In the spring of 1879, Bell dropped out of the Rangers and Joined O. W. Williams on an overland trip to Colorado to seek his fortune from "the immense beds of carbonate ore." Both men later returned to Texas, although Bell turned around and rode on to White Oaks, New Mexico, a mining hot spot in Lincoln County. Not long afterward, Bell acquired dual law enforcement commissions as a deputy sheriff and a U.S. deputy marshal.
On November 27, 1880, Bell rode with a White Oaks posse, engaging Billy the Kid and others in a standoff at the "Whiskey Jim" Greathouse Ranch. The posse sent in a note demanding that the outlaws surrender, and the outlaws responded by inviting the posse's leader, Jim Carlyle, to step inside and discuss it. Carlyle refused until Whiskey Jim agreed to surrender himself to the posse while Carlyle went inside to negotiate with the fugitives. In this manner, negotiations for the peaceful surrender of outlaws progressed. The criminals now had Carlyle; the lawmen had Greathouse. However, becoming concerned because of passing of time and fearing something might go amiss for Carlyle, the posse threatened to shoot Whiskey Jim if Carlyle were not forthwith allowed to leave the ranch house. Reportedly, J. P. Eaker, a posse member, accidentally discharged a gun. Carlyle heard the shot and thought Greathouse had been executed; he panicked and jumped through a window. Who killed him is not clear, but bullets from the outlaw guns likely cut him down. However, there is circumstantial evidence that his nervous comrades outside might have shot him to death, mistaking him for one of the outlaws. Either way, Jim Bell lost a friend.
Ultimately, Pat Garrett's posse captured the Kid and others at Stinking Springs, New Mexico. The Kid went to trial in Mesilla, New Mexico, and was convicted and sentenced to death for the Lincoln, New Mexico, murder of Sheriff William Brady. Deputies returned him to Lincoln County on April 21, 1881, confining him on the second floor of the courthouse, the old Murphy-Dolan general store. The guards were James Bell and Robert Olinger. Folklore records Bell as mild-mannered, polite, and friendly toward his prisoner, while big Bob was overbearing, bullying, and insensitive. The truth is likely somewhere in between; certainly there is no evidence to indicate Bell was abusive, but it is somewhat inconsistent to think he would have sympathized with someone suspected of killing his friend Jim Carlyle. At any rate, as history indelibly records, on April 28, 1881, Bell walked the manacled Kid downstairs to the outside privy, where the prisoner either acquired a six-shooter from under the toilet seat or stripped Bell's from him as they started back up the stairs. Either way, in a desperate attempt to escape the Kid shot Bell on the inside courthouse steps. Bell stumbled outside and died in the arms of the caretaker. The Kid then killed Bob Olinger, legend claiming he did it with Olinger's own shotgun. Olinger was buried at Fort Stanton, James Bell at White Oaks, New Mexico.
.SSS aISO BILLY THE KID; GARRETT, PATRICK; LINCOLN COUNTY WAR; OLINGER, ROBERT
BENDER, John (?-?)
The Bender family saga is one of the great mysteries of the West. It consisted of John Bender, his wife (unnamed), John Bender Jr. (likely a stepson), and Kate Bender. John Sr. and Mrs. Bender spoke practically no English, whereas John Jr. and Kate spoke English rather fluently but with German accents. Kate was the most fluent in English. A wanted notice in 1873 described Kate as "24 years of age, dark hair and eyes, good looking, well formed, rather bold in appearance, fluent talker." She also claimed to be a medium, able to commune with spirits and cure diseases. John, the father, was about 60 years of age, his wife around 50, and John Jr. perhaps 27. Somewhere around the year 1870, the family opened a wayside inn along the Osage Trail a few miles north of Cherryvale, Kansas.
The ramshackle wooden inn contained two rooms divided by a canvas curtain. The front room had a table for meals. A trapdoor under the table emptied
into a dugout cellar. Guests sat with their backs against the curtain, their heads making perfect targets for a heavy hammer. A butcher knife to the throat or a bullet to the head in the cellar finished the job. The authorities estimated that the Benders murdered a dozen or so people, including one child. The evidence was the bodies, buried in the yard.
In May 1873, Governor Thomas A. Osborn posted rewards offering $500 each, or a total of $2,000 for the Bender family. A posse tracked them back and forth across the state and into Indian Territory (Oklahoma). Either of two things happened: (1) the Benders had reached safety in Mexico, or some other part of the United States, and were never heard from again; (2) the posse tracked down the Benders, likely in Kansas, executed them on the spot, and dumped their bodies into a common grave. QQuierr sabe?
BILLY the Kid (Henry McCarty, a.k.a. Henry Antrim; Kid Antrim; William Bonney) (1859?-1881)
Although Henry McCarty, alias William Bonney, alias Kid, alias Kid Antrim, alias Billy the Kid, is generally said to have been born in New York City on November 23, 1859, the alleged "facts" are at best only partly true. Although New York is the generally accepted birthplace of Billy the Kid, there is no absolute proof of his birth there. Probably the best evidence is a Secret Service statement written in early 1881 during the Kid's incarceration in Santa Fe, New Mexico. The Kid was interviewed with regard to a mail theft. The brief, scrawled, practically illegible handwritten interview made no mention of mail theft; and obviously the interrogator considered the subject as a person of no significance. He did state, however, that the Kid "talked like he came right off the streets of New York where he was born."
Prior to this, in 1880 the Kid told a Fort Sumner, New Mexico, census taker that his name was William Bonney and he had been born in Missouri. This statement may have been truthful, but it also has never been proved. If the census-recorded date of birth was correct, when he was slain in 1881 the Kid would have been 24 or 25, depending upon the month and day of birth.
In any case, the widow Catherine McCarty, with "friend" William Henry Harrison Antrim, and her two sons, Henry and Joseph, moved to Indiana, and from Indiana moved to Wichita, Kansas, in 1871. From there the family shifted to Santa Fe, New Mexico, where Catherine and William Antrim married on March 1, 1873. The Antrims then settled in Silver City, New Mexico, where William Antrim worked as a miner. The two boys attended school, young Henry becoming known locally as Kid Antrim. Catherine died of tuberculosis on September 16, 1874, and was buried in Silver City. William Antrim thereafter became a wanderer, dying at Adelaida, California, on December 10, 1922. Joe died in Denver, Colorado, in 1930. When no one claimed the body, it went to a medical school.
Billy the Kid (Bettmann/Corbis)
Young Henry fell in with "Sombrero Jack," and together they burglarized a Chinese laundry in Silver City. Henry got caught. Sheriff Harvey Whitehill locked him in jail, but on September 25, 1875, he escaped by crawling up the chimney.
Young Antrim fled to Camp Grant, Arizona, specifically a suburb of the San Simon Valley known as Bonito (Pretty). He spent most of his time gambling. On August 17, 1877, in a cantina near Fort Grant, a local blacksmith named Frank "Windy" Cahill called the Kid a pimp, and the Kid called Cahill a sonofabitch. The two wrestled. The Kid shot him in the belly, stole a horse, and headed for New Mexico. Cahill died the next day.
Billy likely spent a short period around Mesilla, New Mexico, and may have briefly ridden south to San Elizario, Texas-a distance of about 70 miles from Mesilla-to break a friend, Melquiades Segura, out of the local jail. The Kid and Segura subsequently parted ways. The Kid moved northeast toward Lincoln and Fort Sumner, New Mexico, probably not realizing that he would soon become involved in the Lincoln County War.
The Kid hired on as a cowboy and gunman for Englishman John Tunstall, although the Kid had hardly gotten started when Tunstall was slain by gunmen working for the House of Murphy. During the subsequent Lincoln County War, the Kid participated in the capture and slaying of two accused Tunstall murderers, Frank Baker and William S. "Buck" Morton. Both men were shot and killed on or about March 9, 1878, an uncertainty still existing as to whether they were executed by their captors or slain by the Kid and a few others during a running fight.
The Kid and his friends blamed Lincoln County sheriff William Brady for the death of Tunstall. On April 1, hearing of a disturbance at the opposite end of the street, Sheriff Brady and deputies George Hindman, Billy Mathews, and George Peppin hurried to investigate. Inside an adobe corral, however, waited Billy the Kid and several gunmen, all of whom opened fire as the lawmen passed by. The wall suddenly disappeared in a cloud of blue-white smoke. Mathews and Peppin were out in front and thus escaped. Brady fell instantly dead, whereas Hindman staggered a few feet before dying. The Kid ran out either to take Brady's rifle or to slip an arrest warrant from the sheriff's pocket, but he was driven back by fire from the other deputies. Some stories also have it that the Kid was wounded on the inside of one leg, making it impossible to ride. He spent the rest of the day hiding under the floorboards of a nearby house.
Three days later, at Blazer's Mill on the Sacramento River, a gang calling themselves the Regulators, of which Billy the Kid was a member, rode in shortly before noon. They were eating when someone noticed the approach of Andrew L. "Buckshot" Roberts, one of the slayers of Tunstall. Regulator Frank Coe went out to talk him into surrendering, but shooting started. When it ended, the Regulator leader, Dick Brewer, was dead, Frank Coe had lost a finger, and Roberts was suffering a stomach wound from which he would die within hours. The Kid didn't do much more than become a scrambling witness and get nicked by a bullet.
Other than engaging in a little long-range skirmishing, the Kid remained reasonably out of sight until July 15-19, 1878, when he and the Regulators, including Alexander McSween, underwent a five-day siege at Lincoln. The Kid would later appear as a witness before a court of inquiry regarding the siege, but unfortunately the questions asked and the answers given were not particularly informative. He testified that Harvie Morris, a McSween law clerk, had exited the house in front of Billy and had been shot dead. When Billy dashed out minutes later, three soldiers had fired at him, but he had safely reached the nearby Bonito River.
For the next few months, Billy the Kid did not drop out of sight, but he did not make any headlines either. On November 13, 1878, New Mexico governor Lew Wallace issued a proclamation of amnesty to all participants in the Lincoln County War, and that amnesty included Billy the Kid.
On February 18, 1879, Huston Chapman, a onearmed attorney working primarily for Susan McSween, was murdered on the streets of Lincoln, New Mexico. Governor Wallace demanded to know who had been responsible. Billy the Kid offered to testify if Wallace could quash indictments against him. The governor and the Kid thus met in the Lincoln home of a justice of the peace, John B. "Squire" Wilson. They hammered out an agreement whereby the Kid would submit to arrest and testify before a grand jury regarding what he knew about the murder of Chapman. For all this, Billy's past New Mexico legal sins would be forgiven. However, the governor did not altogether follow through with his part of the bargain. On June 17, Billy, suspecting he had been betrayed, walked out of the jail, climbed on his horse, and put Lincoln, New Mexico, and Lew Wallace's promises behind him.
On January 10, 1880, the Kid killed ne'er-do-well Joe Grant in a Fort Sumner saloon, allegedly after examining the intoxicated man's six-shooter and setting the hammer to fall first on an empty chamber. Four days later Pat Garrett married Apolonaria Gutierrez in Fort Sumner, and he perhaps got to know the Kid as well. On November 2, Pat Garrett became sheriff of Lincoln County, with his office and jail in the Lincoln courthouse. His first order of business was to either jail or bury Billy the Kid. The Kid then wrote Governor Wallace on December 12 and asked for amnesty. Three days later Governor Wallace offered a $500 reward for Billy the Kid.
On December 19, the Kid and several outlaw friends rode through the hard-crusted snow into Fort Sumner after dark. Pat Garrett and a posse were waiting. The lawmen killed Tom O'Folliard, thinking he was Billy the Kid. The desperadoes scattered into the hills. Four days later on December 23, Garrett and his posse trapped Billy the Kid and gang at Stinking Springs. Charlie Bowdre was slain, again because the posse thought he was Billy the Kid. The remaining outlaws surrendered that afternoon.
Tom O'Folliard (University oFTexas at El Paso Archives)
Garrett jailed the Kid at Santa Fe, but the territory transferred him to Mesilla to stand trial on May 8, 1881. The territory charged Billy with the murder of Sheriff William Brady. Throughout the entire war, Billy was the only one of those seven or eight assassins to face a jury. He was found guilty on April 13 and sentenced to be hanged in Lincoln on Friday, May 13, between the hours of 9 A.M. and 3 P.M. Billy the Kid now sent Governor Wallace three letters protesting his innocence and pleading with him to honor his earlier promise of amnesty. Wallace ignored the mail.
On April 15, the county began transferring the Kid by buckboard from Mesilla to Lincoln. Seven riders surrounded the vehicle. On April 21, the procession reached the courthouse jail. The Kid was incarcerated on the second floor, northeast corner, overlooking the Wortley Hotel across the street.
On May 27, Garrett left his deputies James Bell and Bob Olinger guarding the Kid while he rode over to the mining village of White Oaks to collect taxes. Early in the afternoon of the following day, Olinger placed his shotgun in the gun cabinet and escorted a few prisoners across the street to the Wortley for a bite to eat. He left Bell and the Kid playing cards.
A few minutes later Billy asked to visit the outside privy. Bell checked Billy's leg irons and wrist cuffs, then led him downstairs to the toilet. Coming back inside the courthouse, Billy started upstairs with Bell following. When about halfway, the Kid either snatched Bell's revolver out of its holster or had a sixshooter inside his shirt, having most likely removed the weapon from under the privy seat. The Kid turned and shot Bell once, perhaps twice. The deputy stumbled downstairs, through the door, and into the yard. He expired in the arms of caretaker Gottifried Gauss.
The Kid then hobbled over to the gun cabinet, removed Olinger's shotgun, stepped to the window overlooking the street, and waited for the other deputy. When Olinger came running up, Billy allegedly said, "Hello, Bob," then fired both barrels.
It took Billy the Kid until three o'clock to get out of town, primarily because he spent so long getting a leg iron removed from one ankle. Even so, the swinging metal caused the horse to buck him off repeatedly. The Kid finally tied the iron to his leg and rode away.
Everyone now assumed the Kid would go to Mexico or perhaps disappear somewhere in Texas.
Instead, the Kid went to Fort Sumner, perhaps out of a death wish. Garrett had once lived in Fort Sumner and knew everybody there. Pat Garrett's wife had been born and raised there. How could Billy possibly expect to hide in that community? Billy perhaps had a girlfriend there, as so many biographers believe, or he may have just wanted to be around friends.
Nevertheless, somewhere around June 11, Garrett received word that the Kid was indeed in Fort Sumner. On the afternoon of June 13, Garrett and two deputies, Thomas C. "Kip" McKinney and John William Poe, reached Fort Sumner. After scouting around until well after dark, the three men went down to the old officers' quarters to wake up and talk with Pete Maxwell, who seemed to know everything and everybody in town. Maxwell came closer than any citizen in the area to being in charge. Garrett left his two deputies outside on the porch while he went inside, sat down on the edge of the bed, slid his holster around to near the middle of his back for comfort, woke Maxwell up, and began questioning him.
As midnight approached, Billy the Kid came stepping briskly down a path, hopped up on the porch, and walked toward the deputies, reportedly to cut off a slice from a side of beef hanging nearby. The porch roof cast heavy shadows due to a full moon, but the Kid knew his way and was moving along when he stumbled across two unrecognizable Anglos a few minutes after midnight. Jerking out his gun, the Kid asked in a strained and worried voice, "Who are you?" The two men asked the same question.
Obviously hesitating to kill strangers, men he must have assumed were friends of Maxwell, the Kid turned and entered Pete Maxwel
l's bedroom. With his gun in his hand, and stepping to the foot of the bed, he suddenly noticed a figure sitting there. He paused, again hesitating to perhaps kill a friend of Maxwell. So the Kid cocked his weapon and hoarsely whispered, +~s? xQo..,iiero (Who is it? Who is it?)
It is doubtful that he ever heard the roar of Garrett's six-shooter.
Henry McCarty, alias Henry Antrim, alias Kid Antrim, alias Kid, alias William H. Bonney, alias Billy the Kid is buried in the Fort Sumner Cemetery.
.366 rjLrn; ANTRIM, WILLIAM HENRY HARRISON; BELL, JAMES W.; BOWDRE, CHARLES; COGHLAN, PATRICK; EVANS, JESSE J.; GARRETT, PATRICK; LINCOLN COUNTY WAR; OLINGER, ROBERT; WHITEHILL, HARVEY HOWARD
BISBEE Massacre
Daniel Dowd, generally known as "Big Dan," had terrorized southern Arizona and was wanted for cattle theft as well as a stage holdup near Benson. But on December 8, 1883, he and four gunmen-Owen W. Sample, James "Tex" Howard, Daniel Kelly, and William Delaney-pulled their guns and entered the Goldwater/Castenada Store in Bisbee with intentions of robbing it. The event has since been known as the Bisbee Massacre. Depending upon which accounts one reads, the robbers left with between $900 and $3,000. They also left behind four dead innocent bystanders, who had happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. One of them was a woman, Anna Roberts, and another was a deputy sheriff, Tom Smith. A fifth person, Albert Nolly, would die later of his wounds.
The gang itself scattered, but Bisbee deputy sheriff William A. "Billy" Daniels picked up the scent and would not give up. Posses finally quit traveling with him, but Daniels methodically kept to the scattered trails, snatching Daniel Kelly at Deming, New Mexico. A Mexican informant led him across the border to Sabinal, a tiny town north of Corralitos, Chihuahua. Daniels, disguised as an ore buyer, entered Sabinal, arrested Dowd, and soon had him jailed in Tombstone, Arizona. At Minas Prietas, Sonora, he put leg irons on William Delaney. Meanwhile, other officers arrested Red Sample and Tex Howard near Clifton, Arizona. All these prisoners went to trial in Tombstone, Arizona, were found guilty, and were sentenced to be hanged. The territory erected a five-man scaffold, an instrument of death that Dowd called "a regular choking machine." The five men were all hanged at the same time, the leader Dowd strangling before his neck broke.
The Encyclopedia of Lawmen, Outlaws, and Gunfighters Page 6