Billy the Kid

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Post-processed photo of Billy the Kid (around 1880)

Henry McCarty , also William H. Bonney , Henry Antrim or also Kid Antrim (* probably November 23, 1859 in New York or Indiana , † July 14, 1881 in Fort Sumner , New Mexico ), better known as Billy the Kid , is as Gunslinger one of the most famous legendary figures in western history.

Billy the Kid was described by his enemies as an outlaw and a murderer , and according to his supporters he was a fighter in the Lincoln County Cattle War . The number of murders he has been charged with fluctuates between 9 and 21, and four murders have been recorded with certainty. He was shot dead from ambush by Sheriff Pat Garrett .

Secure information about Billy's life comes from his circle of friends. Over the years new legends have been spun around the gunslinger , only a few of which are documented. Basically, the biographies are divided into two camps: Either The Kid is portrayed as an unscrupulous murderer and unpredictable gunslinger or as a victim of the circumstances. In fact, he grew up in a time when access to criminal gangs, contract killers and other outlaws was easy to find (see also Wild West ). Finally, he was also the focus of a bloody political-economic dispute.

Life

Young years in the west

It is not known exactly when or where Billy the Kid was born. Some sources cite September 17th as the date of birth, others November 23rd; however, the year 1859 seems to be certain. He was probably born in New York or Indiana . His mother Catherine McCarty moved to Coffeyville , Kansas with Billy and younger brother Joseph in 1868 . There is no precise information about the father. She soon moved with the children to Pueblo , where she met William Antrim and married in 1873. In the same year, the family changed their place of residence, first to Santa Fe and a little later to Silver City (both New Mexico ). Billy's mother had tuberculosis and hoped that moving to a drier, warmer climate would ease her symptoms. She rented part of the home to travelers and sold homemade cakes. She died on September 16, 1874 of the consequences of her long-term illness.

Billy was considered helpful and affectionate, and one of his employers praised his honesty. He is said to have suffered greatly from his stepfather and, from a young age, sought refuge in saloons , where he is said to have shown great playing talent. Towards the end of his stay, Billy met Jesse Davis, who later became known as Jesse Evans . In the fall of 1871, Billy allegedly stabbed a man who had insulted his mother in a fight in Joe Dyres Saloon . Billy then left home and fled to Camp Bowie, Arizona with a comrade named Alias (according to some sources, this story is made up). There he is said to have murdered an unarmed blacksmith in the army, which is why he had to leave Arizona and the Chiracahua Apache Indian Reservation .

North and south of the Rio Grande

Billy moved on to Sonora , Mexico , where he teamed up with player Melquiades Segura. In Sonora he is said to have shot the player Don José Martínez, whereupon his family put a bounty on his capture. Billy and Segura had to flee again, this time to Chihuahua . During their stay in Chihuahua, four players allegedly disappeared under mysterious circumstances. The population attributed their murder to Billy, although no connection could be made. He and Segura sat down on the Rio Grande .

At the end of 1876, Billy met his childhood friend Jesse Evans there. He roamed the area around the Rio Grande on the US and Mexican sides with him. It is said that the two of them are said to have saved a family of settlers from fourteen Mescalero Indians on the Rio Miembres near Fort Stanton . On their way back to Las Cruces , the two met Evans' future gang members James McDaniels, William S. Morton and Frank Baker. Billy had learned that Segura from San Elizario ( Texas should come) to Las Cruces and decided in Mesilla ( New Mexico to wait) for him. However, when a messenger boy informed him that Segura was in prison in San Elizario, he decided to free his friend. In a now famous eighty-one mile ride in six hours, he hurried there and brought Segura safely back to Mesilla.

There Billy received a letter from Jesse Evans of Lincoln. He crossed the dangerous Guadalupe Mountains to Lincoln , where he first joined Evans' gang who worked for the Murphy-Dolan Store Company . On August 17, 1877, however, after a fight in the George Adkins Saloon , he shot and killed the farrier Frank "Windy" Cahill. He fled and was convicted in absentia as a murderer by a jury. From about that time on, he called himself William H. Bonney .

The Lincoln County Cattle War

Courthouse and prison in Lincoln, New Mexico

The central person and victim of the cattle war was Billy the Kid, who - after coming to Lincoln County from New Mexico - first found work with Lawrence G. Murphy and John Chisum and was then hired by the English rancher John Tunstall.

After the murder of Tunstall, however, he swore revenge and participated intensively in the so-called Lincoln County Cattle War . He was there when the two alleged murderers of Tunstall were shot on March 9, 1878 in Steel Springs, New Mexico. He also belonged to the group of regulators who lured Sheriff William Brady and Deputy George Hindman into an ambush in Lincoln on April 1, 1878 and shot them. He was also involved in the Blazer's Mill shooting that killed Buckshot Roberts on April 4th. Billy was one of the survivors of the decisive battle in Lincoln County War , which was fought July 15-19 in Lincoln.

After Lew Wallace was named governor of New Mexico towards the end of the conflict, he issued an amnesty for all concerned. Billy is also said to have been promised a pardon for testifying against the murderers of attorney Chapman. Billy went to court and kept his end of the bargain, but Wallace was no longer interested in the young outlaw , but rather in his book " Ben Hur ". Billy left the detention disappointed and got by as a cattle thief.

Billy turned to Chisum. He asked for $ 500, which Chisum still owed him. However, since the latter refused to pay Billy the money, Billy threatened to steal Chisum's cattle until he had the equivalent of the debt claimed. He and his gang began stealing cattle from Chisum and those of other breeders shortly afterwards, becoming a nuisance to the entire county.

In 1880, Chisum supported Pat Garrett in his election to Lincoln County Sheriff. Garrett immediately began hunting Billy the Kid and his accomplices, shooting two of them and arresting Billy and two others.

Pat Garrett chases Billy the Kid

Billy the Kid's grave
Pat Garrett

After his arrest in Stinking Springs, New Mexico, a week-long odyssey through various prisons began on Christmas Day 1880. On April 13, 1881, Billy was sentenced to death in Mesilla . He finally arrived back in Lincoln on April 21, 1881 and was locked in the local courthouse. But 14 days later, Billy escaped from the Lincoln County courthouse. Billy stayed in New Mexico instead of leaving the country. On July 14, 1881, he was finally shot dead by Garrett without warning when he entered the bedroom in Pete Maxwell's house in Fort Sumner (at least that is what Pat Garrett said). The grave stone of Billy the Kid is under the coordinates 34 ° 24 '13.4 "  N , 104 ° 11' 37"  W coordinates: '13.4 "34 ° 24  N , 104 ° 11' 37"  W to be found.

Alternative theories of death

To this day, the death of Billy the Kid is surrounded by numerous legends. Over the years two people have claimed that they were in truth Billy the Kid, who was not actually shot by Garrett: Ollie P. Roberts from Hico, Texas and John Miller. While historians have little faith in the story of Roberts, it seems different with John Miller. Not only did he look very similar to the legend, he also spoke fluent Spanish, unlike Roberts. In addition, there are no documents whatsoever about Miller's life until his marriage on August 8, 1881 in Las Vegas , one month after the allegedly fatal shooting.

In 1948 inheritance investigator William V. Morrison traveled to Florida to examine an inheritance case. Joe Hines, an old man, claimed his late brother's land for himself. In a conversation with Morrison, he identified himself as Jesse Evans and told of his participation in the Lincoln County Cattle War . Hines and Evans also stated that Billy the Kid was living in Hico, Texas as "Ollie P. Roberts" at the time. He also claimed that some of his former gang members were still alive. In fact, Morrison managed to track down Evans' old companions Jim McDaniels, Severo Gallegos, Martile Able, Jose Montoya, and Bill and Sam Jones. All members also claimed that Ollie Roberts was actually Billy the Kid.

photos

In June 2011, a portrait photo of Billy the Kid was bought by a collector at an auction in Denver for US $ 2.3 million. The five by eight centimeter black and white picture was the only known authentic picture of him in adulthood at the time.

Detail of a photo that is supposed to show Billy the Kid (left) playing croquet in 1878

In 2015, a recording that is said to show Billy the Kid playing croquet in 1878 was rated as authentic by the auction house “Kagin's Inc.”, which other experts doubt. The 10 by 13 centimeter picture was valued at five million dollars; so that would be the American collector Randy Guijarro in 2010 Fresno ( California acquired) along with two others for two dollars tintype the most expensive photograph in the world.

In 2017, another recording was released, on which not only Billy the Kid himself, but also Pat Garrett can be seen. The image, a tintotype showing a group of five cowboys , was bought by attorney Frank Abrams at a flea market in Asheville , North Carolina in 2011 for only $ 10 and then hung in the buyer's guest room for several years to see the possible true value of the image was initially not recognized. In 2015, after seeing a documentary about the discovery of the croquet game recording, he believed he recognized Pat Garrett in the picture. To have his suspicions verified, he showed it to various experts who, in part, concluded that the picture did indeed show Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid and was taken in 1879 or 1880, which matches the date on the back of the picture, namely August 2, 1880. According to this date, the tintotype would have been made about three months before Garrett's election as sheriff of Lincoln County and less than a year before the murder of Billy the Kids. Other experts, in turn, expressed their skepticism and questioned the conclusiveness of the investigative methods used, which were already used in the analysis of the controversial croquet game recording.

Films (selection)

The fate of Billy the Kid has served as a template for numerous film adaptations, including:

Music (selection)

Classical music

Songs

Albums

documentary

  • Billy the Kid. Documentary, USA, 2012, 52 min., Script and director: John Maggio, production: Ark Media, John Maggio Production Films, first broadcast: January 26, 2013 on arte, synopsis by ARD .

literature

  • Pat F. Garrett: The authentic life of Billy, the Kid . A faithful and interesting story. University of Oklahoma Press, Norman, OK 2000, ISBN 0-8061-3227-2 (English)
  • Eberhard Fritz: Emil Fritz from Monrepos, businessman in New Mexico. The events surrounding the western legend Billy the Kid and their backgrounds in Württemberg. In: Ludwigsburg history sheets. Volume 65, 2011, pp. 151-165.
  • Joe Hembus: Western History 1540-1894 . Hanser, Munich 1979 (paperback edition by Heyne 7143, Munich 1981, ISBN 3-453-01316-6 )
  • Dietmar Kügler: You died in your boots. Motorbuch, Stuttgart 1976, ISBN 3-87943-415-8
  • Bill O'Neal: Gunfighter . An encyclopedia of all gunslingers of the Wild West (original title: Encyclopedia of Western Gunfighters , translated by Georg Schmidt), In: Kontra-Punkt . 7th, thoroughly revised and redesigned edition. Oesch, Zurich 2004 (first edition 1997), ISBN 978-3-0350-2013-7 (as paperback edition: Billy the Kid and his brothers . All gunslingers of the Wild West. Fischer 14366, Frankfurt am Main 1999, ISBN 3-596-14366 -7 )
  • Miguel Antonio Otero, Jr .: The Real Billy the Kid . With New Light on the Lincoln County War. Arte Público Press, University of Houston, Houston, TX 1998, ISBN 1-55885-234-4 (English)

Fiction

  • Jorge Luis Borges : The unselfish murderer Bill Harrigan , story in wickedness and eternity , S. Fischer, 1991

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Image of Billy the Kid auctioned for $ 2.3 million in: Spiegel Online from June 26, 2011
  2. ↑ The only photo of Billy The Kid auctioned for millions in: Tages-Anzeiger from June 26, 2011
  3. ^ Mark Boardman: The Croquet Kid . In: truewestmagazine.com, January 26, 2016, accessed April 25, 2016
  4. ↑ Badische-zeitung.de , October 20, 2015, Jens Schmitz: A photo of Billy the Kid is worth five million dollars today
  5. ↑ Sensational find: Billy the Kid photographed as a hobby player. In: welt.de. October 15, 2015, accessed November 26, 2017 .
  6. ↑ Billy the Kid photo with his killer unearhed at flea market. In: abc.net. November 21, 2017, accessed November 26, 2017 .
  7. ↑ A Plague of Flea Market Billys. In: True West Magazine. February 19, 2018, accessed December 31, 2018 (American English).
  8. ^ Charles D. Brunt | Journal Editorial Writer: Are Billy the Kid, Pat Garrett in tintype? Retrieved December 31, 2018 (American English).

Web links

Commons : Billy the Kid  - album with pictures, videos and audio files
Wikiquote: Billy the Kid  - Quotes
personal data
SURNAME Billy the Kid
ALTERNATIVE NAMES William Henry Bonney; Antrim, Henry
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American serial killer and western hero
DATE OF BIRTH uncertain: November 23, 1859
PLACE OF BIRTH New York City or Indiana
DATE OF DEATH July 14, 1881
Place of death Fort Sumner , New Mexico