Billy the Kid

by Robert M. Utley

  Here, after shucking his hat, vest, and boots, Billy decided that he wanted something to eat. A freshly butchered yearling hung from a rafter on Maxwell’s north porch. With a butcher knife in his left hand and his Colt “self-cocker” in his right, he shuffled out in his stockinged feet to cut a slab of meat.18

  By now, nearly midnight, Garrett and his companions had backed out of the orchard, circled behind the officers’ line on the west, and reached the Maxwell house. It was a long adobe, shadowed by porches on three sides. A picket fence with a gate separated the east face from the old parade ground. As Garrett knew, Maxwell slept in the southeast corner room. In the July heat, the door and windows stood open. Leaving Poe and McKinney outside, Garrett entered the door, walked across the room, and sat on the edge of Maxwell’s bed, next to the pillow.

  Outside, the two deputies waited. McKinney squatted on the ground outside the fence. Poe sat on the edge of the porch, dangling his feet in the open gateway.

  Within seconds of Garrett’s disappearance into Maxwell’s bedroom, Poe glanced to his right and saw a figure approaching along the inside of the fence. In the moonlight, Poe recalled, “I observed that he was only partially dressed and was both bareheaded and barefooted, or rather, had only socks on his feet, and it seemed to me that he was fastening his trousers as he came toward me at a very brisk walk.” Poe thought this might be Maxwell himself or one of his guests.

  The man came almost face-to-face with Poe before spotting him. Startled, he recoiled, covered Poe with his pistol, and sprang to the porch, hissing “Quien es?” As he backed away, toward the door to Maxwell’s bedroom, he repeated “Quien es? Quien es?”

  Poe climbed to his feet and took several steps toward the man, telling him not to be alarmed, that they would not hurt him.

  “Quien es?” the man asked again as he backed into the doorway and vanished inside.19

  In the minute or so since waking Maxwell, Garrett had asked whether Billy the Kid was at Fort Sumner. Agitated, Maxwell had replied that he was not at the fort but was nearby. At that moment, they heard voices outside and saw the man back around the doorframe.

  Approaching the bed, the man asked, “Who are those fellows outside, Pete?”

  Bolting up in his bed, Maxwell spat out, “That’s him.”

  Suddenly aware of the dark shape next to Maxwell, the man sprang back, pointed his pistol, and again demanded, “Quien es? Quien es?”

  Garrett was as startled as the intruder. He had not even thought to ready his pistol. Quickly he shifted his holster and at the same instant identified the other man. “He must have then recognized me,” Garrett later conjectured, “for he went backward with a cat-like movement, and I jerked my gun and fired.” The flash of exploding powder blinded Garrett, and he snapped off a second round in the direction of his target. On the verge of pulling the trigger a third time, he heard a groan and knew he had hit his mark.20

  Pete Maxwell sprang from his bed and hit the floor in a tangle of bedclothes, then raced for the door. Garrett had already reached the porch when Maxwell tumbled out. A startled Poe and McKinney greeted them with pistols drawn. Poe almost shot Maxwell, who shouted “Don’t shoot, don’t shoot” just as Garrett knocked down Poe’s gun hand. “Don’t shoot Maxwell,” he said.

  Hugging the wall outside the door, Garrett gasped, “That was the Kid that came in there onto me, and I think I have got him.”

  “Pat,” replied Poe, “the Kid would not come to this place; you have shot the wrong man.”

  Garrett paused in doubt, then said, “I am sure that was him, for I know his voice too well to be mistaken.”21

  An understandable caution restrained all the men from entering the darkened room to find out who had been shot and whether he was dead. As the Maxwell family and a scattering of townspeople began to gather, Maxwell walked down the porch to his mother’s room and returned with a lighted candle. Placing it on the windowsill, he stepped aside and the lawmen peered in. “We saw a man lying stretched upon his back dead, in the middle of the room,” said Poe, “with a six-shooter lying at his right hand and a butcher-knife at his left.”22

  Venturing inside, Garrett and his deputies examined the body that now was unmistakably revealed to be Billy the Kid. Billy bore one bullet wound, in the left breast just above the heart. Garrett’s bullet had killed him almost instantly.

  Maxwell was certain that Billy had fired once at Garrett, and Poe and McKinney insisted that they had heard three shots. A thorough search of the room turned up only one stray bullet, in the headboard of Maxwell’s bed. Examining Billy’s pistol, Garrett counted five loaded cartridges; the hammer rested on the empty sixth. The empty shell did not seem to have been fired recently, and since men usually kept an empty shell under the hammer as a safety precaution, it probably had not. The report thought to have been a third shot had been Garrett’s bullet ricocheting from the wall and slamming into Maxwell’s headboard, the lawmen concluded. Billy’s fatal second of hesitation had left the initiative to his opponent.

  By now an excited crowd thronged the porch and the old parade ground beyond the fence. As word spread that the Kid had been killed, many vented their grief and anger. A sobbing Celsa Gutierrez cursed Garrett and pounded his chest. Nasaria Yerby, Abrana García, Paulita Maxwell, and the Navajo woman Deluvina Maxwell wept, talked softly, and consoled one another. Armed young men shook their fists and shouted threats at Garrett and his deputies.23 “We spent the remainder of the night on the Maxwell premises,” said Poe, “keeping constantly on our guard, as we were expecting to be attacked by the friends of the dead man.”24

  The next morning, at Sunnyside, Milnor Rudulph and his son Charles heard the news and rode down to Fort Sumner. They found the community buzzing with confusion, anger, and controversy. Some wanted to lynch Garrett and his deputies, barricaded in a room of the Maxwell house with their guns ready for a defense. Others argued that Billy’s death relieved the townspeople of a great strain and that the lawmen deserved their gratitude.

  Rudulph was a sensible, widely respected, and, of particular importance at the moment, literate man. Justice of the Peace Alejandro Segura asked him to organize a coroner’s jury and preside as foreman. Rudulph assented, assembled five citizens, and convened the proceedings in Pete Maxwell’s bedroom, where the body still lay on the floor. Maxwell and Garrett told their stories. Rudulph then wrote out the report, and the jurors affixed their signatures or made their marks. They duly concluded that William Bonney had met death from a bullet wound in the region of the heart, inflicted by a gun in the hand of Pat F. Garrett. “And our dictum is,” wrote Rudulph in Spanish, “that the act of said Garrett was justifiable homicide and we are of the opinion that the gratitude of the whole community is owed to said Garrett for his deed, and that he deserves to be rewarded.”25

  Although many residents would have vigorously dissented had they known of Rudulph’s accolade, one of the jurors who laboriously scratched an X next to his name surely agreed. He was Sabal Gutierrez, husband of Celsa Gutierrez.

  The women had asked for the corpse, and after the jury completed its task they had the body carried across the parade ground to the carpenter shop. There, Poe recounted, it “was laid out on a workbench, the women placing lighted candles around it according to their ideas of properly conducting a ‘wake’ for the dead.”26

  “Neatly and properly dressed,” according to Garrett, the remains were placed in a coffin, which was borne to the old military cemetery that now served the community. There, on the afternoon of July 15, 1881, Fort Sumner paid final respects to Billy the Kid. Fittingly, he rested next to his old compadres of the Lincoln County War, Tom O’Folliard and Charley Bowdre.

  For the two decades remaining to him, Pat Garrett basked in public acclaim as the officer who killed Billy the Kid. The deed took on an almost superhuman glow as the Kid’s reputation blossomed into legend and as he came to be remembered as the frontier’s most exalted outlaw.

  Yet, able lawman that he wa
s, Pat Garrett had got his man almost entirely by accident. He and his deputies thought that the fugitive was somewhere in the vicinity, but in trying to find him they encountered nothing but frustration. If the Kid had not blundered into the darkened bedroom at exactly the right moment, Pete Maxwell would have been one more frustration—like Rudulph, nervous but uninformative. Maxwell was their last hope; the next day, they doubtless would have saddled up and ridden back to Roswell.

  By the most improbable coincidence of timing, therefore, Billy fell almost literally into Garrett’s lap. To be sure, the sheriff kept his head, reacted with split-second decision, and shot accurately, although in the darkness he ran a great risk of shooting the wrong man. Even so, he triumphed less because of what he did than because of what his opponent failed to do. Billy had the same instant the lawman did in which to recognize his enemy and fire at him. He had his gun in hand, while Garrett’s rested in his holster.

  Why did he fail to pull the trigger? Fear of hitting Maxwell? Fear of hitting some unrecognized friend? Garrett himself provided as good an explanation as any: “I think he was surprised and thrown off his guard. Almost any man would have been. Kid was as cool under trying circumstances as any man I ever saw. But he was so surprised and startled, that for a second he could not collect himself. Some men cannot recover their faculties for some time after such a shock. I think Kid would have done so in a second more, if he had had the time.”26

  WHAT THEY FOUGHT WITH

  Some Frontier Favorites

  26. Although percussion weapons had become obsolete by Billy the Kid’s time, many had been re-chambered to fire metallic cartridges. They were reliable, inexpensive, and popular. Originally the cylinder of this 1861 Colt’s Navy, a common Civil War handgun, held six paper cartridges containing powder and ball. When struck by the hammer, a separately affixed cap containing fulminate of mercury ignited the round. In this conversion, the weapon now fires six .38-caliber metallic cartridges. (Photo by Fred Ochs, Panhandle-Plains Historical Museum, Canyon, Texas)

  Except as noted, photos by Ron Dillow. Technical data from Ken Pate.

  27. In the late 1870s the Winchester ’73 gradually overcame the prejudices of westerners against repeaters and the feelings of some, chiefly buffalo hunters, that it was underpowered. By the 1880s, accuracy, rapidity of fire, and ease of handling made the Winchester the characteristic shoulder arm of the frontier. The rifle (left) held fifteen .44-.40 center-fire cartridges in the magazine beneath the barrel, the carbine (right) held twelve. The lever beneath the stock chambered each round preparatory to firing. Billy the Kid was rarely separated from his Winchester.

  28. In the favor of westerners, no handgun came close to Colt’s six-shooter. Simple, sturdy, functional, easily handled and repaired, the Colt’s won a large and loyal following in the West. Introduced in 1873, the single-action Colt’s Army (above) gradually overshadowed all other sidearms in the U.S. military service and, as the “Peacemaker,” achieved instant popularity with civilians. The 1873 model came with a 7½-inch barrel and fired a .45-caliber center-fire cartridge. Later, Colt offered a .44-caliber version and a choice of two shorter barrels, 5½ inches and 4¾ inches. Still another version, the double-action “self-cocker,” found favor with many, including Billy the Kid. With the single-action, cocking the hammer rotated the cylinder and positioned a fresh round for firing. With the double-action, pulling the trigger advanced the cylinder and fired the round in one motion. The double-action came in two models, the .38-caliber “Lightning” (below) and the .41-caliber “Thunderer.” The Kid carried the latter.

  29. Designed for hunting, shotguns could also be used against humans, as they frequently were in the West. At close range, they did a lot of damage, and they did not have to be aimed. Escaping from confinement in Lincoln, Billy the Kid shot down Bob Olinger with his own 10-gauge Whitney. This is a Greener, available in 10- or 12-gauge, with which Wells Fargo equipped its stagecoach guards.

  30. Buffalo hunters favored the durable, hard-hitting Sharps shoulder arm, which delivered maximum power at maximum range. The Sharps was single shot and, unlike the repeaters, could take cartridges of varying lengths and, thus, varying loads of powder. The Sharps Model 1874 sporting rifle (left) came in chamberings of .40, .44, .45, and .50 caliber, with charges ranging from 50 to 150 grains of black powder. Before the advent of the 1873 Springfield, the Sharps carbine (right) was a common cavalry arm. This Model 1863 percussion breechloader has been re-chambered to receive a .50-.70 metallic cartridge.

  31. The U.S. Model 1873 Springfield “Trapdoor” served the U.S. Army for two decades. A hinged “trapdoor” in front of the hammer lifted to expose the chamber, which received a single .45-.70-caliber round. Infantry carried the rifle (left), cavalry the carbine (right). Colonel Dudley’s command was armed with these weapons when he marched into Lincoln on July 19, 1878. Many promptly found their way into civilian hands. Buckshot Roberts used Dr. Blazer’s Springfield rifle to kill Dick Brewer.

  18

  The Legend

  The news of Billy the Kid’s death electrified the Territory of New Mexico and the sensation-loving world beyond. “The vulgar murderer and desperado known as ‘Billy, the Kid’ has met his just deserts at last,” proclaimed the newspaper in his boyhood home of Silver City. “His death is hailed with great joy,” commented the New York Sun, “as he had sworn that he would kill several prominent citizens, and had already slain fifteen or eighteen men.”1

  The press reports spread the Kid’s name and fame throughout the nation and further inflated the image of matchless desperado that had already been planted in the public mind. In May 1881 the Police Gazette had described in fervent prose Billy’s escape from Lincoln.2 Now the rest of the pulp press rushed to tell his life’s story.

  In sixteen action-packed chapters of the Five-Cent Wide Awake Library for August 1881, “Don Jenardo” created the stereotype of Billy as cold-blooded killer. Sample:

  “Oh! Billy, Billy,” cried the terrified wretch, “for God’s sake don’t shoot me!”

  “Hold your head still, George, so I will not disfigure your face much, and give you but very little pain.”

  The words were spoken in that cool, determined, blood-thirsty manner, as only the Kid could speak.

  In quick succession, within less than a year, five “biographies” of Billy the Kid appeared in dime-novel format, including The Cowboy’s Career; or, The Daredevil Deeds of Billy the Kid, the Noted New Mexico Desperado, by “One of the Kids”; and Billy the “Kid” and His Girl, one of “Morrison’s Sensational Series.”3

  Such ephemera, however, was not enough to ensure Billy lasting fame. Without Marshall Ashmun Upson, he might well have vanished into oblivion.

  Ash Upson was no ordinary frontier postmaster. A fragile little man with a wan complexion, a broken nose, and a face pitted by smallpox, he turned on all comers a pair of big mournful eyes that gave him a look of perpetual sadness. Yet he was convivial, droll, and benevolent. In the fifty years following his Connecticut birth, he had traveled almost everywhere in the United States. Indeed, one of his two chief characteristics was a compulsive wanderlust that kept him in almost constant motion. The other was a literary talent stemming from a classical education and several decades as a printer and journalist. Ash Upson had a gift for graphic prose, usually stimulated by the contents of a bottle, and he indulged it with flowery contributions to newspapers throughout the nation.4

  Upson had ample opportunity to know Billy the Kid, who occasionally patronized Roswell’s combination store and post office and joshed with the other customers. Although not likely intimates, the two were both open and gregarious enough to have been more than casual acquaintances. This intermittent personal connection, together with his own observations from his postmaster’s vantage, made Ash an authority on Billy and his friends and the events in which they figured.

  After the death of Billy the Kid, another friend called on Upson’s knowledge of recent history and his endowments as a
writer. Pat Garrett had been elected sheriff to put Lincoln County’s outlaws out of business. After he gunned down the Kid, however, many among a people who subscribed to the code of the West muttered about the unfairness of that shot in the dark. Garrett felt the need to tell his side of the story.

  Within a matter of months, Ash Upson had helped his friend tell that story.5 Garrett took the manuscript to the publishers of the Santa Fe New Mexican, and the book appeared in the spring of 1882, less than a year after the demise of Billy the Kid. The title page reflected the florid style of the time: The Authentic Life of Billy the Kid, the Noted Desperado of the Southwest, Whose Deeds of Daring and Blood have Made His Name a Terror in New Mexico, Arizona & Northern Mexico.

  Nowhere on the crowded title page did Upson’s name appear. Later he claimed to have written every word.6 Actually, the book was a collaborative effort. The first fifteen chapters bear every evidence, in both style and content, of Upson’s sole authorship, and not coincidentally they cover the period before Garrett arrived on the scene. The final eight chapters, describing events in which Garrett participated, register a distinctive shift in style and radiate an authority lacking in the others.

  Although not many copies of the Authentic Life were sold, it nevertheless had a decisive impact on the Kid’s image. More than any other single influence, the Garrett-Upson book fed the legend of Billy the Kid. As the legend blossomed, writers turned to the Authentic Life for the authentic details. Ash Upson’s fictions became implanted in the hundreds of “histories” that followed. For more than a century, only a few students thought to question the wild fantasies that flowed from Ash’s imagination. In the evolution of the Kid’s image, the Authentic Life is a book of enormous consequence. Ironically, the man most responsible for the book remains unknown except to a handful of specialists.