Paul Colt's Blog, page 44

Deathly Controversy

John Ringo’s body was found by a teamster. Ringo had a gun in his hand and a bullet hole in the right temple. He was buried where he was found. The coroner’s report ruled the death suicide. The suicide verdict came with a trail of anomalies and circumstantial oddities sufficient to fuel a legacy of controversy. When found, he was not wearing boots. He had strips of undershirt tied to his feet, giving the appearance of having been walked in for some distance. One of the cartridge belts he wore was strapped on upside down. Besides the exit wound in the top of his head, he bore a scalp wound cut by some sharp instrument. His horse was not on the scene. It was found two weeks later, still saddled.

The body was found a quarter mile west of the home of one B. F. Smith, close enough to be within hearing of a gunshot. No mention is made of Smith’s whereabouts or testimony in regard to the discharge of a weapon. The coroner’s report noted the pistol in Ringo’s hand had five chambers loaded. Some question whether the pistol had been fired as safety practices common in the day, did not load the chamber the hammer rested on. The coroner did not report powder burns on the body as would be typical of a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head. Additional speculation was caused by the presence of a light colored hat at the scene. The coroner’s report mentions the hat, but draws no significance to a question as to why the hat showed no evidence of having been worn at the time of the shooting.

Speculations on Ringo having been murdered persisted when Frank Leslie confessed from his prison cell he in fact killed John Ringo. Those who doubt Leslie’s claim believe he made it out of a desire for notoriety. Others hypothesize Wyatt Earp returned to Arizona to finish his ‘Cowboy vendetta’. There is even a fanciful theory Doc Holiday killed Ringo, placing him magically in two places at the same time.

Fifty years after the facts described here, the last surviving coroner’s juror, Robert Boller commented on the various speculations in a letter to one Frank King. According to Boller’s recollections, the body when found had been dead for some time and had discolored, accounting for the absence of observed powder burns. The letter claims a discharged cartridge casing was found in the pistol chamber on which the hammer rested. Boller’s account states the hat was found beside the body. When Boller’s recollections are added to the Coroner’s report it would appear to confirm the suicide ruling, though the details he offers are the fifty year old recollections of an old man.

Next Week: Luke Short

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Johnny Ringo

The Mason County War started as a dispute over range stock ownership between German settlers in Mason County and southern sympathizing native Texans from neighboring counties. The Germans were Union loyalists. A series of violent incidents escalated to an ethnic feud.

In May 1875 Mason County Deputy Sheriff John Wohrle arrested Texan Tim Williamson. While escorting the prisoner to jail, a mob in Mason assaulted Williamson and killed him. Deputy Wohrle made no attempt to protect his prisoner. Williamson’s friend, former Texas Ranger Scott Cooley swore to avenge his friend’s death. When the Mason County Grand Jury failed to indict anyone for Williamson’s death, Cooley took matters into his own hands, gunning down Deputy Wohrle.

Ringo was drawn into the conflict in September 1875 when his friends Moses Baird and George Gladden were lured into Mason by gambler James Cheyney. The pair were ambushed by a posse led by Mason Sheriff John Clark. Baird was killed and Gladden wounded. Baird’s killing bought blood feud.

September 25 eight Texans including Ringo rode into Mason. Ringo and another man made it their business to track down Cheney and kill him. Four days later, Cooley, Baird’s brother Ringo and others ambushed three Germans as they rode down the street in Mason.
In December 1875, Ringo and Cooley were arrested and charged with threatening the Burnet County Sheriff and his deputy. They were held in the Travis County jail where they were subsequently indicted. In March of 1876, following a change of venue, Ringo and Cooley were tried and convicted in Lampasas County. In May of 1876 with the help of friends, Ringo and Cooley escaped the Lampasas County jail where they were held pending appeal.

Ringo was recaptured in October 1876 by a posse led by the Lampasas County Sheriff. While he was being held in the Travis County jail he became friends with John Wesley Hardin. In November, a Mason County Grand Jury indicted Ringo for the murder of James Cheyney. He was transferred to Mason County. In May 1878 the Mason County District Attorney dropped all charges in the Cheyney murder for lack of witnesses. Ringo ass released and drifted west to Arizona.

Next Week: Deathly Controversy
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Doc Holiday

Doc Holiday’s contradictions don’t stop with his complex persona. His life and legend are riddled with lapses between fact and fancy. It really depends on the sources you consult. We consulted several. Here is a sampling of the discrepancies.

John Henry Holiday was born 14 August, 1851. Other sources date his birth to 1852, owing to an error on an early tombstone. A seemingly well documented source suggests he was born with a cleft palate, surgically repaired in infancy though leaving him with a speech impediment for the remainder of his life. No other source confirms the infirmity.

Professionally he trained as a dentist, graduating from the Pennsylvania College of Dental Surgery in 1872. He was not a medical doctor or surgeon as variously represented by some sources. Shortly after graduation he contracted tuberculosis, consumption as it was then known, in all likelihood from his mother who died of it. He established a dental practice in Texas, however coughing fits brought on by the disease made it difficult to perform delicate procedures. When his practice failed he turned to gambling to support his himself and his considerable drinking habit. By one account he consumed four quarts of whiskey a day. Another source had it a more plausible two. Alcoholic by any measure.

Gambling proved a dangerous profession for an adept player with a hot temper. Doc became an expert marksman with a pair of nickel-plated double action revolvers, a .41 Colt Thunderer and a .38 Colt Lightening. While he is often portrayed carrying a sawed off shotgun, the only time he ever did was the Tombstone fight. He fired it once, tossed it aside and reverted to his Colts.

His friendship with Wyatt Earp began in 1877 in Fort Griffin Texas when Wyatt was on the trail of the notorious outlaw Dirty Dave Rudabaugh. While in Fort Griffin Doc also met and fell in love with Mary Katherine Haron(e)y a.k.a. Kate Fisher, Elder, Holiday, Big Nose Kate. Accounts of their ten year relationship vary from turbulent to tender. In spite of her various names and sordid reputation, Kate was a cultured woman who appealed to Doc’s more refined side.

There is little doubt Doc was a killer. How many men he killed is a matter of some dispute. By one account he killed six or seven. By a well-documented source, no more than two. Doc died of consumption at thirty-six in Glenwood Springs, Colorado November 8, 1887. Incredibly surviving his life-style and disease fourteen years. Best Hollywood portrayal ever: Val Kilmer, Tombstone.

Next Week: John Ringo

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Wyatt Earp

The roots of Wyatt Earp’s legend are found in his days as a peace officer in Kansas. He got his start in law enforcement when Wichita was a cow town. The reputation he earned there propelled him to center stage in Dodge City during that town’s wild and wooly heyday. We get to know him there with the aid of his friends, Bat Masterson, Luke Short and his early associations with Doc Holiday.

The Wyatt we came to know in those days was a calm, cool, level headed lawman, utterly fearless no matter the circumstances. He wasn’t hot tempered or quick on the trigger. Most often when he drew his gun to subdue a trouble-maker it was to deliver a butt blow to the head. ‘Buffaloing’ as he termed it was the tactic favored by both Wyatt and Masterson who often teamed in risky situations. One delivered the buffalo blow while the other backed his play with more lethal intent should the need arise. Rowdy cowboys were given the opportunity to sleep it off in jail with little more than a headache to show for it.

The Dodge City period is also a time when Wyatt forged fast friendships that would last lifetimes. Owing to the stressful circumstances of law enforcement, Wyatt and Bat Masterson formed a friendship based on absolute trust. Later in life, both men followed their gaming appetites to a taste for prize fighting. When Wyatt became involved in a disputed bout where he served as referee, Bat who didn’t witness the fight, rose to his friend’s defense. Wyatt simply wouldn’t fix a fight he argued. End of conversation.

When Wyatt needed help in Tombstone, he called on Bat and Luke Short. Both men responded; but for circumstances, both likely would have been at Wyatt’s side when the trouble in Tombstone came to a head near the OK corral. When Luke was run out of Dodge, Wyatt and Bat answered his call to the Dodge City war.
Doc Holiday didn’t have many friends. Wyatt was one. Doc stood shoulder to shoulder with the Earp brothers against the Clanton McLaury faction in Tombstone. Later Wyatt saw to it that Doc avoided prosecution for his part in the vendetta ride to avenge Morgan Earp’s murder.

The Wyatt we come to know in these stories is more than a cool competent hand in a tough situation. He is a man his friends could count on and they did.

Next Week: Doc Holiday

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Bat Masterson

Bat and his brother Ed based their early buffalo hunting seasons out of Dodge City, Kansas. As the herds thinned, the hunts moved southwest into Indian Territory on the Oklahoma Texas panhandle. Indian tribes in the area, including Quanah Parker’s Comanche, took offense at the threat to their livelihood, giving rise to the dust-up at a trading post located near Adobe Walls.

Following the Adobe Walls attack, Bat signed on as a cavalry scout in what became known as the Red River War. In January of the following year he got into a scrap with a trooper over a dance hall girl. Shots were exchanged. The trooper and the girl were killed. Bat was seriously wounded, taking a bullet to the pelvis. He would walk with a limp for the rest of his life.

On his recovery, he returned to Dodge and turned his prowess with a gun into a law enforcement career as a deputy sheriff. He later ran for sheriff and was elected. During this period he demonstrated himself to be a cool head in the face of danger and a tough lawman in the face of Dodge City’s cow town collection of notorious gunmen and desperados. The rogue’s gallery of those episodes makes for more story than these pages allow. When he failed to win reelection as sheriff, he became deputy U.S. Marshal, continuing his crime fighting days.

The 1880’s led Bat to Colorado and Arizona, living as a professional gambler. He got interested in promoting prize fighting along with his long-time pal Wyatt Earp. It was during this period, he began writing a sports column on boxing for a Denver weekly newspaper. He traveled to New York at the suggestion of none other than Teddy Roosevelt to serve as bodyguard for George Gould, a prominent New Yorker subject of a series of death threats. Masterson hob-knobbed with New York’s elite society. He settled near present day Times Square and for the next twenty years wrote a sports column for The New York Morning Telegraph. He died at his desk October 25th, 1921.

Next Week: Wyatt Earp

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Legendary Noise, John Wesley Hardin

So what was it about John Wesley Hardin that made him so controversial? He was a gunfighter alright. By all reports he was fast and a sure shot. He did his share of killing no doubt. How many men did he kill? It depends on who you ask. I came up with sources totaling 19, 29 and as many as 40. Pick a number. The body count is only the beginning with John Wesley.

He was born May 26, 1853 in Bonham Texas, the son of a Methodist preacher. He was named for the founder of that church. So much for what’s in a name. He grew up on the south side of the civil war and never got over it. He hated Yankees and blacks both of whom are numbered among his victims, starting at age fifteen. At eighteen he hired onto an Abilene cattle drive. By the time the herd arrived, his gun and temper had considerably reduced payroll expense in favor of his employer.

While in Abilene he hung out at Ben Thompson and Phil Coe’s Bull’s Head Saloon. Thompson considered Hardin’s gun a security asset to his establishment and plied his considerable thirst in return. Hardin became acquainted with city marshal Wild Bill Hickok. Most discount the story Hardin used the road-agent spin to throw down on Hickok. Instead the two regarded one another with a healthy respect. When Hardin’s temper inevitably led to bloodshed, he fled. I am told by his distant cousin, Donnie Adams, Hardin was fearful of facing Hickok.

Hardin returned to Texas, married and had three children. His attempt to settle down proved short lived. In 1873 he got into a dust-up over Reconstruction politics, killing a former police officer. In 1874 he the killed Brown County Sheriff and his deputy. The family fled to Florida. Texas Rangers arrested him in Pensacola.

Convicted of murder, he served a 16 year prison term. He studied law in prison and on release, was admitted to the Texas bar. We could comment here on his change of profession; but let’s not offend any of our murderer friends. In a twist of irony, Hardin was killed by a man he hired to kill another man in a dispute over a woman.

Next Week: Bat Masterson

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Calamity Jane

Truth be told there weren’t many women who took to gun fighting in the west. We include Martha “Calamity Jane” Canary here because she loved Wild Bill and never backed down from a fight.

Calamity Jane is an audacious, comic, tragic character. Her biography is laced in legend and fact. She was born in Princeton Missouri in 1852 to a farm family, the eldest of five. The family moved west in 1865. Within two years both her mother and father were dead. Orphaned, Martha took charge of her younger siblings. She took menial jobs to support the family, including cook, nurse, dance hall girl, mule skinner, teamster and army scout. These latter gave rise to her habit of dressing like a man. She could ride, shoot, drink and cuss with the best or worst of them.

Her army exploits earned her ‘Calamity Jane’ sobriquet. On a scouting mission against hostile Indians, she rescued her fallen commander while under attack. The officer recovered his wounds and declared her “Calamity Jane, heroine of the west”. Her reputation was born.

She met Wild Bill Hickok while traveling to Deadwood in 1876. Both being given to tall tales and whiskey, they fashioned a fast friendship. Jane fell hard for the dashing, flamboyant Hickok. Hickok on the other hand preferred femininity in his romantic interests. On reaching Deadwood, Jane worked as a pony express rider. Her romantic hopes for Hickok were dashed in August by the assassin Jack McCall.

In later years, Jane lived off her notoriety, appearing in Wild West shows including Buffalo Bill’s. She had a hard time holding a job due to her hot temper and penchant for alcohol. She also had a well concealed soft side, nursing victims of an 1878 smallpox epidemic. She died in 1903 and is buried beside Wild Bill, together at last.

Next Week: John Wesley Hardin, Legendary Noise

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Law, Love and Legacy

Hickok sported long flowing locks, a broad brimmed pancake crown hat, leather leggings, a brace of ivory handled pistols and a serious knife. He was a crack shot and accomplished horseman. He was also courteous and genteel with an eye for the ladies.

He took up law enforcement in 1869, serving as sheriff in Hays City Kansas. His reputation for iron fisted law enforcement at the business end of a Colt began to grow. In 1871 he became marshal in the tough cattle town of Abilene Kansas. Aside from the wide-open rollicking Texas cowboys, Abilene had its own collection of gunmen. Notorious among them Ben Thompson and Phil Coe, owners of the Bull’s Head Saloon a favored hangout of young John Wesley Hardin. Bar-rail speculation ran rampant concerning who among the three and Hickok might be the fastest gun. Reputations bred healthy respect.

We’ve previously recounted the risqué sign Thompson erected to draw attention to the Bull’s Head. It led to a confrontation between Thompson and Hickok that ended peaceably when Thompson white-washed parts of the anatomically correct sign. We’ll save the story of Hickok and Hardin for John Wesley’s profile on these pages. Which brings us to Coe. Coe was in the conversation about the fastest of the four gunnies; but truth be told he was probably a distant fourth to the other three. The dust up between Coe and Hickok started over a woman. Plenty of bad blood simmered between the two leading up to the night Hickok was summoned to the Bull’s Head by a drunk shooting up the street. The drunk was Phil Coe. With Thompson out of town and little chance of reprisal, it was time to settle the score. When Hickok confronted Coe, Coe reacted imprudently. Bill dispatched him at close range.
Someone came running up the dark street in response to the shooting. Hickok whirled and fired, killing his deputy and friend, Mike Williams. That was the end of Hickok’s days as a lawman. We are left to wonder if he resigned out of remorse for the killing of his friend; or rather because he was suffering the onset of glaucoma and could no longer trust his eyes. Buffalo Bill Cody next put Hickok to work in his wild-west show. Bill wasn’t a showman. After about a year he returned to the west where he found love.

Hickok fell madly in love with Agnes Lake Thatcher, a beautiful former circus performer. He married her in 1876. While he was at it, Martha Jane Cannary fell madly in love with Bill. Calamity Jane was positively moon-struck over the dashing gunfighter and gambler. With his eyesight fading, Bill headed to the gold fields around Deadwood to stake himself to a life with Agnes at the poker tables. Of course we know the fabled end to the story. Bill arrived a little late to his regular game at Carl Mann’s No. 10 Saloon. His usual seat with his back to the wall was occupied. Bill was forced to sit with his back to the bar. That was all the invitation the assassin Jack McCall needed. He shot Bill in the back of the head, killing the man holding two pair, black aces and eights, the dead man’s hand.

Next Week: Calamity Jane

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Wild Bill Hickok

Born May 27, 1837 in Troy Grove Illinois. James Butler Hickok traded in a farmers plow for a Navy Colt and headed west in 1856 where he joined General James Lane’s Jayhawker Kansas Brigade during the Bleeding Kansas run up to the civil war. There he met and befriended young William Cody. Buffalo Bill would become Hickok’s lifelong friend.

He began his career as a lawman in 1858 as marshal in Monticello Township in Kansas. He launched his gunfighter reputation when he gunned down five wild ones intent on turning the town into a shooting gallery. Soon after he took to freighting for Russell, Majors & Waddell. Some of you may recall the firm’s overland stage ambitions from these pages and the bet they made in creating the Pony Express. During his freighting days, Bill encountered a Grizzle. The bear took offense at being shot and mauled Hickok nearly to death before he managed to slit the bear’s throat.

In 1861 he returned to work for Russell, Majors & Waddell’s Pony Express. Too big to ride, Bill signed on to work at the Rock Creek Station in Nebraska. This would be the sight of the July 12th, McCanles Massacre and the springboard to Wild Bill’s notoriety. A sensational account of the affair appeared in Harper’s in 1867 more than five years after the event. The story, attributed to Hickok by the source, told of Bill shooting and killing five confederate assailants led by McCanles, before dispatching three more in hand to hand combat with his knife.

Historians have pieced together a very different story. Russell, Majors and Waddell leased The Rock Creek Station from McCanles and were behind in the rent. McCanles, his son, a cousin and hired man came to collect. The station master and his wife resisted. Hickock joined the fight. He or the station master killed McCanles. Hickok is reported to have wounded another. He and the Station Master were charged with murder but were acquitted when no one in the McCanles party was allowed to testify.

History not-withstanding, the Harper’s story launched the legend of Wild Bill Hickok. Dime novelists soon signed on to embellish the gunfighter’s reputation, which served only to add to the daring fetes of his war record and subsequent exploits.

Next Week: Law, Love and Legacy

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Gunfighters: It Depends on Who You Ask

After researching and writing about the rogues’ gallery of colorful characters featured in this series, a couple of observations jumped out to me. The first is the unbelievable amount of overlap in their stories. Many of them knew each other. At various times they rode on opposite sides of the law or teamed up to face common opposition.

We know the Earp brothers famously went to the gunfight near the OK Corral with their friend Doc Holiday. What isn’t so well known is that prominent gunfighters, gamblers and friends Bat Masterson and Luke Short played the Oriental Saloon in the weeks leading up to the legendary show down. Both left town on other business and missed the festivities.

Dirty Dave Rudabaugh along with “Mysterious” Dave Mather rode through the lawless side of New Mexico with what became known as the Dodge City Gang. Early in his outlaw career in Kansas Rudabaugh was pursued and arrested by then Sheriff Bat Masterson. Later Masterson was hired by the Atchison Topeka & Santa Fe to provide the muscle needed to defend AT&SF interests against rival Denver & Rio Grande railroad in a dispute known as the Royal Gorge War. Rudabaugh joined Masterson along with Doc Holiday, “Mysterious” Dave and Ben Thompson. Talk about a high profile posse.

Dodge City hosted a dust-up over Luke Short’s ownership interest in Chalk Beeson’s Long Branch Saloon. When the town’s political establishment decided to run Luke out of town, Short put out a call for help. Bat Masterson, Wyatt Earp, Charlie Bassett and others answered. Short prevailed backed by a formidable assemblage of notorious gunnies, famously known as the Dodge City Peace Commission.

Ben Thompson and Phil Coe had their respective disputes with Wild Bill Hickock during the time they owned the Bull’s Head Saloon in Abilene. John Wesley Hardin was a regular at the Bulls head in those days. While the four of them strolled around town like competing roosters in a hen yard, they never really came to confrontation, other than Hickock killing Coe when Coe was too drunk to defend himself.

Which brings me to my second observation about all these coincidental acquaintances. The big reputations tended to give each other a wide birth. Big guns avoided throwing down on their peers. Call it healthy respect. So here are their stories, controversies and all. Take ‘em for what they’re worth; and enjoy. Hands-up, don’t shoot the messenger.

Next Week: Wild Bill Hickok

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