Custer during the 1874 Black Hills Expedition. ble battles were fought—hand to hand—and where at twilight the song of Sister Meadowlark will make your heart cry. My mother, Christine (Elk Tooth Woman) told me coyote stories about the Trickster. I learned that the stars were the spirits of my an- cestors, that my great-great-grandfather Mahpiya Kiny’An (Flying Cloud) still rode his snorting horse along the White Road of the Milky Way. “If I looked carefully, Mom said, I would see the Great Bear and the Star That Does Not Turn (the North Star). She told me the Life Force, or the Great Mystery, is named Wakan Tanka, that all of creation—the four-legged beings, the tall stand- ing trees, even the wind—has a spirit and is alive.” Western Writers of America and other organi- zations have recognized his beautifully illustrated and narrated books with multiple awards. Long before he discovered writing, however, Nelson 2 8 WILD WEST A U T U M N 2 0 2 2
ART OF THE WEST TOP LEFT: GALLUP CULTURAL CENTER; ABOVE AND RIGHT: NATIONAL MUSEUM OF THE AMERICAN INDIAN, SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION (2) teaching art at public schools in North Dakota Clockwise from top left: and Arizona. There Is a Pipe That Is Sacred (featured artist These days Nelson, who relies on personal ex- print, 1997 Inter-Tribal perience and research before tackling a subject, Pow Wow, Gallup, N.M.); doesn’t just illustrate books. His original works an illustration of the horse grace the collections of Montana’s Little Bighorn dance ceremony from Battlefield National Monument, the National Mu- his 2010 Abrams book seum of the American Indian in Washington, D.C., Black Elk’s Vision: A the North Dakota Heritage Center & State Museum Lakota Story; and Mani- in Bismarck, among other museums and galleries. fest Destiny—Smallpox, His illustrations have appeared in magazines and a ledger drawing (on other writers’ books, and he provided the cover paper, ink, Prismacolor, illustration for the Black Lodge Singers’ Grammy- pastel, acrylic) used as an nominated CD More Kids’ Pow-Wow Songs. illustration in Crazy Horse and Custer: Born Enemies. Traditional Lakota ledger art informs Nelson’s loved art. He traces that passion back to 1957–58, artistic style. He renders most of his illustrations when his mother took private oil-painting lessons with acrylic paint on primed rigid particle board. from a German artist. “I brush, splatter, spray, drip and sponge,” he ex- plains. When does he know a painting is finished? “I was a 7-year-old kid with a front-row seat to Hopefully, that’s when his schoolteacher training the whole process of easel painting,” Nelson recalls. kicks in. “I watched with fascination as she mixed colors on an artist’s palette and spread paint on a blank can- “I can tell you it is easier for an art teacher to vas, turning a flat surface into the illusion of cloud- see when his student’s painting is finished,” Nelson filled skies, mountains, pine forests reflected in admits. “I have often told students, ‘Stop. Your lakes and still lifes of fruit and flowers. The magi- painting is finished. Don’t overwork it.’ Artists cal process of illustration inspired this young boy.” must be mindful of when their brushstrokes have completed their work. Knowing when to stop is That led in turn to an art degree from Minnesota a challenge. The process of writing helps the artist State University Moorhead, followed by a career become a better illustrator, and illustrating im- proves one’s writing. I believe one should not overstate their message. When you have crossed the finish line, stop running.” A U T U M N 2 0 2 2 WILD WEST 2 9
INDIAN LIFE Fourteen-acre Monks Mound anchors the site of Cahokia, the largest Mississippian culture city, east of present-day St. Louis. Below: This effigy pipe of a male figure known as Resting Warrior or Big Boy is from Spiro Mounds, in eastern Oklahoma. THE MOUND BUILDERS CAHOKIA AND OTHER IMPRESSIVE CITIES OF THE MISSISSIPPIAN CULTURE ROSE AND FELL BEFORE THE ARRIVAL OF CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS T BY MIKE COPPOCK iming was everything for Christopher basic religious tenets, such as their concept of a sun god. Columbus and the handful of Europeans They also indulged in high-stakes gaming and gambling. who initially followed in his wake after Their cities became the springboards for familial the Italian explorer “sailed the ocean blue in 1492.” dynastic ambitions. Had such bold men crossed the Atlantic a scant seven The largest of these cities was Cahokia, with an decades earlier, they would have encountered, instead estimated peak population approaching 20,000. of scattered, primitive tribes, a civilization more than Sprawling across 6 square miles on the east bank capable of halting their European intrusion into of the Mississippi River immediately opposite the New World. present-day St. Louis, Mo., the city encom- For more than a millennium the intercon- passed some 120 earthen mounds. Today nected peoples of the Mississippian culture built 2,200-acre Cahokia Mounds State Historic TOP: MATTHEW GUSH/ALAMY STOCK PHOTO; LEFT: UNIVERSITY OF ARKANSAS MUSEUM cities, warred and traded across the trail systems Site centers on the largest surviving Mississip- and rivers lacing what today is the eastern half of the United pian earthwork, Monks Mound, which stands 100 feet high and States. The loose confederation comprised upward of 3 million occupies 14 acres. Its size is all the more remarkable when one people from some 60 different tribes speaking more than 30 considers the millions of cubic feet of earth brought to the site languages and spanned from Virginia to the Rockies and the basketful by basketful. It was atop such mounds residents held Gulf of Mexico to the Great Lakes. The civilization dominated religious ceremonies, proffered offerings and human sacrifices the region from roughly 700 to 1420. and interred the bodies of deceased nobles. Farmers, tradesmen Mississippians initially settled along the major rivers in the and commoners alike built their homes—simple thatched huts— Midwest and Southeast, where they developed fortified settle- adjacent to these ceremonial mounds, while secondary plazas ments with protective palisades, broad plazas and large earthen on the fringes of each settlement served as farmers markets. mounds. Though primarily farmers, they were also exceptional Cahokia manufactured ornaments and other trade objects potters and metalworkers, primarily in copper. Warfare among crafted from stone, shell, bone and copper, as well as daggers, the disparate tribes was continual, but they did share certain maces and other weapons renowned across the Mississippian 3 0 WILD WEST A U T U M N 2 0 2 2
INDIAN LIFE HERB ROE world. Such were must-have items among the nobility of other or sleep, they would dance, sing and wait for planting instruc- cities, including Spiro and Natchez, for the Cahokians were tions from the priests. trendsetters. Their goods spread across North America, speak- ing to a robust trade system that returned to these cities hoes Around the turn of the 15th century crop yields began to of stone and bison bone from the Great Plains, copper from decrease in Spiro and other cities across the Mississippian world. Lake Superior and shells from the Gulf of Mexico. The Little Ice Age, which gripped Europe in cold, also took a toll in North America. At first Spiro traded for food with the cities in Yet, by the mid-14th century Cahokia had collapsed. There is warmer climes to the Southeast, until those cities also began to feel no evidence of an attack at the site, let alone conquest by another the pinch from a changing climate. The alarmed priests ultimately people. Many researchers believe the city simply could not sus- had Spiro evacuated, remaining behind in order to perform reli- tain itself at the size it had reached, so its people scattered. The gious rites in hopes of appeasing their god. Fleeing residents mi- broader Mississippian culture hung on another century or so. grated west and south to settle in neighboring communities, much like modern-day exoduses from major cities to suburban enclaves. From its 10th century origins Spiro, along the present-day Oklahoma-Arkansas border, evolved into an important reli- Researchers believe that around 1420 the Spiroan priests, gious and political center of the Mississippian culture. Primarily their efforts having failed to stem crop losses or stave off hunger, traders, the Spiroans established outposts along the great rivers decided to make a final grand spiritual appeal to their sun god. at which they exchanged pipes and pottery for buffalo hides, After having everything deemed religious brought to Spiro and meat and shoulder bones they used as plows. The Spiroans and ceremonially buried in the sacred mounds, the priests resumed surrounding peoples sustained themselves with harvests of corn, their religious rites for more than a year. beans and squash from the rich soil of alluvial floodplains. One distinguishing characteristic of the Spiroans was the deliberate But there was no turning back to better times. Crop failures deformation of their skulls. Shortly after giving birth, mothers became endemic, and the consequent drop in food supply made would tightly wrap animal skins around their babies’ heads, grad- it impossible to sustain large, concentrated populations. Out of ually transforming their skulls into conical, oblong shapes un- options, the Spiroans and other city-dwelling Mississippians dis- mistakable by other tribes even at a distance. It is thought they did persed into the surrounding countryside, forming smaller groups so to mark their status in society and familial or clan membership. and doing their best to survive. The collapse in many respects echoed the fall of the Roman empire. While Spiro’s population peaked at about 10,000 people, the winter and summer solstices drew thousands more for For the first time in centuries the disparate peoples of North three days of religious ceremonies. In Spiro’s Temple Plaza America returned to their tribal and seminomadic roots even as anywhere from 10,000 to 30,000 men could be found paying Spanish and French explorers began penetrating the continent. homage to their sun god, who spoke through the priests, telling Much of our knowledge of Mississippian culture derives from them when to plant their crops, how to conduct their cere- observations of the Grand Village of the Natchez, in the lower monies and other details of religious and everyday life. In prepa- Mississippi Valley, which survived well into the period of Euro- ration for such ceremonies, worshipers smoked sacred tobacco, pean colonization. While the people of Natchez resisted French drank a highly caffeinated purgative tea brewed from yaupon incursion, by 1731 they had been defeated and dispersed, some holly leaves they called the “black drink” and then promptly seeking refuge and blending into such well known tribes as the vomited up the contents. After three days without food, water Chickasaws, Cherokees and Muscogees (Creeks). Their bloodline survives, if not in name. An artist’s conception of Spiro, once home to 10,000 people who harvested corn, beans and squash from rich soil deposited by annual Arkansas River floods.
A Killer and a Lover The date is April 28, 1881. Billy the Kid has killed Deputies James Bell and Bob Olinger in Lincoln, New Mexico Terri- tory, and with cool deliberation rides away in Gary Ernest Smith’s oil painting Billy Leaves Town. Opposite: One of the Kid’s reputed lovers was Paulita Maxwell, and Joe Ciccarone depicts them as a couple in his black-and- white portrait Billy the Kid and Paulita.
RECOLLECTIONS OFTHE KID In the 1930s the Federal Writers’ Project recorded anecdotes about Billy the Kid—some undoubtedly spurious, others bearing the ring of truth With smoking six-guns By Mark Iacampo Billy the Kid blazed a path across American again, the Kid got his wish when shot down by the relentless Garrett on July 14, 1881, in friend Pete Maxwell’s bedroom at the latter’s folklore as wide as the Chisholm Trail. Fact family ranch in Fort Sumner (see P. 88). and fiction meld inscrutably in the tales of Stories of the Kid’s romances have also the young desperado in a tradition rumored made the rounds. Paulita Maxwell, a daugh- to have been started by Billy himself when ter of prominent rancher Lucien Bonaparte he claimed to have gunned down 21 men, Maxwell and sister to Pete, was popularly “One for every year of my life.” believed to have been one of Billy’s lovers. Countless books, articles and big- and Some even allege she was pregnant with small-screen productions have made the highlights of his Billy’s baby at the time Garrett gunned down the fugitive brief life common knowledge to even the most passive West- Kid in her older brother’s bedroom. Another rumored lover ern aficionado. Young Billy first broke jail in Silver City, of the man known as William Bonney was Sallie Lucy Chi- New Mexico Territory, in September 1875, killed a reputed sum, a niece of cattle baron John Chisum, although it is far bully in Arizona Territory in August 1877, then returned more likely they were just friends (see “Much Misunderstood OPPOSITE: GARY ERNEST SMITH/MEDICINE MAN GALLERY, TUCSON, ARIZ.; THIS PAGE: JOE CICCARONE to his adoptive territory. By that November he was riding Miss Chisum,” by David S. Turk with Sallie Lynn Chisum for English businessman/rancher John Tunstall in turbu- Robert, in the February 2018 Wild West). lent Lincoln County. When Tunstall was shot down in Feb- But other stories rarely make it into the history books, tales ruary 1878, the Kid and the other self-proclaimed Regula- of horse races, knife play, poker games and dances. Though tors sought revenge against his killers, setting off the Lincoln less dramatic than such events as the public shooting of County War. Things heated up on April 1 when Regulators Sheriff Brady or the ambush killing of Deputy Bob Olinger gunned down the county’s corrupt sheriff, William Brady, from a second-story window of the Lincoln County Court- then boiled over in July amid a five-day fight between the house or Billy’s alleged romances with Paulita and Sallie, such competing factions that culminated with the burning of anecdotes paint a more complete picture of the daring youth the McSween house and killing of businessman Alexander who captured the imagination of so many American readers. McSween. After the war the fugitive Kid, who had supported As part of the federal Works Projects Administration (WPA), McSween, elected to remain in the county. That unwise de- which between 1935 and ’43 put some 8.5 million people to cision led to Billy’s capture at Stinking Springs in December work to alleviate unemployment amid the Great Depression, 1880, followed by a busy April 1881 marked by the Kid’s the Federal Writers’ Project (FWP) sent hundreds of writers conviction for Brady’s murder at trial in Mesilla (see re- nationwide to record the life stories of a broad swath of Amer- lated story, P. 46) and his bold escape from the Lincoln icans. The resulting documents offer a unique glimpse into County Courthouse, during which he killed two of Sheriff the past, recording diverse facets of interviewees’ lives, from Pat Garrett’s deputies. Swearing never to be caught alive their occupations and religious practices to their political A U T U M N 2 0 2 2 WILD WEST 3 3
Among the Tall Tales laws was killed, and the other ran away. In the 1930s Elbert Croslin, who was born four years None of us were hurt.” after Billy was slain, related a story in which he was in Portales, New Mexico Territory, and nearly crossed In all fairness, decades had passed be- guns with a poker player a hotel proprietor warned him was the notorious Kid (second from left in this painting). tween the time of the alleged events and views and even their favorite meals. Amid the when Gomez related his story. As his- SATURNINO BACA fascinating tales of those who settled the West, torian Mills notes, however, Baca had alongside thrilling accounts of Indian raids and cattle rustling, is the occasional offhand reference finished his term as sheriff before Billy to Billy the Kid. ever arrived in Lincoln County. “The incident may well have occurred Not all such recollections should be accepted at face value, of course. “One of the perils of a while Baca was sheriff, but Billy wouldn’t have been involved,” Mills said. Kid/Lincoln County War historian,” explains one such historian, James Mills, “is having to So, was Gomez mistaken about the Kid’s involvement or wrong about differentiate between the realistic recollection of old-timers and where they got a little carried who was sheriff at the time? Either seems feasible. But Gomez had other away or their memory muddled in some cases.” clear recollections of Billy. “He used to practice target shooting a lot,” Case in point is a tale told by Francisco Go- mez, who was 83 years old when interviewed the old-timer recounted. “He would throw up a can and would twirl in 1938. Gomez had worked for the McSweens and claimed to have ridden with the Kid against his six-gun on his finger, and he could hit the can six times before it a pair of rowdies who shot up Lincoln. “[Civil War veteran] Captain [Saturnino] Baca was sher- hit the ground.” iff then,” Gomez said, “and some tough out- laws came to Lincoln and rode up and down the Interviewed by the FWP at age 82 in 1937, Annie E. Lesnett was TOP: SARA BLOODWOLF; ABOVE: ROBERT G. MCCUBBIN COLLECTION/OLD WEST EVENTS streets and shot out window lights in the houses married to a local storekeeper and hotelier and was the mother of two and terrorized people.” At Baca’s request, the young children at the time of the Lincoln County War. Acquainted with old-timer alleged, Billy led Gomez, José Chavez Billy, she corroborated his skill with firearms. “The Kid was one of the y Chavez and two other men on a hunt for the quickest, most accurate shots in the Southwest,” she recalled. “He often badmen. “The outlaws went to the upper Rui- said, however, that he wished he were as accurate with a six-gun as doso, and we followed them. We caught up with he was with a rifle. He was good with a pistol but excellent with a rifle.” them and shot it out with them. One of the out- According to Jack Robert Grigsby, who was born in Tyler, Texas, in 1854, orphaned as a boy and moved to Lincoln County when he was 16, Billy was just as adept with a knife. In a cattle camp near Hackberry, Texas, Grigsby looked on as the Kid got into a fight with a fellow hand that quickly turned violent. “Billy cut the Negro across the side of the face and down the back with a long butcher knife,” Grigsby recalled. The victim fled, then collapsed. As the wounded man pleaded for his life, the Kid snapped, “Oh, shut your damn mouth! I have already done all to you that I want to.” Billy’s reaction, as reported by Grigsby, coincides with other accounts of the Kid’s cool detachment. “Billy stood there and wiped 3 4 WILD WEST A U T U M N 2 0 2 2
the blood off of the knife with his hands…as unconcerned as if he hadn’t done a thing. But he left after that. He was afraid the officers would hear of this and would get him for other things he was wanted for.” The Kid certainly had a fearsome reputa- tion. George Bede, who arrived in New Mexi- co Territory in 1877 and worked on Chisum’s Jinglebob Ranch near Roswell for five years, had regular interactions with Billy. “Whenever I met him, he acted mighty decent,” Bede re- called, “and ’twas generally said about him that he never turned a fellow down that was up ALEXANDER MCSWEEN JOHN CHISUM against it and called for a little help. But, also, the folks ’lowed he would shoot a man just to see the fellow give the For every story that paints Billy as a steely gun- dying kick. ’Twas said he got a powerful lot of amusement out of watch- man, just as many describe an amiable young ing a fellow that he didn’t like twist and groan.” man many called friend. Gomez remembered Apocryphal or not, such tales stood the Kid in good stead at times. the Kid’s big roan horse. “Billy would go to the Take, for example, an anecdote from Ambrosio Chavez, whose cousin gate and whistle, and the horse would come Martín was a friend of Billy’s. Chavez recalled a prize match between up to the gate to him. That horse would follow Martín’s mare and a fast horse owned by a group of passing Texans. The Billy and mind him like a dog.” Lesnett also bet was three fat beeves. But when Martín’s mare won the race by a wide had benign recollections of the Kid. “He was margin, the Texans cried foul and angrily refused to honor the wager. very fond of children,” she said. “He called my Shortly thereafter the Kid arrived at Martín’s for a visit, and on hearing the little boy [Irvin] ‘Pardie’ and always wanted story, he determined to visit the Texans and set the matter straight. “The to hold the baby [ Jennie Mae].…He also had women at Martín’s ranch just begged Billy not to go to collect the bet,” a little dog…[that] would jump up on the Kid Chavez said, “as they were afraid that there would be trouble over it, and until he would laughingly pull his gun and be- that Billy might get killed. But Billy just laughed at them.” Armed with two gin firing into the ground. The dog would play- pistols and two cartridge belts, the Kid rode into the Texans’ cattle herd fully follow every puff of dust, yelping joyfully.” and shot down three of their best animals. He then told Martín to have Billy also frequented local dances. According to the Texans deliver the meat. “The Texans were so scared when they found Ella (née Bolton) Davidson, who shared a mem- out that he was Billy the Kid that they broke camp and left right away.” orable spin around the floor with the Kid, many LEFT: LIBRARY OF CONGRESS; RIGHT: CENTER FOR SOUTHWEST RESEARCH, UNIVERSITY LIBRARIES, UNIVERSITY OF NEW MEXICO Another tale that cast the Kid in a heroic light came from Pedro M. a local hostess believed “the Kid had been led Rodriguez, who was born in Lincoln County in 1874. His 1938 interview into evil paths and, through kindness and friend- centers on Indian fighting, specifically his father’s service in then Captain liness of hospitality, might be led back into the (and future Lincoln County sheriff) William Brady’s 1st Regiment New straight and narrow way.” Mexico Volunteer Calvary, headquartered at Fort Stanton. “In those days,” Many people spoke of the polite young outlaw Rodriguez said, “the Indians roamed all over Lincoln County and were with overt fondness. Berta (née Ballard) Manning always killing people and stealing cattle and horses.” When Indians threat- was 10 years old in 1879 when she settled with ened the family cattle herd, Pedro’s grandfather gathered a posse of cow- her family in Fort Sumner. “Yes, I remember boys, the Kid among them, to ride into Turkey Canyon and drive the Billy the Kid real well,” she recalled. “He was not cattle down to the Ruidoso. Halfway up the canyon some two dozen rough looking and was very quiet and friendly. Mescalero Apaches, led by Chief Kamisa, intercepted the wranglers. I never saw anything ugly about him or in his Amid a parley the Indians subtly moved in to surround the cowboys. manners.…He was kind and could be a good Keeping a cool head, the Kid instructed his fellow hands in Spanish to friend. But I am sure we should not make a hero tighten up their horses’ cinches and follow him. “Billy mounted his horse, of Billy, for after all he was a bandit and a killer.” with a six-gun in each hand, and started hollering and shooting as he rode Berta’s brother, Charles Ballard, had a simi- toward the Indians. The rest of the men followed, shooting as they went. lar impression of the Kid. “I remember good They broke through the line of Indians, and not a one of the men were times I had with Billy the Kid,” he recalled. hurt.” The cowboys then rounded up the cattle and returned them to “He was not an outlaw in manners—was quiet Rodriguez’s corral. “The next morning Kamisa and a band of Indians but good company, always doing something in- came to my grandfather’s house.” A deal was struck, and for the paltry teresting. That was why he had so many friends. price of three beeves the Apaches vowed to leave Rodriguez’s herd alone. We often raced horses together.” Charles also “The Indians kept their promise and never stole any more cattle.” touched on the Kid’s reputation as an outlaw. A U T U M N 2 0 2 2 WILD WEST 3 5
PAT GARRETT point the Kid would meet a stage, take the driver’s gun, make off with PALACE OF THE GOVERNORS PHOTO ARCHIVES, NEW MEXICO HISTORY MUSEUM the strongbox and then split the take with the driver. To thwart the young “Billy was credited with more killings than he outlaw’s depredations, the stage company outfitted one Sam Perry with ever did. However, there were plenty that could fast horses and his pick of possemen and set him off in pursuit of the Kid. be counted against him. It was reported he was “Sam was a crook too,” Byler asserted. “He came by where Tress Under- the one who killed [McSween attorney Huston] wood and I were working and tried to get us to go with him. He said Billy Chapman when Chapman refused to dance when the Kid’s hideout was on the border, that he knew where it was, and that ordered, but Billy had nothing at all to do with we could sell out to him and split, then get us an old pack jack, trudge that shooting.” back and tell that the Kid and his gang overpowered us and took every- thing we had.” Byler and Underwood declined the offer, but some weeks Recollections of the Kid in the FWP in- later Perry returned “just as he had planned, leading the old jack and loaded terviews paint a picture of a young man seem- down with money. He took us into Silver City, and we all got drunk.” ingly caught up in circumstances beyond his control. But however congenial a friend he may Obviously, the Kid was not the only rustler to ride the range. Rumor have been, he was indisputably an outlaw. J.H. had it even Garrett had ridden and rustled beeves with Billy. “Pat had “Jake” Byler spent his adult life punching cows been a partner of Bill’s before Pat went to farming and ranching,” Bede and shared hair-raising tales about stampedes, claimed. “Under some sort of an arrangement Pat surrendered and was gunfights and cattle rustling. “I ran cattle all not sent to prison.” Bede lived for a time on Garrett’s ranch and claimed over west Texas, from Tom Green to the Pecos the Kid came by frequently at the rancher’s invitation. “When Pat became and from there to New Mexico,” he recalled. a lawman, he sent for Billy.” According to Bede, who “heard some of the While working as a hand for Tularosa Basin chinning,” Garrett tried to persuade the Kid to give up his desperado rancher Pat Coghlan, who had a government lifestyle, but Billy would have none of it. “I guess the Kid hankered for contract to furnish beef to reservation Indians, his amusement of watching shot men kick and groan.” In support of Byler learned not to question where the cattle his allegation, Bede offered another anecdote: came from. “A new hand knew better than to ask questions,” he said. “If he had any sense I am sure father and I heard the last words the two men said on the subject of the at all, he kept his mouth shut and stuck to duty. If he didn’t, he didn’t last long. Kid’s surrender.…The Kid was mounted and ready to leave, and Pat said to him, “Billy the Kid was doing his part of the steal- “Billy, you can see it my way, I guess?” ing [of cattle] on the Pecos and selling to Cogh- lan,” Byler said. “I’ve slept many a night right “No, Pat,” the Kid said. by Billy and never asked a question, just got up next morning and took the cattle he had brought “Well, you understand I have to either resign or kill you, and I am not going in up to the reservation without a word.” But rustling wasn’t the Kid’s only source of illicit to resign.” income. According to Byler, Billy worked a side deal with local stage drivers. At a prearranged “You mean that you’ll try to kill me’, the Kid answered while laughing; and then he rode off, saying, “So long, pardner.” It was some spell after that last call of the Kid’s when Pat killed the fellow. Not all old-timers, though, accepted the fact of the legendary outlaw’s death. “There seems to be evidence that Billy the Kid was not killed by Garrett but that he lived to be an old man down near Marfa, Texas,” said Dr. John Randolph Carver, who was interviewed in Fort Sumner at age 67 in 1937. Carver cited three reasons so many people refused to believe the Kid had died that night in Maxwell’s bedroom. “One is that his sister came out to see him and then did not go to his grave but went directly east. That his horse was never seen again is another reason. Third is that Pete Maxwell and Pat Garrett were his friends, and that a Mexican was buried instead of Billy the Kid.” As with Elvis, Amelia Earhart and others, tales of the Kid’s survival and rumored sightings abound. Take a story told by Elbert Croslin, who made a living as a rodeo performer and claimed to have run afoul of Billy during a poker game. For the record, Croslin was born in 1885, four years after Garrett killed the Kid. Croslin’s undated interview centered on bronco-busting and other wild adventures out West. He related one particularly punishing series of rides in Bonham, Texas. “I took so many falls that it hurt my pride quite a bit,” he said. “I didn’t even want to stay around, so I caught some freight trains and went to New Mexico.” While in Portales the broke, recovering rider 3 6 WILD WEST A U T U M N 2 0 2 2
LEFT: LIBRARY OF CONGRESS; RIGHT: NEW YORK CITY MUNICIPAL ARCHIVES found himself spectating at a poker game, drawn to it by the pistols and Federals Writers’ Project heaps of gold coins stacked on the table before each player. “I’d seen money like that in banks before,” Croslin recalled, “but not out in public.” Above left: Journalist and writer Henry Alsberg (1881– He proceeded to “sweat the game,” skulking along the fringes to study 1970) was founding director of this New Deal program poker hands and learn each player’s style. When one of the men made a that employed some 10,000 out-of-work Americans foolish play, Croslin grunted in derision. Bad move. “He jumped around so during the Great Depression. Its writers, including those quick that I never realized he was moving till he was facing me, and, Lawd! above from New York, interviewed people of all stripes, Lawd! he had his six-shooter pointed at my biscuits.” Noting Croslin was including some who claimed to have known Billy the Kid. a mere lad, the player grabbed him by the shirt collar, dumped him outside on the boardwalk and returned to the game without uttering a word. While the credibility of Billy the Kid encoun- ters in many of the FWP interviews remains in Angered and humiliated, Croslin decided to seek revenge. “I thought question, that doesn’t make them any less inter- I was some pumpkins, and I also thought that since they didn’t know me, esting or entertaining. Aside from tales about the I could get away with tough stuff, and they’d just think I was sure tough.…I Kid, the interviews contain plenty to hold one’s finally made up my mind to get [my] pistol and go kill the man.” As Cros- interest. Charles Ballard, for instance, served lin returned to the hotel lobby with gun drawn, the white-faced proprietor as a Rough Rider during the Spanish-American snatched the gun from his hand. “You wouldn’t have a chance with that War and rode in the honor guard amid Theo- man,” he explained. “Why, he’s Billy the Kid, one of the best and fastest dore Roosevelt’s second inaugural parade in pistol toters the world has ever seen.” Sobered by the warning, Croslin 1905. In his interview Byler held forth on Indian left his six-gun behind and caught the first homeward-bound freight train. raids, knife fights and barroom brawls around Further down in his interview he mentions having later joined a party of the poker table. His story of Billy the cattle thief drovers trailing a herd past Stinking Springs, a known hangout of the Kid. and stage robber was but one anecdote from his “I took it up for another chance to see Billy,” he said. “I was disappointed, own long life of adventure. though, because a fellow named of Pat Carret [sic] had already killed him somewhere. I think that’s the way it was. Anyway, I never saw him.” Whether or not we believe such tales of the legendary Billy the Kid, the FWP interviews in “After I got back home,” he recalled, “I had quite a few tales to tell the archives of the Library of Congress repre- about the cowpunchers, and did I tell about Billy the Kid. Of course, sent a valuable collection of American folklore it goes without saying that I never told what really happened between and Western heritage. While they may not stand him and me. The tale I told had a different ending!” up to historical scrutiny, they sound mighty fine when shared around a campfire. One may assume Croslin was simply relating a tall tale to his inter- viewer. “I always was kind of a hand to brag on anything,” he admitted. Mark Iacampo, who once performed stunts as a It’s likely the well-meaning barkeep simply told the cowhand his intended Rough Rider at the Rawhide Western Town in “victim” was Billy the Kid to spare the youngster trouble. Still, it appears Scottsdale, Ariz., is a freelance writer for publica- Croslin believed the claim, or he wouldn’t have joined a cattle drive past tions on three continents. For further reading he one of the Kid’s hangouts. Or, perhaps in the same way present genera- recommends Billy the Kid: The Endless Ride, tions still idolize Elvis, folks who grew up in Billy’s shadow may have by Michael Wallis; The Real Billy the Kid, earnestly believed the Kid still roamed the West. Either way, stories like by Miguel Antonio Otero Jr.; and the Library Croslin’s undoubtedly fueled the popular notion Billy had survived and of Congress collection American Life Histories: may ultimately explain why so many people embraced the claims of such Manuscripts From the Federal Writers’ Project, impostors as “Brushy Bill” Roberts, who insisted he was the Kid right up 1936 to 1940, searchable online at loc.gov/ until his death on Dec. 27, 1950. collections/federal-writers-project. A U T U M N 2 0 2 2 WILD WEST 3 7
A Boy and His Mother Opposite: Gary Ernest Smith’s Billy the Kid depicts the young outlaw in profile. There is no known photograph of Billy’s mother, Catherine McCarty Antrim. The images below are often presented as picturing the Kid’s mother, but neither has been authenticated. THE KID’S MOM OPPOSITE: GARY ERNEST SMITH/MEDICINE MAN GALLERY, TUCSON, ARIZ.; TOP: WICHITA-SEDGWICK COUNTY HISTORICAL MUSEUM; RIGHT: HALEY MEMORIAL LIBRARY & HISTORY CENTER, MIDLAND, TEXAS Catherine McCarty Antrim did all she could to protect and raise both of her sons—Billy, the future outlaw, and Joe, the future forgotten brother By Melody Groves I think of the morn when I sailed away from thee / I said, ‘Pray to God for me, pray to God for me’ C atherine McCarty sang along to the Emigrant Landing Depot, popularly known as the popular tune “La Paloma” Castle Garden, in Battery Park, while the famed and twirled around the wooden Ellis Island didn’t open until 1892.) Passenger dance floor, her 12-year-old son’s hands in records list Catherine’s occupation as “servant.” hers. Surely the tune resonated with other Common in that era, indentured servants typi- women like her who’d left Ireland long ago. cally worked for wealthy families up to seven Words to the two-step jig, in Spanish and years before earning the freedom to make their English, flowed together this day in 1873 in own way, as Catherine did. the Southwestern town of Silver City, New Mexico Territory. After arriving in America, immi- The music, courtesy of a squeezebox, fiddle grants of many nations, particularly and guitar, reached a crescendo and then ended. Billy the Irish, chose to band together in bowed to his mom, and she curtsied to him. She and close-knit communities. Catherine Billy often sang and danced together, making quite the likely did too, at least for a while. As pair. The crowd clapped enthusiastically as Catherine she listed her occupation on arrival, laughed, her smile infectious, her love of music and she likely already had work lined up. dancing shared by her son. It’s not known where she was first While little is known about Catherine’s early life, employed, but records indicate that a few facts have emerged, thanks to relentless research- by 1860 she was living in Utica, N.Y., ers. She appears to have left Ireland aboard the steam- where she worked for the John Munn ship Devonshire during the Great Famine of the mid- to family. Around 1861 she gave birth to late 1840s and arrived in New York City in 1846. Born around William Henry McCarty, who lives on 1829 (a fairly reliable guess, as her 1874 obituary lists her age in infamy as Billy the Kid. That said, despite much research as 45), she was around 17 when she stepped foot on Ameri- by many people, exactly when and where the Kid was born can soil. Prior to 1855 immigrants would have disembarked is not a settled matter. The identity of his father is also any- on the docks on the east side of Manhattan, where little pro- one’s guess, though in an 1868 census in Indianapolis, where cessing took place. (Through 1890 people were welcomed at Catherine lived for several years, she listed herself as the widow of one Michael McCarty. 3 8 WILD WEST A U T U M N 2 0 2 2
Most historians believe William Henry A Boyhood in Motion TOP: JEFFERSON COUNTY HISTORICAL SOCIETY, MADISON, IND.; LEFT: DARKLITRIA (aka “Billy”) to be Catherine McCarty’s older son. Though many give his birth year Top: A sketch of Indianapolis’ original as 1859, Billy himself claimed to have been Union Depot. Catherine and her two born around 1861, and many intriguing hints boys lived in Indiana’s state capital in point that way. Joseph (aka “Josie” or “Joe”) the 1860s. Left: Billy looks especially Bonney McCarty was born some two years kidlike in this cartoonish depiction. after Billy and cited 1863 as his birth year in census forms. Question is, how did Joe may have set her up financially, acquire the middle name Bonney, and why buying her silence. did Billy later adopt it as an alias? In any case, Catherine was no A theory that makes sense of the Bonney connection suggests that average woman of the 1860s. Al- while living in Utica and working for the Munn family, Catherine en- though she claimed the title of wid- gaged in a tryst with a neighbor. In the 1860 census we find that eight ow, she was not the undereducated, “poor widow doors up the street (according to the 1858/59 city directory) lived brothers woman” of Irish immigrant stereotype. Catherine John J. and Edward Finch Bonney, who were older and younger than was smart, likable and educated and had a good Catherine, respectively. Rumors flew of a liaison, but with which brother eye for business. By all accounts, she was also a is unclear. Was Billy and Joe’s father a Bonney? Is that why Catherine good mom, protecting her sons and doing what- gave Joe the middle name of Bonney and how Billy lit on it as an alias? ever necessary to see they succeeded in life. By 1868 she had moved to Indianapolis, the In that place and time, had 30-something indentured servant Catherine exact reason open to speculation. What we do and one of the Bonney brothers produced offspring, what would have know is in that year’s census she listed herself happened? The Bonney family probably would have chafed at the po- as the widow of Michael McCarty. Why did she tential tarnishing of their upper-class reputation. After all, Catherine was identify herself as such? Likely because she was. probably Irish Catholic, while they were likely of English Protestant Moreover, society of the day would have shunned ancestry, a combination akin to fire and gasoline. What then to do with a woman who admitted to having birthed one the love child/children? Why not send them and their mother as far west (or both) of her children out of wedlock. It was as possible? By then trains ran clear to Indianapolis. That is the prob- far more respectable to claim widowhood, a able sequence of events for Catherine and her young sons, for they soon status all too common after the Civil War. traveled to the edge of the frontier. Though speculation, the Bonneys Life must have been difficult in booming Indianapolis. In order to support her boys, 4 0 WILD WEST A U T U M N 2 0 2 2
LEFT: PALACE OF THE GOVERNORS PHOTO ARCHIVES, NEW MEXICO HISTORY MUSEUM; RIGHT: ROSWELL DAILY RECORD The Stepfather and the Ghostwriter Housing the steam locomotives bringing goods and people to and from the West, Indianapolis was abuzz with commerce. Coal powered the Above: William Antrim, who married Catherine in Santa economic boom. Darkening the sky, the resulting coal smoke made eyes Fe in 1873 but didn’t commit to raising her boys and rarely and noses water and breathing difficult. Little thought was given to what spoke of them, lived to age 80. Above right: Ash Upton, effects such particulates in the air would do to people’s health. Progress ghostwriter of Pat Garrett’s The Authentic Life of Billy, the was at hand, and nothing would stop commercial growth. Kid, noted Catherine’s “charity and goodness of heart.” Was this where Catherine contacted tuberculosis, then known as Catherine operated a laundry and sold baked consumption? In 1870, whether for clearer air or the excitement of goods. She may have taken in boarders, an- moving to a growing frontier town, she and her boys (Billy, around 9, other common occupation, as many soldiers and Josie, 7) shrugged off the gray skies and cold, wet winters and headed had mustered out of service and needed a place west for Wichita, Kan. to ground themselves while reacclimating to civilian life. Bill Antrim joined them. More is known about William Henry Harri- In 1869 the government opened the Osage Indian trust lands son Antrim, the man who became Catherine’s in Kansas to the general public for homesteading. Requirements? Move husband and her boys’ stepfather, than is known onto a 160-acre quarter section of land and within five years perform about the McCarty clan. Born in Huntsville, certain improvements. Catherine’s tuberculosis must have been a driving Ind., in 1842 (making him a dozen years Cath- factor in their decision. Doctors knew her only hope—no cure, just hope— erine’s junior), Bill was the fifth of seven siblings. was a move to a drier climate with clear air. Wichita had both. His father, Levi, was a merchant and proprietor of a hotel in nearby Anderson. While in school Aware of the potential stigma of cohabiting as unmarried adults, Cath- Bill and siblings washed dishes, hauled wood erine and Bill took up separate residences. Bill bought a small plot of land and waited tables at the hotel. 6 miles northeast of town, on which he built a cabin and worked as a farm- er, while Catherine and the boys moved into a building on North Main In June 1862 the 20-year-old Antrim enlisted Street, living above the room out of which she ran a laundry service. for three months in the Union Army, muster- ing in as a private with the 54th Regiment of the In the heart of Wichita’s growing business district, her City Laundry Indiana Infantry. After marching the 42 miles attracted a steady stream of customers from the day she opened. Her busi- to Indianapolis with fellow volunteers, Antrim ness did well enough to merit mention in the March 15, 1871, inaugural spent three months on guard duty at Camp Mor- edition of The Wichita Tribune: ton before mustering out of service. Remain- ing in the city, he moved to 58 Cherry St. and CITY LAUNDRY became a driver and clerk at Merchants Union The city laundry is kept by Mrs. McCarty, Express Co., within a few blocks of the McCarty residence on North East Street. to whom we recommend those who wish to have their linen made clean. Her hands were in hot, sudsy water from dawn to dusk, drawing from mounds of used sheets from the various brothels and the shirts and trousers of cowhands and businessmen alike. A U T U M N 2 0 2 2 WILD WEST 4 1
Next Stops—Wichita and Denver Left: This photo captures Main Street Wichita, Kan., in the 1870s. Catherine and boys moved there from Indianapolis. Below left: Denverites gather in June 1872 to lay the cornerstone for the first school. Catherine, Antrim and the boys lived there briefly later that year. Since the only school, an abandoned army dugout, had literally fallen in As Catherine’s laundry business prospered, TOP: WICHITA-SEDGWICK COUNTY HISTORICAL MUSEUM; LEFT: DENVER PUBLIC LIBRARY on itself, Catherine set aside time to teach her boys reading, writing and she invested in land. Among other parcels, she ciphering. Billy became an avid reader and later wrote captivating letters, acquired a vacant lot downtown and a quarter including several inquiries to New Mexico Territory Governor Lew section adjacent to Antrim’s property. Bill, mean- Wallace about a possible pardon for murders committed during the while, bought the property on which the laun- Lincoln County War. Bucking convention, Catherine also involved herself dry sat, as well as an adjacent plot. He deeded in local politics. Out of 124 leading citizens to sign a petition for the town’s both to Catherine. incorporation, she was the only woman. She even attended the board of trustees meeting. The town officially incorporated on July 21, 1870. In a sworn deposition from the period Antrim noted the McCarty family had moved out of Wichita boomed after incorporation, soon boasting the third largest the city and been living on the quarter section population of any Kansas town. Unfortunately, the bad elements multi- adjacent to his since March 4, 1871. For it Cath- plied right alongside the good. Wanting better for her sons, Catherine erine had paid $1.25 per acre, or a total of $200 sought to shelter them from the influences of town rowdies. Turns out, cash (more than $4,600 in today’s dollars), and avoidance proved impossible. she paid in full. With help from the boys Bill had built the family a cabin “12 by 14 feet, one story In the spring of 1871, just down the street from the City Laundry, high, board roof, one door and two windows.” a deputy U.S. marshal engaged in a shootout with a fugitive that left the marshal wounded and the wanted man dead. No doubt the boys heard the That summer Catherine and sons, likely with gunfire, and they may have witnessed the shooting. Within days Catherine help from Bill, cultivated 7 acres and set out 57 moved herself and the boys out of town and into Antrim’s cabin. Public fruit trees. Fencing off one section with split rails, opinion be damned—she wanted her sons safe. they put in long rows of Osage orange trees. In late summer Billy and Josie picked sand plums along the creek and riverbanks, while Catherine and Bill enjoyed the pleasure of elderberry wine. Life was certainly sweet for the blended family. Historians have debated how Billy came to be known on period documents as Henry Mc- Carty, but it makes logical sense. When Cath- erine teamed up with Bill Antrim, that made one too many “Bills” in the household. Thus, to avoid confusion, she may have taken to call- ing her son by his middle name, Henry. Child- hood friends in Silver City later confirmed the Kid’s given name was William. Those friends added that while he never liked being referred to by his middle name, he would answer to both Billy and Henry. Just when things were looking up, Cather- ine’s tuberculosis returned with a vengeance. A stifling hot laundry is far from an ideal work- place for someone battling the disease. There she sat day after day laboring among tubs of dirty clothing boiling in soapy water and a tub of cold water into which she could plunge her hands to prevent scalded flesh. Amid that hu- mid, closed-in environment her tuberculosis took hold, and her health plummeted. Hospitals were a rarity on the frontier, leaving the sick few options but bed rest, though those suffering from tuberculosis might opt to move to a healthier climate. Such was Catherine’s choice. 4 2 WILD WEST A U T U M N 2 0 2 2
In August 1872 Catherine sold her Wichita hustling town. After the discovery of gold at the confluence of Cherry holdings and made ready to move to Denver. Creek and the South Platte River in 1858, the camp had grown into a Though members of Antrim’s family had re- sprawling settlement almost overnight. While mining remained the big- cently relocated to Wichita, he followed Cath- gest attraction, people afflicted with tuberculosis and other maladies also erine and her boys west. Frontier travel in the flocked to Colorado, drawn by the clear, dry air. Springing up across the 1870s was rough. There were no rest areas with region, luxurious resorts for consumptives offered hot baths and other toilets, running water and vending machines, restorative treatments. Catherine, though likely priced out of such ex- no fast-food joints to fill a hungry belly, no over- orbitant resorts, was able to partake of the dry, sunny climate and fresh, head lights at night under which to sleep. Far invigorating mountain air. from averaging 60 miles per hour, like today’s RIGHT: NATIONAL ARCHIVES; BELOW: SILVER CITY MUSEUM vehicles, horse- or ox-drawn wagons might make 20 miles a day. Travelers like the McCartys and Antrim had to rely on their own wits and know- how to survive the journey. Although rare, In- dian attacks remained a concern, as Cheyennes, Sioux, Kiowas, Comanches and Kaws still roamed the Great Plains and were not welcoming of migrants. In the wake of the Army’s 1868–69 winter campaign against the Plains Indians, the worst of the violence was over, and things were relatively calm on the Kansas fronter. But scat- tered incidents were a reality. As there was safe- ty in numbers, the McCartys and Antrim did not travel alone. The four stayed awhile in Denver, Bill likely working a stint as a teamster for Wells Fargo. In 1872 the “Mile-High City” was a bustling, She Lived Here the Rest of Her Life When Billy was about 13 the newly minted Antrim family moved to Silver City, New Mexico Territory, and lived in a small log house on Main Street. The initial plan for the town, founded in the summer of 1870, was based on a grid pattern (see period map at right). Catherine opened a laundry, sold baked goods and took in boarders. Her husband’s heart was in mining, and he wasn’t home much.
Santa Fe Church and Silver City Homesite “hop” at Fort Marcy. But Billy was immediately, inexorably drawn to the LEFT: PALACE OF THE GOVERNORS PHOTO ARCHIVES, NEW MEXICO HISTORY MUSEUM; RIGHT: STEVE HAMBLIN (ALAMY STOCK PHOTO) bailes, as an adult often traveling miles to attend one. With music pro- Above: Catherine McCarty married Bill Antrim at the vided by violins, guitarróns, vihuelas and sometimes harps and coronets, First Presbyterian Church on March 1, 1873, with Billy the bailes also proved irresistible to his spirited Irish mother. (then called Henry) and Joe in attendance. Above right: Bill Antrim lived on this site through 1875. The original It was here Catherine married Bill Antrim on March 1, 1873, at the cabin was torn down in 1894. The 1870s-style cabin First Presbyterian Church. Her boys signed the register as witnesses. pictured was built for the set of Ron Howard’s 2003 Western The Missing and later presented to Silver City. In search of the perfect place to call home, the newly minted family left Santa Fe, soon landing in the south-central New Mexico Territory For reasons unknown within months burg of Silver City. In it Catherine saw an established town that offered the McCartys and Antrim left Denver, head- her boys a stable life. Amid a productive district pockmarked by silver ing south on the Santa Fe Trail over Raton Pass. mines, Silver City boasted numerous businesses, including a bowling By year’s end 1872 they landed in Santa Fe, alley, dance hall, apothecary, post office and various commercial stores. the capital of New Mexico Territory, amid the Stagecoaches, freight wagons, prairie schooners, wagons and buggies aspen-laden Sangre de Cristo Mountains. Be- crisscrossed the valley. yond its outermost dwellings cornfields hemmed in the city from the west, south and east, while Fortunate to find an available small cabin downtown (most families prairie bordered it on the west. Spanish con- had to settle for tent living), Catherine opened a laundry, sold baked quistadors had dubbed the city La Villa Real goods and took in boarders. Her charity and largesse were legendary. de la Santa Fe de San Francisco de Asis (The Royal “Many a hungry ‘tenderfoot’ has had cause to bless the fortune which City of the Holy Faith of St. Francis of Assisi), led him to her door,” wrote ghostwriter Ash Upson in Pat Garrett’s a mouthful of a name later residents had re- The Authentic Life of Billy, the Kid. “In all her deportment she exhibited the duced to Santa Fe. unmistakable characteristics of a lady—a lady by instinct and education.” Catherine must have enjoyed the life in the Antrim found work at Richard Knight’s butcher shop, but his heart dry and dusty Southwestern capital. Horse racing and soul were in mining. The region around Silver City on into eastern was a big draw, and sporting folk had laid out Arizona Territory was rife with diggings and men searching for the elusive a course along the road to the mining district of ore. An obsessed Antrim spent more and more time away from Catherine Cerillos. Footraces in town along Lincoln Ave- and her boys. When he wasn’t off mining either in Arizona Territory or nue also drew crowds, promising purses of $100 Mogollon, New Mexico Territory, he frequented the gambling houses or more. Some citizens objected to holding such in Silver City, often losing at the faro and poker tables any money he’d footraces on Sundays, though they didn’t seem earned through his labors. to mind if it were a race of the four-legged kind. Meanwhile, Catherine and 12-year-old Billy spent many happy hours Hispanic residents held fandangos and bailes at the festive bailes. “Mrs. Antrim could dance the Highland Fling as well almost every night. As more Americans arrived as the best of the dancers,” recalled Louis Abraham, Billy’s best friend. in town, they brought their own homegrown dances, including masked balls and a social Neighbors remembered Catherine as a jolly Irish lady, her blue eyes sparkling, full of life and mischief. Despite her illness, they recalled, she showed fortitude and good cheer, traits also evident in Billy. Always the doting mom, Catherine baked after-school treats for her sons and friends, who loved their visits to the Antrim home. “She always welcomed the boys with a smile and a joke,” Abraham said. “The cookie jar was never empty.” “To those who knew [Billy the Kid’s] mother, his courteous, kindly and benevolent spirit was no mystery,” wrote Upson. “She was evi- dently of Irish descent. Her husband called her Kathleen. She was about the medium height, straight and graceful in form, with regular 4 4 WILD WEST A U T U M N 2 0 2 2
FROM TOP: STEVE LOEFFLER; PALACE OF THE GOVERNORS PHOTO ARCHIVES, NEW MEXICO HISTORY MUSEUM features, light blue eyes and luxuriant golden Misremembering Mom hair. She was not a beauty but what the world calls a fine-looking woman. She kept boarders Above: Catherine Antrim’s first name is misspelled in Silver City, and her charity and goodness of on this marker, which was erected in 1950 over her heart were proverbial.” gravesite at Silver City’s Memory Lane Cemetery. That marker replaced the worn, wooden slab at left. Despite outward appearances, the stress of After Catherine died at age 45 on Sept. 16, 1874, physical labor and emotional strain of her illness best friend Clara Truesdell cared for Billy and Joe, continued to take a toll on Catherine’s health. until Bill Antrim made other arrangements for them. Those suffering from tuberculosis are not only plagued with hacking coughs and chest hotel, which would have been a convenient pains but also severe fatigue, making place to meet Garrett. He later worked as a bar- rest and a stress-free lifestyle essential. tender in El Paso before wandering back north But Catherine was not getting that. Her to Denver. Along the way he fathered a child husband was often absent, and she had and then married. two boys to support. If Joe had any success gambling, he didn’t As the disease ate away at Cather- hold onto his money long. He died penniless in ine’s sturdy frame, those halcyon days Denver on Nov. 25, 1930. His unclaimed body in Silver City ended far too soon. “She was donated to the Colorado Medical School. was a sweet, gentle little lady,” a friend recalled, “as fond of her boys as any Stepfather Bill Antrim’s life continued to mother should be.” Toward the end center on mining. After living mostly in east- Catherine asked best friend Clara Trues- ern Arizona and south-central New Mexico, he dell to care for her sons when she was spent winters in El Paso and eventually moved gone. Clara agreed. Within a week of to Adelaide, Calif., living out his later years with their conversation, on Sept. 16, 1874, a niece. In the wake of Billy’s death Antrim is Catherine, 45, finally succumbed. not known to have spoken about his stepsons. He died at age 80 in 1922. As usual, husband Bill Antrim was away mining, which left funeral details Catherine’s death had left 13-year-old Billy to Catherine’s friends and her boys. Abraham’s father hammered together adrift without guidance and security. Had she her coffin, and a stream of neighbors walked with Billy and Joseph be- lived, William Henry McCarty might never have hind the casket-laden wagon. Catherine is buried in Silver City’s Memory become Billy the Kid. Lane Cemetery. Award-winning author and New Mexico native Set adrift, Billy, 13, and Joe, 11, stayed with the Truesdell family until Melody Groves writes what she loves most—Westerns, Antrim found his way home. He placed the boys with Knight the butcher. both fiction and nonfiction. For further reading she Then, figuring he was done raising kids, he again skipped town. By late recommends The Illustrated Life and Times of 1874 Henry and Joe had become separated. Knight sent Billy to live with Billy the Kid: The Final Word, by Bob Boze Bell; the Truesdells. Surely, Billy clung to that family—people he knew and Billy the Kid: The Endless Ride, by Michael who had liked his ma—as a lifeline. The family had recently bought the Wallis; and Antrim Is My Stepfather’s Name: Star Hotel on Hudson Street, renovated the business and renamed it The Boyhood of Billy the Kid, by Jerry Weddle. the Exchange (a popular hotel name out West). Joe was sent to live with Joe Dyer, a proprietor of the New Orleans Club, where the 12-year-old worked for his keep cleaning, serving liquor and running errands. Unfortunately, growing up in such an environment without any parental supervision or guidance, Joe also gambled and drank. He was even spotted by a childhood friend smoking at a Chinese opium den. Within a couple of years Joe was thoroughly submerged in that vice-ridden world. Unlike Billy, Joe retained Antrim’s last name throughout his life. A drifter, opium fiend and alcoholic, Joe worked stints as a card dealer, gambler, miner, room clerk and day laborer. On one occasion, either in Trinidad, Colo., or Albuquerque, he met Pat Garrett, the onetime sheriff of Lincoln County, N.M., who killed brother Billy on July 14, 1881. After a long conversation that went unrecorded, they shook hands and went their separate ways. In 1883 Joe was working as a cook in an Albuquerque A U T U M N 2 0 2 2 WILD WEST 4 5
THE TRIAL OF JOSEPH E. LOPEZ AND DAVID THOMAS; RIGHT: COURTESY OF BETH WILSON AND SID GARDNER BILLYTHE KID While the Kid’s activities during and after the Lincoln County War are well known, details of his murder trial in Mesilla, New Mexico Territory, have been overlooked By David G. Thomas
47 Bristol and Billy Judge Warren Bristol presided over Billy the Kid’s April 1881 trial in Mesilla, New Mexico Territory, for the murder of Lincoln County Sheriff William Brady three years earlier. On Monday, March 28, 1881, Billy the Kid and Billy Wilson were escorted from IRA E. LEONARD their jail cells in Santa Fe, New Mexico Territory, to the train depot by Deputy U.S. Marshal Tony Neis and Police Chief Frank Chavez. Accompanying the lawmen and their handcuffed prisoners was attorney Ira E. Leonard. Though they were being transported to Mesilla, nearly 300 miles to the south, to face trial for serious crimes—the Kid for having killed Lincoln County Sheriff William Brady and Andrew L. “Buckshot” Roberts, Wilson for counterfeiting—the pair must have been elated at their relative freedom. They had been locked up in the Santa Fe jail for 91 days. The southbound train went only as far as Rincon, some 30 miles shy of Mesilla. As the party disembarked, they were confronted by a mob of “roughs” who intended to wrest Billy from his escorts. Marshal Neis was able to shepherd the Kid and Wilson to a saloon across the street where he and Chief Chavez barricaded themselves and their prisoners in a back room. A U T U M N 2 0 2 2 WILD WEST 4 7
Facing Trial in Mesilla, New Mexico Territory Billy the Kid became well acquainted with The Doña Ana County Courthouse, the second building on the right, on the southeast corner of the Mesilla Plaza. Inside, besides the courtroom where he was tried, were the office of the sheriff, the office and residence of the head jailer and the cell in which Billy was held. The Kid appeared before Judge Bristol first thing on March 30 to face charges of murder and accessory to murder in the killing of Buck- shot Roberts, who’d been mortally wounded on April 4, 1878, amid the Lincoln County War. The case was being pursued in federal court, as the site of the killing, Blazer’s Mill, was on the Mescalero Apache Indian Reservation. Juris- diction over reservations was limited to the federal government. The Kid pleaded destitution, and Bristol appointed Leonard as his attor- ney. Leonard then asked the court for Neis, not knowing whether the mob intended to time to prepare Billy’s defense, and free or to lynch Billy, advised his prisoners that if the the court granted the motion. The next door were breached, his first action would be to “turn day, March 31, the Kid appeared be- FROM LEFT: ARCHIVES AND SPECIAL COLLECTIONS, NEW MEXICO STATE UNIVERSITY; COURTESY BETH WILSON AND SID GARDNER; PALACE OF THE GOVERNORS PHOTO ARCHIVES, NEW MEXICO HISTORY MUSEUM his guns loose” on them. Disinterested men on the fore Judge Bristol and pleaded not guilty outside eventually convinced the roughs to disperse. to Roberts’ murder. The next morning the party took the stagecoach On April 6 Billy’s trial for the murder to Mesilla, passing through Las Cruces. Hostile of Roberts opened. At the suggestion crowds were waiting at both places. On reaching WARREN BRISTOL of attorney Albert Jennings Fountain, their destination, Neis and Chavez turned over the Leonard moved Billy’s not guilty plea Kid and Wilson to Doña Ana County Sheriff James be withdrawn and the case dismissed, W. Southwick, who placed the pair in the two-cell Mesilla jail, which as the federal government lacked jurisdiction. already held 14 prisoners. The jail was within a high-walled placita. Leonard argued that although Blazer’s Mill, the Forming one wall of the placita was the Mesilla Courthouse, which served site of Robert’s killing, sat amid reservation land, as a primary school when court wasn’t in session. Katherine Stoes, a the mill itself was on private land. Thus, the site student the year Billy was tried, described the courtroom: fell under territorial jurisdiction. Acting Attorney General Simon Bolivar New- At the back end of the room is a small platform on which are a table and chair for comb filed a demurrer, arguing while it was true the judge. On either side of the platform is a small table with two chairs. In one the federal government lacked jurisdiction, that corner of the back wall is a large bookcase with the glass missing from one door. fact was irrelevant to the case. Judge Bristol over- At the other corner is a stove in front of the fireplace. There is no other furniture ruled Newcomb’s demurrer, quashed the indict- in the room except 16 or 18 wooden benches without backs. In front of the desk ment and ordered Billy “go hence without delay.” was a small clearance where the lawyers came to make their pleas. Of course, the Kid was not free to simply The jurors sat in the first two rows of benches. During deliberations walk out of the courthouse. After granting a they were cloistered in Joshua Sledd’s Casino Hotel, one block south of dismissal in the Roberts murder case, Judge the plaza. Witnesses were also isolated there prior to their testimony. The Bristol remanded Billy to the custody of Sheriff court paid Sledd $2 a day for the use of his hotel, one of three in Mesilla Southwick to be held for trial in the killing of at the time. Sheriff Brady. The Third District Court, in which the Kid and Wilson were to be tried, The next day, in federal session, Billy Wilson’s had jurisdiction over both federal and territorial cases. Court regulations counterfeiting trial opened. Defense attorney required it to address federal business before territorial business, so each Sidney Barnes (Leonard could not represent morning the court would open in federal session. After the federal business Wilson, as he had been subpoenaed as a witness wrapped up, that session would adjourn, and the territorial session would against him) immediately requested a change of open. The district magistrate, in this case Judge Warren Henry Bristol, venue to Santa Fe, a motion opposed by New- presided over both sessions. Territorial lawyers sometimes served as comb. Bristol agreed to send the case to Santa Fe. prosecutor in federal cases and as defense lawyer in territorial cases, On April 8, in territorial session, the Kid ap- or vice versa. The court met six days a week, resting on Sundays. peared before Judge Bristol to answer for the 4 8 WILD WEST A U T U M N 2 0 2 2
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