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| In his history of Billy the Kid, Charles Siringo portrayed Billy as a crazed psycho-killer who made his first kill at age 12 |
In his History of Billy the Kid, Charles Siringo portrayed Billy as a crazed psycho-killer who made his first kill at age twelve. Then, Billy snuck off to Fort Union, New Mexico, where he gambled with the black soldiers. A “black nigger” cheated him, and he shot the man dead. Not long after that, he stabbed a man three times in a saloon fight and ran out of the establishment with blood dripping from his right hand.
Siringo
blamed it on Billy’s violent temper. However, Sheriff Pat Garrett, who would
eventually track Billy down and kill him, said just the opposite. Garrett said
people often talked about the look in Billy’s eye and his temper just before he
killed, but the Kid wasn’t like that.
Garrett said, Billy ate “and laughed, drank and laughed, talked and laughed,
fought and laughed and killed and laughed.”
The
only picture we have of Billy the Kid doesn’t do him justice. He looks more
like a mental defective with a lopsided face
than someone often described as a lady’s man. Billy stood five feet eight
inches tall, weighed about 140 pounds, and had a stringy, muscular build. His
hair was a sandy brownish-blond, and the one personality trait that stuck out
about the Kid was his sense of humor.
In
other circumstances, he might have been a politician or a business mogul, but
he was a gunman in the Old West and one of the best at his trade.
Very
little is known about the Kid’s early life. He may have been born in New York
or Indiana, but there is no evidence to favor either state. His given name was
William Henry McCarty Jr., but he went by William H. Bonney in New Mexico.
As soon as he was elected sheriff of Lincoln County, Pat
Garrett rounded up a posse and set out after the Kid
Billy’s first documented kill occurred sometime after he turned sixteen. Frank “Windy” Cahill, the blacksmith at Fort Grant, got a kick out of bullying and pushing Billy around. One day he pushed him a little too far and began to chase after him and swear at him. Finally, he knocked Billy to the ground and pummeled his face. Billy was no fool. He knew he couldn’t outfight Cahill, so he pulled his gun and shot him dead. The coroner’s inquest labeled the killing a homicide, and Billy hit the trail one step ahead of the law.
Billy
reappeared in Lincoln County, New Mexico Territory, in 1877. He changed his
name to William H. Bonney and began
working for the Coe-Saunders ranch. Unfortunately, that move placed him
smack-dab in the center of the Lincoln County War.
The
Lincoln County War started in the summer of 1876
but heated up in the spring of 1877. The Cattle King of New Mexico, John
Chisum, ran 40,000 head of cattle that ranged over a 200-square mile area. The
smaller ranchers accused Chisum of swallowing up their cattle and placing the
Chisum brand on them. Chisum claimed just the opposite. He said that the small
ranchers cut cattle out of his herds and
sold them at the army posts for a quick profit.
Alex
McSween was a prominent Lincoln County lawyer and ally of John Chisum. He
originally worked as a lawyer for Murphy and Dolan, but later switched
allegiances to work as an attorney for John Chisum. Murphy and Dolan later
claimed McSween embezzled money from them.
Alex
McSween convinced John Tunstall, a wealthy Englishman, that Lincoln County was
ripe for the picking. Tunstall bought a ranch on the Rio Feliz and set up a store and bank in the town
of Lincoln. In doing so, he allied himself with the Chisum faction.
The story is that Billy met New Mexico Governor Lew Wallace with a six-shooter
in one hand and a Winchester 73 rifle in the other
Lawrence Murphy and James Dolan ran the Murphy-Dolan store just down the street from Tunstall’s new store. They had enjoyed a monopoly on business in Lincoln since Murphy started the business in 1869. Because of that, they could charge the local ranchers exorbitant prices for their goods. When Tunstall opened his store, he charged lower prices and stole business away from the Murphy-Dolan store.
Things
soon turned violent, with each side employing hired guns to get their way.
In
February 1878, Deputy Sheriff William Morton and his posse rounded up horses owned by Tunstall and McSween. They came
across Tunstall riding with his herd. Morton claimed Tunstall pulled his gun,
so he shot him off his horse. But, Pat Garrett said, when Tunstall was lying on
the ground, Tom Hill rode up to him, placed his shotgun to his head, and
“scattered his brains over the ground.”
Richard
M. Brewer, Tunstall’s ranch foreman, was sworn in as a special constable in
Lincoln, and his posse, known as the Regulators, rode off in search of
Tunstall’s killers. They captured Morton and Baker on March 6 but reported them killed in an escape attempt
on March 9. The Regulators later ambushed and killed Sheriff William Brady and
his deputy, Fred Waite, on the main street of Lincoln.
Violence
continued to rage throughout the spring and summer of 1878. Finally, New Mexico
Governor Lew Wallace (a former Civil War general and the author of Ben Hur) offered an amnesty for any man
involved in the Lincoln County War who wasn’t currently under indictment. Billy
sent Wallace a letter offering to testify in return for amnesty. Governor
Wallace and the Kid met in Lincoln in March 1879 to negotiate for Billy’s
testimony. The story is Billy met Wallace with a six-shooter in one hand and a
Winchester 73 rifle in the other.
Under
the terms of their deal, Billy was arrested
for a short period. When he finished testifying, he was supposed to be set free.
Unfortunately, the Governor reneged on his promise, and the Kid soon escaped.
Billy the Kid shot his way out of the Lincoln County Jail,
killing Deputy Sheriff J. W. Bell
Billy’s life remained uneventful for the next year and a half. He stole a few horses and rustled some cattle. During this period, the only standout event was a bit of gunplay with Joe Grant—a gunfighter wannabe. The story is Grant went on a wild bender at Hargrove’s Saloon and grabbed a gun from one of Billy’s compadres. Billy got hold of the gun, set it to an empty chamber, then challenged Grant to a fight. When Grant pulled his gun, it clicked on an empty cylinder, and Billy shot him dead.
As
soon as Pat Garrett was elected sheriff of Lincoln County in November 1880, he
rounded up a posse and set out after
Billy. The Kid was outgunned and quickly
surrendered to Garrett. Billy was tried at Mesilla, New Mexico, in March 1881
and convicted for the killing of Sheriff William Brady. The court sentenced him
to hang on May 13, 1881.
Billy
was confined in the old Murphy-Dolan store in Lincoln while waiting to be
hanged. On the evening of April 28, Billy overpowered Deputy J. W. Bell on the
stairs outside the prison, snatched his gun, and shot him dead. Inside the jailhouse, he grabbed Pat Garrett’s rifle from
his office and laid in wait for Deputy
Marshal Robert Olinger. After killing Olinger, Billy stole a horse and galloped
out of town.
On
July 14, Garrett received word that the Kid was holed up in the abandoned ruins
of Fort Sumner, and he rode off to bring him in. According to Garrett’s account
of Billy’s death published in his book The Authentic Life of Billy the Kid,
he went to the ranch of Peter Maxwell looking for the Kid.
Garrett
was in Maxwell’s bedroom questioning him on the Kid’s whereabouts when Billy
stumbled in with a six-shooter in one hand and a meat cleaver in the other. It
was dark, and at first, Billy didn’t
realize there was anyone in the room with Maxwell.
Maxwell
whispered, “That’s him!”
The
Kid jumped back, “raised his pistol, a self-cocker, within a foot of my breast.
Then, retreating rapidly across the room, he
cried: ‘Quien es?’ ‘Quien es?’ All this occurred in a moment. Quickly as
possible, I drew my revolver and fired, threw my body aside, and fired again.
The second shot was useless; the Kid fell dead. He never spoke. A struggle or
two, a little strangling sound as he gasped for breath, and the Kid was with
his victims.”
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