FREDERICKS, William (1872-1895)
William Fredericks was born in Germany and still had his heavy German accent when he showed up in California. In May 1890, masked and carrying a shotgun, he stopped a Mariposa County stage, found the strongbox empty, and got only a few pennies from the driver and one female passenger. Within a week he was caught and given four years in Folsom Prison. For a bandit, this was not an auspicious beginning.
Three years later, practically to the day, the prison released him for good behavior, but Fredericks had learned little. He arranged for friends still in prison to get guns so that they might escape, but all were killed during the attempt.
Fredericks then fled to Nevada, riding as a train hobo. However, he shot a crew member trying to evict him, and on June 30, 1893, killed Nevada sheriff William H. Pascoe, who sought him for questioning. Although a statewide manhunt commenced, no success came until March, when Fredericks appeared back in California at the San Francisco Savings Union, handing a note to a teller demanding money or the building would be blown up. That confrontation ended with Fredericks killing the teller, then fleeing down the street, where he tried to hide by crawling under an empty house. Officers flushed him out. In April 1898, he went on trial for murder, was found guilty, and was sentenced to be hanged.
On the day of his execution he borrowed some paper, wrote an account of his crimes, and tried to sell them for $100. After lowering the price to $20 and still getting no takers, he tore up the confession. On July 26, 1895, he went quietly to his death.
FREE, Mickey (1847?-1915)
This celebrated scout was born in Santa Cruz, Sonora, Mexico, his last name being Martinez. After his father died, his mother moved to the Sonoita Valley of Arizona, where she remarried. On January 27, 1861, wandering Apaches stole the boy and raised him as a Western White Mountain Apache. Sometime during his youth, he was blinded in his left eye, the disfigurement giving him a lifelong vicious appearance. He married four times, fathered four children and was never known to have killed anyone, although many stories have circulated otherwise.
The name "Mickey Free" was the name he gave when he joined the Apache Scouts on December 2, 1862. He became a first sergeant, rode repeatedly with the noted scout Al Sieber, and was considered a fine interpreter and spy (scout). He rode with Gen. George Crook during the Sierra Madre expedition of 1883. In 1885, he accompanied Chatto and other Apaches to Washington, D.C. He reportedly died in the summer of 1915.
FUSSELMAN, Charles (1866-1890)
Although born on July 11, 1866, at Greenbush, Wisconsin, Charles Fusselman moved with his family to Nueces County, Texas when he was four years old. In May 1888, he enlisted as a private in Company D of the Texas Rangers. In June 1889, Fusselman-now a corporal-traveled by train to the isolated whistle stop of Maxon Spring (near Marathon), Texas, where he and wanted outlaw Donanciano Beslinga blazed away at each other without effect during a violent thunderstorm. The two met again at sunrise, and this time the ranger fired eight rounds into Beslinga, who did not survive. A year later the state promoted Fusselman to sergeant and transferred him
to Presidio, Jeff Davis, and Brewster Counties. He frequently made courtroom appearances in and around El Paso, Texas.
On April 17, 1890, as Fusselman lounged in the El Paso sheriff's office talking with Deputy Frank Simmons and police officer George Herold, rancher John Barnes dashed in and breathlessly reported a theft of cattle at Mundy Springs in the Franklin Mountains, eight miles north of El Paso.
Fusselman, Herold, and Barnes rode in pursuit and entered an east-side canyon, where they easily captured Ysidoro Pasos, a rustler rear guard. A halfhour later the lawmen unexpectedly blundered into the outlaw camp, where, during a brief gun battle, the rustler leader, Geronimo Parra, shot Fusselman twice in the head with a rifle, killing him instantly. The rustlers escaped. The lawmen retreated back to town and later returned with a large posse. They recovered Fusselman's body. A funeral home packed Fusselman in ice and shipped him to Lagarto, Texas, for burial. Today this tragic canyon, the largest in the Franklin Mountains, is called Fusselman Canyon.
S66 a190: HUGHES, JOHN R.
GAINESVILLE Hangings
An example of fear, ignorance, war, racism, lack of communications, and man's inhumanity to man occurred at Gainesville in Cooke County, Texas, during mid-October 1866. What became the "Great Gainesville Hangings" had their initial roots in North-South bitterness before and after the Civil War.
Gainesville, about 60 miles north of Fort Worth and Dallas, and 10 miles south of the Red River, had begun as a small community eventually reached by the Butterfield Overland Stage Company. The small community of Gainesville turned into a continental crossroads. Here in northern Texas, Union sentiment ran high, since only about 10 percent of the population owned slaves. Furthermore, Cooke and most of its neighboring counties voted against seccession, arousing the fears of farmers and cattlemen who did own slaves. Making matters worse, Kansas abolitionists (known as Jayhawkers) had been active in this part of Texas. While they found much of the population desiring only to be left alone, these Jayhawkers aroused considerable sentiment for turning north Texas into a free state.
The Confederacy Conscription Act (generally called the Conscript Law) of April 1862 was unevenly enforced in north Texas. By some accounts, the draft leaned toward inducting Union Sympathizers into the Confederate army. Therefore, many of these individuals formed what became locally known as the Union League, or the Clan. Rumors circulated
that the league planned to assault regional arsenals. Texas reacted by dispatching state troops on the morning of October 1, 1862. The 11th Texas Cavalry arrested an alleged 150 white Unionists-none of them slave owners-in and around Gainesville, holding them at Gainesville and charging them with insurrection and treason.
The military turned the prisoners over to civil authorities and returned to their encampment. At this point the community seemed to go berserk. Thomas Barrett, a local preacher who wrote memoirs of the event, recalled that "there were crowds ... in every direction, armed and pressing forward [toward] prisoners under guard. The deepest and most intense excitement . . . prevailed. Reason had left its throne. The mind of almost every man seemed to be unhinged, and wild excitement reigned supreme. When I arrived on the [town] square, there were perhaps three or four hundred armed men ... in sight." Although trials had not yet started, Barrett mentioned that "a [hanging] tree [in the public square] had already been selected," a "historic elm with long and bending limbs."
The jailed prisoners next went before a citizens court of 12 jurors, seven of them slave owners. In this court, the jurors needed not a unanimous vote but only a majority vote of seven. Therefore, by majority vote several of the suspected Unionists were released, but the jury still convicted seven leaders of the accused, most of whom confessed, after a fash ion, allegedly admitting plans for an attack on the town in coordination with Kansas Jayhawkers. They spoke of secret handgrips, various oaths and degrees of membership, special words with double meanings, and distinctive motions made with the hands or eyes or feet, one of them a particular way of tugging on the ear. They allegedly confessed that men, women, and children would be slain during a forthcoming uprising.
The seven-one at a time, after being found guilty-were turned over to the outside mob and taken to a huge elm tree in the Gainesville public square and hanged. Not satisfied, however, the mob within hours sent word that 14 more men had to be hanged, or else everyone in the building would be killed, including the jury. Therefore, the intimidated jury called for a list of names, chose 14, then handed the list to the jury foreman, saying, "Maybe this will satisfy them [the outside mob]." The 14 men were then locked in a separate room and told they would be hanged during the following day, Sunday.
During the next morning the condemned were loaded into a wagon and hauled down California Street to the Public Square, where at the direction and insistence of the mob the military carried out the executions, hanging each man from a branch
of the elm. However, even the larger limbs would not support several bodies at once, so the hangings took all day, darkness finally approaching as the last man died. Barrett noted in his memoirs that the mob did not permit wives and children to observe the executions, but he also wrote that "the sun set that night on fourteen widowed families."
A killing lust satisfied, at least temporarily, the remaining 60 to 80 prisoners, now considered innocent, would be released, likely within the week. But other tragedies intervened. Within days, unknown but suspected Union assailants ambushed and killed Confederate colonel William C. Young, the officer charged with originally rounding up the insurrectionists. They also killed a local resident named James Dickson. None of the slayers were identified or ever apprehended, but an enraged community still had the remaining prisoners as targets for its rage. These men were now hustled from jail back to the courtroom and retried on the original charges. Two-thirds (about 50 or 60) were released, but 19 were convicted and promptly taken by heavily guarded cart to the same public square and hanged from the same elm on the following Sunday. Altogether, 40 men had
now died in the Gainesville Square at the end of a rope.
The Texas government paid expenses for the military's part in rounding up the accused and in general applauded what came to be known as the "Great Gainesville Hangings." Many state newspapers provided supportive editorials. However, after the Civil War ended, a few of the jurors were tried by a Union government for murder. All but one were acquitted.
GARLICK, William Henry (1868-1913)
In the annals of Western history, the name William Henry Garlick is seldom mentioned, but a careful investigation reveals that this steady and fearless lawman was a highly regarded and respected El Paso County deputy sheriff during trying times at the westernmost tip of far West Texas. Aside from serving a satchel full of routine arrest warrants, scuffling with drunks, calming family disputes, and serving subpoenas, William Henry Garlick had the Mexican Revolution to worry about.
During the heady days of the topsy-turvy revolution, Fedemles, revolutionaries, and mercenaries were creating mischief and murder along the turbulent border. Sometimes their motives were pure, and at other times their intentions were personal and larcenous. Area lawmen maintained a constant guard, sometimes jumping back and forth across the international line.
On numerous occasions, famed Texas Ranger captain John Hughes, the "Border Boss," detailed Sgt. C. R. Moore and Pvt. Charles Webster to parallel the movements of revolutionists operating from across the Rio Grande and prevent any unwarranted and unwelcome intrusion onto Texas soil. Knowing they indeed had their hands full with this dicey assignment, the pair of rangers sought the help of a salty border veteran, 45-year-old W. H. Garlick.
The trio of lawmen shadowed the movements of Pascual Orozco's army. The Mexicans no doubt looked to the American side of the Rio Grande and postulated that the three lawmen posed little threat, yet, for whatever reason, the insurgents moved on, wary of testing them. Later, however, other rebels decided to splash across the line for piracy and pillage. Three made a bold attempt to ford the river but were turned back by an officer's admonition. With reinforcements, the rebels wheeled about and charged back across the river toward the lawmen and just as suddenly opened fire. Undaunted, Moore, Webster, and Garlick returned the shots. Three bandoleer-wearing bandits tumbled from flat-horned Mexican saddles. With news of the incident in hand, the Texas governor instructed Captain Hughes, "You give an account of the experience of Sergeant Moore and Private Webster and Deputy Sheriff Garlick in their brush with the rebels. I think the time has come when the State should not hesitate to deal with these marauding bands of rebels in a way which they will understand."
After the shootout, Deputy Garlick was clearly tagged a ranger cohort and supporter, although nothing happened until the middle of June (1913), when he and Texas Ranger Scott Russell arrested Sabino Guadarrama, Will Hill, and L. Dominguez for stealing cattle. The defendants made bond and threatened revenge.
Then on June 23, Garlick and Russell entered the Guadarrama family business, the "del Barrio Libre" grocery and butcher shop, a suspected site for selling meat from stolen, butchered beeves. Garlick and Russell were not overly concerned, as both "were considered excellent pistol shots and were quick on the draw," at least so reported the El Morroirag uses. However, for the moment both dropped their guard, and suddenly each was struck from behind by a heavy meat cleaver (an ax by other reports) in the hands of Mariana Guadarrama, Sabino's mother. And, at almost the exact instant that the two officers fell to the floor bleeding copiously from massive head wounds, Juan Guadarrama, another of Mariana's sons, riddled the face-down lawmen with lead, firing nine shots. However, in a wickedly sour twist of fate, during the chaotic fracas somehow Juan shot his own mother, the ax-wielding Mariana, in the stomach. She died on the floor, inches from Garlick and Russell.
Scott Russell's remains were shipped to his birthplace, Stephenville, Erath County, Texas. Garlick was survived by a pregnant wife and four children, and he was later interred at Valentine, Jeff Davis County, Texas. Juan Guadarrama went to the penitentiary.
SE6 CkO; HUGHES, JOHN REYNOLDS; TEXAS RANGERS
GARRETT, Patrick Floyd Jarvis (a.k.a Pat Garrett) (1850-1908)
Pat Garrett is best remembered as the slayer of Henry McCarty, a.k.a. William H. Bonney, a.k.a. Billy the
Kid. Garrett came into the world as one of eight children at Chambers County, Alabama, on June 5, 1850, the son of John and Elizabeth Garrett, farmers. Three years later the family moved to Claiborne Parish, Louisiana, where Pat grew up. Due to a family dispute, Garrett left home in 1869 and became a buffalo hunter on the Texas plains. In November 1876, Garrett shot and killed buffalo hunter Joe Briscoe during a campfire altercation. At Fort Griffin, Texas, a grand jury declined to prosecute.
On February 1, 1877, a Comanche band struck the buffalo hunters' camp near present-day Lubbock, Texas, inflicting damages. Shortly afterward, Garrett left the buffalo range, rode into Fort Sumner, New Mexico, briefly entered the hog business, and married Apolinaria Gutierrez. They would have eight children.
Pat Garrett and his wiFe, Apolinaria, in a photo likely taken on their wedding day (Author's Collection)
New Mexico's Lincoln County War commenced in 1877-78. In November 1880, Pat Garrett became the Lincoln County sheriff. On December 19, 1880, at Fort Sumner, New Mexico, Pat Garrett and his posse killed Tom O'Folliard, a friend and outlaw associate of Billy the Kid. Early the next morning, December 20, Garrett trapped Billy the Kid and gang remnants in a rock house at Stinking Springs, several miles from Fort Sumner. During a shootout the posse killed gang member Charlie Bowdre. Several hours later the Kid and the others surrendered and were transported by buckboard and train to the territorial prison in Santa Fe. From there the Kid was moved to Mesilla, New Mexico, tried for murder, found guilty, and was sentenced to be hanged at Pat Garrett's jail in Lincoln, New Mexico. But that never happened, because while Garrett was collecting taxes at White Oaks, New Mexico, the Kid killed two guards and escaped. Then, shortly before or right after midnight on July 14, 1881, Sheriff Pat Garrett fired two revolver shots in Pete Maxwell's bedroom at Fort Sumner, New Mexico. One bullet struck the wall; the other buried itself in the heart of Billy the Kid. It took Garrett another six months to collect the $500 reward.
A biography then appeared with the mind-numbing title of The rx"'n,- Made His a arr New Mex:ico, Northrerr~ Aipxico. Pat Garrett's name went on the cover as author, but Garrett's journalist friend Ash Upson claimed that he (Upson) wrote every word of it.
Garrett could not get reelected sheriff, although he continued dabbling in territorial politics. In 1884, with rampant cattle rustling occurring in the Texas panhandle, the LS Ranch retained Pat Garrett to organize a force of Texas Rangers and suppress the outbreaks. By 1885 much of the rustling had ceased, so Garrett disbanded the lawmen. Thereafter, he worked briefly for the Cree Ranch in New Mexico, but within a year, due to drought and a pullback
of foreign investment, Garrett was again out of work.
Garrett moved his family to Roswell, New Mexico, where in cooperation with various financiers, he engaged in irrigation schemes along the Pecos River. By 1893, however, due to a financial depression, Garrett was forced out. Bitter, he left New Mexico, moving to Uvalde, Texas, where he gambled and raced horses with John Nance Garner, who would be
vice president of the United States during the first two FDR administrations.
Meanwhile, back in New Mexico, Col. Albert Jennings Fountain, a prominent Mesilla resident, and his young son Henry had been traveling by buggy across the desolate 70-mile stretch between Alamogordo and Mesilla, New Mexico. Somewhere near White Sands, they disappeared. The territory feared murder, and once again New Mexico needed Pat Garrett. He returned to become sheriff of Dona Ana County in early 1896. In doing so, he switched from the Democratic to the Republican Party.
During the course of the Fountain murder investigation, Garrett zeroed in on three suspects: Oliver Lee, Bill McNew, and James Gilliland, ranchers and cowboys living in the Tularosa Basin of southern New Mexico. Before dawn on July 12, 1898, Garrett and several deputies rode to Wildy Well, a ranching line-camp near present-day Oro Grande, New Mexico. The posse dismounted a quarter-mile distant from the shacks, approached, and broke into the bedroom of a rancher and his wife. The suspects were not there. During the search that followed, Tularosa, New Mexico, school teacher and deputy Kent Kearney placed a ladder against the roof of a shack. The outlaws shot him off it when he climbed up to look around. He died shortly afterward. The gunmen on the roof, in control of the high ground, forced the sheriff and his deputies to surrender and relinquish their weapons before leaving.
A sheriff had now been humiliated, three outlaws were loose and running, and the whole Southwest was in an uproar. However, two of the Fountain murder suspects, rancher Oliver Lee and cowboy Jim Gilliland, subsequently surrendered and were taken to Hillsboro, New Mexico. During an 1899 trial that made newspapers all over the country, Lee and Gilliland were acquitted.
The Encyclopedia of Lawmen, Outlaws, and Gunfighters Page 20