Humankind’s view of history is never static. As more and more information becomes available, notions about what has happened often change, are modified, and are sometimes thrown out altogether. At one time in history, the idea of geocentrism—the earth is the center of the universe—ruled scientific thought. At one time in the not too distant past, the process of continental drift was believed to be embraced only by madmen. Today, examples of the reality and consequences of the shifting crustal plates are endless. It is no longer theory, as some would have you believe, but well-established, provable, scientific fact.
So it is with Western outlaw history. While many of these topics have been seemingly researched and written about as completely and thoroughly as can be expected, very few of them have, in truth, been investigated. The words research and investigate are often used interchangeably, and in many cases can overlap, but the latter, in the words of investigator Joe Nickell, “connotes a particular type of scholarly or scientific examination or inquiry.” Applying this concept to historical investigation, Nickell defines it as “that aspect of research in which appropriate methodologies are applied toward the resolution of historical conundrums.”
The goal of the investigator is the accumulation and development of proof sufficient to solve the problem. One important problem encountered here is that the standard of proof required to settle historical questions has never been codified. Clear and convincing evidence that leads to proof beyond a reasonable doubt is an extremely high standard that, unfortunately, generally remains impractical relative to historical questions and conundrums. This high standard is often forsaken for a lower one, one that simply relies on a preponderance of evidence.
When more than one hypothesis can account for the known, established facts, the one with the fewest assumptions is most likely correct. This principle is known as Occam’s Razor, the “principle of parsimony,” which essentially implies that the simplest explanation is usually the right one.
Butch Cassidy’s alleged death and return is a historical conundrum, or more accurately, a set of historical conundrums. To solve this conundrum, we can only make analyses, inferences, and deductions using the existing evidence, and there is precious little substantial evidence. What evidence does exist, however, can provide some important direction toward solving the problem.
There are three events, or issues, relative to Butch Cassidy that must be explored pertinent to determining the fate of the outlaw. First, it must be ascertained whether or not he was involved in the robbery of the Aramayo payroll. Second, it must be determined whether or not it was Butch Cassidy who was involved in the San Vicente incident—the arrival, the so-called shootout, and the burial. And third, elements and evidence of the alleged return of Butch Cassidy must be evaluated.
Finally, given a thorough analysis infused with logic, inductive and deductive reasoning, and a dose of common sense, a conclusion can be made, a conclusion based on the amount and quality of the evidence, a conclusion invoking Occam’s Razor.
The Robbery
There is little reason to doubt that a robbery of the Aramayo mine payroll occurred on or about November 4, 1908. The principal witness to the robbery was Carlos Peró, a mine official and the man in charge of escorting the payroll. However, Peró’s identifications and descriptions remain suspect for they are entirely contradictory; thus, it would be dangerous to rely on his testimony that the robbers were Butch Cassidy and Harry Longabaugh. It would be useful if additional evidence existed that linked Cassidy and Longabaugh to the robbery, but there is none.
Researchers Ann Meadows and Dan Buck have offered what they interpret as additional evidence that Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid were guilty of the Aramayo payroll robbery: the memoirs of one A. G. Francis, a British mining engineer who was working in southern Bolivia at the time.
According to an article written by Francis and published in 1913, two men he “judged to be Americans” arrived at his camp sometime in August 1908. The strangers introduced themselves as Frank Smith and George Low and claimed they were stockmen on their way to Argentina. The three men enjoyed a fairly pleasant visit accompanied by friendly conversation during the next few days. Then, Smith and Low departed.
Francis encountered the same two men a second time in Tomahuaico, where he had later moved his operations—they rode into his camp only a few hours following the Aramayo robbery. According to Francis, one of the men described how they relieved Carlos Peró of the payroll money and fled.
The following day, an Indian arrived in camp to inform the three men that, in response to the robbery, a military detachment had been sent out and was on its way Tomahuaico. To Francis’s dismay, his visitors asked him to guide them, telling him they were going to Uyuni.
Unwillingly, but not inclined to refuse, Francis guided the two men along a seldom-used route, finally arriving in the small village of Estarca, where they spent the night. In the morning, Smith and Low told Francis, much to his delight no doubt, that they were proceeding alone. That was the last Francis saw of the robbers. The next day, wrote Francis, he was informed that “two white men had been killed the previous evening at San Vicente.”
While there is little doubt that A. G. Francis had an encounter with the two men who robbed the Aramayo mine payroll, there exists no credible evidence that either one of them was Butch Cassidy. Cassidy was never positively identified by Francis, and there is little to support the hypothesis that he was involved.
There is a serious problem associated with the presentation of Francis’s recollections by Meadows and Buck as evidence of the involvement of Cassidy and Longabaugh in the robbery. In Meadows’s book Digging Up Butch and Sundance, the author presumed to insert the names of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid into Francis’s narrative via brackets, leaving the reader with the impression that it was a foregone conclusion it was those two men and no others. Francis, in truth, never identified either of his visitors as Cassidy or Longabaugh. In fact, Francis offered a supposition that one of them was actually Harvey Logan. Meadows’s and Buck’s playing loose with Francis’s words clouds, rather than clarifies, the real or hypothesized role of Butch Cassidy in the Aramayo payroll robbery.
In summary, despite a very remote possibility, there is not a single shred of substantial or conclusive evidence that Butch Cassidy and Harry Longabaugh were the perpetrators of the Aramayo robbery.
The San Vicente Incident
Here are the essential, generally accepted facts: two strangers arrived at San Vicente during the afternoon of November 7, 1908; the two were engaged in a confrontation with local authorities; and the two were killed, either by the attacking Bolivians or by their own hand.
From the available evidence, it appears that the two strangers were the same ones who robbed the Aramayo payroll, two men whose identities have never been positively determined.
So many different versions and interpretations of what transpired at San Vicente exist that it will probably never be possible to discover the truth of the principal elements of the events:
The exact day, as well as the time of day, the strangers arrived in San Vicente is not agreed upon.
The four Bolivians who approached the room in which the strangers took temporary residence have been identified in different accounts as either soldiers, policemen, civilians, or a “posse.”
Their numbers have been reported to range from two to an entire company of armed soldiers.
The so-called gun battle has enjoyed a myriad of descriptions ranging from a couple of shots fired to a “veritable din, intense firing, lasting over an hour” (in Richard Patterson’s Butch Cassidy: A Biography).
One researcher, as well as a former Bolivian president, claims no shootout ever occurred.
The dates of the shootout differ with different researchers.
Reports claim the strangers’ rifles and ammunition were left in the patio, and other reports claim they were in the room with them.
Some reports state the strangers commit
ted suicide, some say they surrendered, at least one says they were executed, and another says they escaped.
Some say the strangers were discovered dead at 6:00 a.m.; some say at noon.
Some claim the bodies were placed in a coffin; some say they were not.
Some claim the bodies were buried; some say they were not.
Some claim there was a monument placed over the graves; some say there was not.
In truth, no one actually knows what happened at San Vicente or who was killed.
Despite the acute paucity of substantial evidence, two arguments have remained prevalent regarding the San Vicente incident: (1) the two strangers who were killed were Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, and (2) they were buried in the San Vicente cemetery.
Despite what many believe, despite the preponderance of the oft-repeated tales, and despite decades of research and investigation into the matter, there is no substantial, conclusive, or even compelling evidence that either Butch Cassidy or Harry Longabaugh were the two strangers who arrived in San Vicente, that they were killed in that town, or that they were buried in the local cemetery.
The Return of Butch Cassidy
Now for the major conundrum of the Butch Cassidy issue: did the famous outlaw survive his South American experiences to return to the United States, to visit family and friends, and to eventually die there?
The evidence in support of Cassidy’s return is largely associated with the testimony of those family members and friends who claim he did. This evidence is relatively plentiful and, in the majority of cases, difficult to dispute. The only way it can be effectively challenged is to provide sufficient evidence that Cassidy was killed in Bolivia, or anywhere else for that matter, and that has never been done. Until more and better evidence is available to either confirm or contradict Cassidy’s return, accepting the notion that he did relies on the aforementioned testimony of family and friends, along with a few photographs—all of which is evidence but not proof.
However, given the preponderance of this evidence, we are, deductively speaking, faced with the distinct possibility that Butch Cassidy did return.
The alleged return of Butch Cassidy is beset with a further conundrum: what was his identity in the United States after he came back? Clearly, it would not have been in his best interests to continue using the name Butch Cassidy, or even Robert LeRoy Parker. Logically, he would have adopted an alias. The prevailing thinking is that the alias and identity Cassidy employed was William T. Phillips.
A great deal is known about the man named William T. Phillips, at least as far as his life after 1908 is concerned. Previous to that, there is no record that he ever existed.
Phillips’s life was reviewed in chapter 17, and it would serve no purpose to repeat it here. Essentially, however, we examine the prevailing arguments against and for William T. Phillips as Butch Cassidy.
Arguments against William T. Phillips as Butch Cassidy
Those who maintain the position that William T. Phillips could not have been Butch Cassidy offer as primary arguments the testimony of Phillips’s wife, a computer analysis of the faces of the two men, contradictions of Lula Parker Betenson’s claims her brother returned, and a handwriting analysis.
The Testimony of Gertrude Phillips
A year following the death of her husband, Mrs. William T. Phillips responded to a query from writer Charles Kelly, who was pursuing a potential link with Butch Cassidy. In the letter, printed in part in Larry Pointer’s In Search of Butch Cassidy, Mrs. Phillips claimed her husband was “born and raised in an eastern state” and, influenced by dime novels, headed west. As a teenager, according to the letter, William Phillips “fell in with Cassidy” around the time of the Johnson County War. Gertrude Phillips said her husband knew Cassidy “very, very well.” She also claimed she knew the outlaw as well.
As a result of the information contained in Gertrude Phillips’s letter, Charles Kelly concluded that William Phillips only represented himself as Cassidy and used this assumed identity to search for buried loot. Phillips, claimed Kelly, was a fraud.
Based in large part on Gertrude Phillips’s correspondence, Kelly’s deduction is most often quoted by those who seek to dispute the claim that William T. Phillips was Butch Cassidy.
An examination of Gertrude Phillips, her personality, and her possible motives for making such a claim is necessary to provide a somewhat different point of view.
According to Pointer, Gertrude Livesay Phillips has been described as “shy,” “withdrawn,” “introverted,” and “straight-laced.” In Spokane, as William Phillips enjoyed the company of his several friends and neighbors, Gertrude became resentful and “embittered.” The relationship between the two grew strained, and it was rumored that Phillips became involved in at least one extramarital affair. William Phillips, likely as a result of the tension generated by his declining income and the problems associated with his wife, began to drink more and more.
Between his depression and his drinking, Phillips’s health declined markedly. When he became too great a burden to maintain at home, Gertrude finally had him placed in a nursing home. Once there, she never visited him. Gertrude Phillips passed away twenty-two years later in 1959.
William Richard Phillips, the adopted son of Gertrude and William T. Phillips, offers a different perspective relative to his mother’s view that his father and Butch Cassidy were two different men. The younger Phillips told writer Jim Dullenty that, contrary to his mother’s claims, his father was indeed Butch Cassidy and that the fact was well known in the Phillips family. His mother, however, preferred to say it was not true because she cared little for the associated notoriety.
Gertrude Phillips’s testimony manifests at least three distinct elements that cause the investigator to question her credibility and veracity. First, she clearly cared very little about her husband during the last months of his life: once he was placed in a nursing home, she had nothing to do with him. The record shows that neighbors visited and saw to his welfare, but Gertrude did not. Second, her position on her husband as Butch Cassidy is contradicted by her own son. Third, her statement that she knew Butch Cassidy herself causes one to question her truthfulness: if, as she insisted, her husband was not Butch Cassidy, then how and where could she have possibly met the outlaw? The answer is most likely that she could not.
Ultimately, Gertrude Phillips’s testimony that her husband, William T. Phillips, was not Butch Cassidy cannot be accepted as complete truth.
Photoanalysis
In 1991, a report of the results of a computerized photoanalysis was published in the pages of a pulp magazine called Old West. For comparison, the analyst, one Thomas G. Kyle, selected two photographs. One was the famous Wyoming Territorial Prison photograph of Butch Cassidy, a face-on view of a somewhat disheveled Butch Cassidy, a photograph that was taken on his admission to the facility when he was twenty-eight years of age. The other was an image of a besuited William T. Phillips, a photograph believed to have been made in 1930 when Phillips was judged to be in his mid-sixties. Though the ages of the subjects differ by greater than three decades, some similarities are initially evident in the eyes and noses.
In Kyle’s analysis, the images are scanned and adjusted such that, according to the investigator, the distance between the eyes of each subject and the distance between the horizontal eye-distance line and the mouth are the same for both. The end result of this procedure is the superimposition of a grid over each face, a grid consisting of only two horizontal lines and two vertical lines.
With this grid in place, Kyle proceeds to analyze the ears (“somewhat different”) and the noses (“do not appear quite similar”), even though those particular features are not in the least impacted by the grid. Kyle then states, “Hair and hairlines are also important landmarks in visual recognition” and concludes that the hairlines of the two men do not match, that Phillips’s is lower than that of Cassidy.
Kyle then compares the sizes of the two men’s heads by
superimposing what amounts to crude outlines of each of their heads, one over the other, and “deleting all details but the edge of the hair and the profile of the head.”
Kyle concludes his study stating that “Butch had a much larger head than Phillips, a telling comparison” and that Cassidy and Phillips were “different people.” On the basis of the Kyle article, published under the title “Did Butch Cassidy Die in Spokane? Phillips Photo Fails,” many have embraced the notion that the case on the Cassidy-Phillips connection is now closed. Kyle’s analysis, however, begs to be criticized and consequently rejected—it fails on every point.
In the first place, it is bewildering to professional photoanalysts and researchers that Kyle employed such an elementary and error-prone nonstatistical analysis when at least two statistically valid procedures were available. The well-established Townes and Kaya-Kobayashi methods were procedures utilized regularly by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Central Intelligence Agency, Interpol, and progressive law enforcement agencies throughout the United States and the world.
In the second place, the design and methodology of Kyle’s study was unsophisticated and without logic. The two images Kyle selected were clearly unsuitable for comparison: the Cassidy image is a full face-forward photograph that provides a bilaterally symmetrical head. The Phillips image, on the other hand, is that of a man whose face is turned a few degrees to his right, providing what professional photoanalysts call an “angled facial,” which is rendered bilaterally asymmetrical and therefore not capable of being legitimately compared to the Cassidy photograph. Competent professional photoanalysts would never have considered undertaking a photo-comparison study employing these two photographs.
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