GUNFIGHTERS

Billy the Kid

Four men stood over the young man's lifeless body that night of July 14, 1881, at old Fort Sumner, New Mexico Territory. Some would talk about the shooting, but the last few moments of Billy the Kid's life were destined to be enveloped in mystery and myth.

The killing of Billy the Kid did not end his story. For more than a century the tales have continued. Hundreds of books have been written. Moviemakers have found a bonanza. The Kid is better known than most presidents. In death the outlaw has become larger than life.

But he never robbed a bank or a train. He never appeared on a wanted poster. And he never stood in the street and dared another gunman to "draw."

Historians now generally agree that the Kid killed four, maybe five men (three of them were men who died while four or more gunmen were all shooting at the same target).

What he did do, as one of the editors at Time/Life put it, was go "to Hell with a self-confidence hard not to admire in one so young." And he did it in short order - his career lasted less than the time it takes to graduate from high school.

Billy the Kid, aka Henry McCarty, Henry "Kid" Antrim, and William Bonney, among other aliases, lived as he died: violently. But the circumstances of his demise are uncertain.

Sheriff-elect Pat Garrett's official version was that in December of 1880 he captured the Kid and delivered him to the authorities in Santa Fe. The Kid subsequently was convicted and sentenced to hang for murdering a previous Lincoln County, New Mexico, sheriff. But the wily young outlaw cheated the hangman by killing his two guards and fleeing to Fort Sumner. Tipped as to the Kid's whereabouts, Garrett and two deputies, John Poe and Tip McKinney, made their way from Roswell to Sumner, riding at night on the back trails. But a search of Sumner and the surrounding area failed to turn up the Kid.

Eventually, Garrett and his men decided to visit Pete Maxwell, an acquaintance of Billy, to see if he knew where the outlaw was. Around midnight, as Garrett went into Maxwell's bedroom, the Kid came walking across the yard on the inside of the fence. According to Poe, he was hatless and in his stocking feet. However, neither Poe nor McKinney, both Texans and new to the area, knew what the Kid looked like. Poe thought he was a Mexican employee of Maxwell.

As the Kid mounted the porch, he saw the two deputies squatting in the shadows waiting for Garrett. The Kid had a butcher knife (he had

been on his way to carve a steak from a freshly killed yearling) and a self-cocking .41-caliber Colt Thunderer. He called out, "Quien es?" (Who is it?) Receiving no reply, he backed into Maxwell's room and directed his question to Maxwell. "Quien es, Pete?"

"He came directly towards me," Garrett recounted. "Came close to me, leaned both hands on the bed, his right hand almost touching my knee." Garrett said he recognized the Kid's voice immediately and dared not speak because his own gun was in its holster, and he was sitting on it.

"The Kid must have seen, or felt, the presence of a third person at the head of the bed. He raised his pistol, a self-cocker, within a foot of my breast."

The Kid jumped back. Garrett drew his revolver and fired twice.

"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 many victims."

Among the numerous legends adhering to Billy the Kid, this version of his death, too, eventually would be viewed by some as a tall tale.

The Kid had a special fondness for the Mexican people. If anything, they were his secret power.

He spoke Spanish fluently.

He had a Mexican querida (girlfriend) in more than one plaza. He was affectionately called El Chivato (The Infant Rascal) by the locals. They loved him. All over the territory they hid him and lied for him. So much so, that when Pat Garrett finally hunted down the Kid, he had to use imported Texans to help him do it.

While most of his notoriety stemmed from activities in New Mexico, the Kid ventured into Arizona in late 1875 using the name Henry McCarty. His age was undocumented, but there is a clue

J. W. "Sorghum" Smith, a hay contractor

The Kid spent less than two years in Arizona. The map below shows where he spent most of that time. (COUNTERCLOCKWISE FROM BELOW, LEFT) This overview of Camp Grant shows the small guardhouse just west of the parade ground from which the Kid managed to escape even though extra precautions were taken. Before it was Knowler & Johnson, this was Milton McDowell's store, said to be a hangout for the rustlers the Kid fell in with. (PHOTO COURTESY OF JERRY WEDDLE/THE DUBOIS FAMILY) For a brief period, the Kid cooked and bused tables at the Hotel de Luna near Camp Grant. (PHOTO COURTESY OF JERRY WEDDLE/IRENE KENNEDY)

Sizing Up the Kid

Those who knew Billy describe him: "He had the face of an angel, the soft voice of a woman, and the mild blue eyes of a poet." - Ygenio Salazar Fought with Billy in Lincoln County war "... he weighed about 125 pounds and was five feet seven inches tall, and as straight as an arrow. The Kid had beautiful hazel eyes. Those eyes so quick and piercing were what saved his life many a time." - Frank Coe A rancher who also fought with Billy in the war.

"He weighed about 135 pounds, light complected [sic], with blue grey eyes and had very small hands and feet. His two front teeth were large and protruded. He was a nice and polite chap. One thing that struck me as very funny at the time was that he had on a black dress coat, his trouser legs stuffed in his boot tops and a large light hat." -Dr. M. G. Paden Lincoln County resident "He ate and laughed, drank and laughed, rode and laughed, talked and laughed, fought and laughed, and killed and laughed." - Sheriff Pat Garrett "He was no better and no worse than the other boys of his age." - Mary Richards The Kid's schoolteacher "He was not handsome, but he had a certain sort of boyish good looks. He was always smiling and good-natured and very polite and danced remarkably well . . ." - Paulita Maxwell The Kid's sweetheart (RIGHT) Accused of murder, the Kid was captured by Pat Garrett and brought to trial. He was sentenced to hang but escaped that fate by spilling more blood in yet another escape.

Continued from page 6 at Camp Thomas in southeastern Arizona, remembered the undersized waif who walked up and asked for work. “He said he was 17,” Smith recalled, “though he didn't look to be 14.” His only experiences with the law to that point were for stealing butter and later for receiving stolen property clothes taken from a Chinese laundry. For the latter offense, he was confined to a cabin that had been converted into a makeshift jail. During the night, he squirmed up the chimney and escaped.

He spent nearly two years in Arizona, but few of his activities are documented. Legend and folklore have filled the gaps. To hear tell, every rancher in southeastern Arizona hid him and every other old-timer saw Billy the Kid shooting his way across the landscape. Truth is he was just an unemployed busboy named Henry McCarty.

For a brief period, he got a job cooking and busing tables at the Hotel de Luna near Camp Grant where he fell in with an ex-soldier named John R. Mackie and began stealing horses and saddles, especially cavalry horses.

Researcher Jerry Weddle recently discovered the 1911 reminiscences of Miles Wood who was the owner of the Hotel de Luna and justice of the peace during the Kid's stay at Camp Grant. At one point, Wood recalled a particularly reckless event in which the Kid and his partner crowned their horse-theft adventures: “A lieutenant and a doctor came down one day. They said they would fix it so that no one would steal their horses. They had long picket ropes on the horses and when they went into the bar, carried the ropes with them. Mackie talked to the officers quite a while and when they came out they only had a piece of rope in their hands. The Kid had gone with the horses.” The victims found little humor in the theft. They filed a complaint with JP Wood. A warrant was issued, and a constable sent to arrest the duo. “He came back,” Wood wrote, “and said he could not find them. I knew he did not want to find them.” By this time, Henry McCarty had a bankroll and a hatful of aliases.

“He came to town,” recalled Gus Gildea, a local cowboy, “dressed like a 'country jake' with 'store pants' on and shoes instead of boots. He wore a six-gun stuffed in his trousers.” The Kid considered himself a gambler. He dealt monte and “bucked the tiger” whenever he had a stake.

Ranch foreman Gus Gildea (ABOVE) saw the Kid (ABOVE, LEFT) come to town dressed in the outfit he liked to wear when he passed time at the saloon and dance ball at Camp Grant. Gildea also witnessed the shooting that caused the Kid to hightail it out of Arizona. (PHOTO COURTESY OF SPECIAL COLLECTION, UNIVERSITY OF ARIZONA)

Bad Boy, Good Copy

During the last 110 years or so, the press has had a field day with Billy the Kid. As the times change so does Billy at least on paper. “. . . he was a low down vulgar cut-throat, with probably not one redeeming quality.” Grant County Herald July 28, 1881 “A genius for depopulation . . . a Robin Hood of the mesas, a Don Juan of New Mexico whose youthful daring has never been equalled in our entire frontier history.” Bookmarker for The Saga of Billy the Kid by Walter Noble Burns, 1926 “The Kid is now viewed as a victim of circumstances who deserved a better life.” The Western Hero in History and Legend by Kent Ladd Steckmesser, 1965 “Billy the Kid just keeps riding across the dreamscape of our minds silhouetted against a starlit Western sky, handsome, laughing, deadly. Shrewd as the coyote. Free as the hawk. The outlaw of our dreams forever free, forever young, forever riding.” New Mexico magazine Paul Andrew Hutton, June, 1990

Bogus Billy

In the 1990 movie Young Guns II, Billy the Kid didn't die at Fort Sumner. He lived to be an old man in Hico, Texas, under the alias Brushy Bill.

I hate to be a spoilsport, but there are at least three details about Brushy Bill that do not match up with Billy the Kid:

Not long after the picket-rope affair, Miles Wood saw the Kid and Mackie enter the hotel for breakfast. "I told the waiter that I would wait on them. I took a large server and tray and took it in and slipped it on the table in front of them. Pulled a six-gun from under it and told them 'hands up.'"

Wood walked them out the door and herded them on foot the 2 1/2 miles to the guardhouse at Camp Grant where he asked the commanding officer to hold them until he could make other arrangements.

About an hour after he was locked up, the Kid asked the sergeant of the guard to take him out for some purpose. Wood noted in his reminiscences: "Right back of the guardhouse, and in front of several men, the Kid turned and threw a handful of salt in the guard's eyes and grabbed his gun." But the attempt failed. The guard yelled for help, and the men disarmed the boy and returned him to confinement. Wood, who had walked back to his hotel, was summoned back to the camp where he had the blacksmith fit the Kid with a pair of shackles riveted around his ankles. But it was to do little good.

"That night," Wood wrote, "myself and my wife were at a reception at the colonel's house when the sergeant of the guard came to the door and called the colonel out. In a few minutes, he came back and said the Kid was gone, shackles and all."

It was Henry McCarty's second escape on record. It would not be his last.

He later showed up at the new mining camp of Globe City (as it was called then) where he may have gone to see his stepfather, William Antrim, according to researcher Weddle, who has traced Antrim to the area. Weddle also believes that Antrim may have alerted officials, as a constable arrested the Kid twice, and twice he slipped away.

But in spite of the danger at Camp Grant, the Kid could not stay away from his old stomping grounds.

On the night of August 17, 1877, in George Atkin's saloon, the Kid got into a fracas with the local blacksmith, Francis P. "Windy" Cahill.

Gus Gildea remembered that night. "He was called 'Windy' because he was always blowing' about first one thing and another. Windy started abusing him. He would throw Henry to the floor, ruffle his hair, slap his face, and humiliate him before the men in the saloon.

It would be the last time. The Kid pulled his pistol out of his pants and before Windy could grab it, he fired. The bully went down and died the following day.

Henry McCarty fled Arizona never to return. He had three years and eleven months to live.

He gravitated to eastern New Mexico and changed his name to Billy Bonney. He went up a few more chimneys. He got out of even more tight spots. He participated on the losing side in the "Lincoln County war," a bloody shootout among rival factions of ranchers and merchants over control of the 28,000-square-mile county in southeastern New Mexico. But when he plunged out of a burning house with pistols blazing and escaped during the climax of that war, he became a local hero. And, finally, when he killed his two guards and escaped hanging for the murder of the exNew Mexico sheriff, his exploits were detailed in newspapers across the country.

During the investigation of the war, the combatants were given safe conduct to tell their sides of the dispute to the newly appointed New Mexico governor. During his interview, Billy, holding a Winchester in his right hand and a revolver in his left, told the governor: "I am not afraid to die like a man fighting, but I would not like to be killed like a dog unarmed."

Four men stood over Billy the Kid's corpse: Pat Garrett, Pete Maxwell, John Poe, and Tip McKinney. Garrett had some explaining to do. Billy and he were once friends. So Garrett wrote a book justifying his actions. Ironically, it sold poorly.

Forty-four years later, Poe wrote a book about the Kid and the events of July 14, 1881. Poe echoed Garrett's "official" version.

Maxwell never talked publicly about the incident.

McKinney never granted an interview (some say he was never asked), and he never wrote a book. But he did confide in a mining partner named Frederick William Grey. In 1912, Grey published an obscure book titled Seeking a Fortune in America. In it, Grey related, albeit briefly, what he said was McKinney's version of the killing. McKinney contended to Grey that Garrett learned the Kid would visit his "Mexican sweetheart," Paulita Maxwell, Pete's sister. The lawmen arrived at the Maxwell house before the Kid and "tied and gagged the girl." Garrett hid behind the sofa, and when the Kid showed clearly in the open door, Garrett shot him.

Grey commented, dryly, "This was not showing much sporting spirit."

Flawed memory? Secondhand gossip? Perhaps. But McKinney had nothing to gain by fabricating a story.

One hundred and ten years later, I think it is safe to say Billy the Kid died like a dog, unarmed.