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It was December 18, 1880, for a short time Billy the Kid led Pat Garrett
on a cat and mouse game, but finally the sheriff would catch up with the
Kid. Garrett was at Fort Sumner looking for the Kid, but the Kid wasn’t
there; he was hiding out at a nearby ranch owned by Tom Wilcox and Manuel
Brazil. The Kid then received a note from a Fort Sumner resident saying
that Garrett and his posse had left and were heading south to Roswell. The
Kid and his gang mounted up and made the cold ride through the snow to
Fort Sumner. What the Kid didn’t know was that he was riding into a trap,
Garrett himself sent the phony note and was waiting in the shadows of the
old Military hospital for the Kid to make his appearance.
As the Kid
and his gang, which consisted of four members (Dave Rudabaugh, Tom O’Folliard, Billy
Wilson and Tom Pickett,) rode towards the hospital, Garrett whispered,
“That’s them” to his men and they opened fire. The lawmen thought the rider
leading the way was the Kid and aimed for him, but it was O’Folliard; shot
in the chest, he keeled over in his saddle, and didn’t follow when the Kid
and the others rode hell bound for leather into the fog. It wasn’t much use
to pursue the Kid in the dark and snowy weather, so the lawmen carried
O’Folliard inside a room in the old hospital and laid him down on the floor,
while the men played a game of poker. Tom O’Folliard, Billy the Kid’s best
friend with whom he shared many adventures with, died.
The Kid and his friends rode back to
Wilcox/Brazil’s ranch and got their wits back, ate a hot meal and then
departed. The cat and mouse game resumed for another three days until one
night Garrett tracked the Kid to a stone house in Stinking Springs. The
lawmen waited quietly till dawn, until they heard movement and voices coming from
inside the house. Garrett then instructed his men that when the Kid
appeared, they were to open fire and kill him. Suddenly, a figure came out
of the house. Garrett recognized the wide brim hat the Kid always wore and
told his men to shoot. Once again, like that night at Fort Sumner, the men
shot the wrong man. This time it was Charlie Bowdre. The wounded man wheeled
back into the house, then after a few minutes later, Wilson yelled out that
Bowdre was dying and wanted to come out. When Bowdre staggered from the
house, he walked towards the men and collapsed dead in the snow.
The outlaws refused to surrender and even
attempted to escape. Garrett noticed one of the horses was being reeled in
through the door. The Kid’s plan was for them to get mounted on their
horses, burst through the door and take their chances. The sheriff
knew what he was up to and shot the horse dead, which then blocked the
doorway. Now the men were really trapped. After their attempted escape,
there was a standoff, but by the afternoon the hungry outlaws couldn’t
resist the smell of food the lawmen were cooking over a roaring fire. The
starving and cold outlaws then gave themselves up.
After a hearty meal, the lawmen and their
prisoners packed up and headed back to Wilcox/Brazil’s ranch, where they
spent the night. The next morning they headed out to Fort Sumner, where
Garrett delivered the body of Charlie Bowdre to his wife, who went into
hysteria and attacked the men. The prisoners were then taken to the blacksmith
to be shackled. During this brief stay in Fort Sumner, the Kid supposedly gave his most prized
possessions to posse members Jim East and Frank Stewart, with whom he became
friendly with after his capture: to East he gave his Winchester rifle and to
Stewart his beloved mare, said to be the fastest in the territory. Later
that evening,
saloon owner Beaver Smith had such a fit, saying the Kid owed him the rifle,
that East reluctantly gave the it to him. Another more likelier version to
the story concerning the Kid’s possessions, is that Garrett confiscated
them and gave them to East and Stewart as payment for helping him with the
pursuit. This would then explain later why the Kid try to file suit to get
his mare back.
The next morning, the prisoners were loaded onto a wagon and headed
out for Las Vegas. On December 26th, the posse arrived and were greeted by
curious onlookers who wanted to catch a glimpse of the famous outlaw
called “Billy the Kid.” At the jail, the Kid and the other prisoners
were treated to new clothes and the Kid was said to be in good spirits,
playing to the crowd and chatting with a reporter.
One reporter wrote that the Kid “...has a bold yet pleasant cast of
countenance. When interviewed between the bars at jail this morning, he
was in a talkative mood, but said that anything he might say would not be
believed by the people. He laughed heartily when informed that the papers
of the Territory had built him up a reputation second only to that of
Victorio. Kid claims never to have had a large number of men with him, and
that the few who were with him when captured were employed on a ranch.
This is his statement and is given for what it is worth.” Dave Rudabaugh
backed the Kid's comments by saying that the papers had exaggerated the
Kid's depredations in the country and that it wasn't as bad as reported.
After being interviewed by reporters and gawked at by spectators, Billy
the Kid and his companions were put in a jail, described by one of the reporters as “a little hole in the wall,” for the night.
The next morning, the prisoners were
hustled to the train depot, where they encountered a mob that was after Rudabaugh (he had killed a Las Vegas jailer several months earlier). But
luckily no violence erupted and the train left without incident. At their
destination in Santa Fe,
the prisoners were taken to the city jail and locked up, and Garrett, who
was through
with his obligations, left for Lincoln County.
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From the moment he was captured, the Kid’s mind was working on saving his
neck. He would try to do it through attorneys, the governor and escaping,
but first on his agenda was try escaping. The Kid and his cohorts tried to dig their way
through the dirt floor of their cell, but the guards found the hole and
separated them. Unfortunately, the Kid got the worst of it; he was chained
like a circus elephant and locked in a dark tiny solitary cell.
Next, he tried an attorney, Ira Leonard,
who visited the Kid in jail but lost interest in helping him at that time
and didn’t come back till weeks later. The Kid then tried Rudabaugh’s
attorney, Edgar Caylpless, but the attorney wouldn’t represent him for free,
so the Kid offered him his horse that Stewart now owned,
which meant the attorney would have to file a suit for ownership of the
mare. Caylpless too, lost interest in the Kid’s case.
The Kid then took pencil and paper, and
wrote letters to Governor Wallace reminding him of his promise. The Kid did
in fact stick to his end of the bargain, not to mention putting his
life at peril, but the governor didn’t come through on his. Now it was too
late. The governor would never pardon Billy the Kid, who had become too
famous. The Kid was running out of options and couldn’t depend on anyone
else but himself, and focused on one thing -escape.
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On March 28, 1881, the Kid was removed
from the Santa Fe jail, and taken by train to Mesilla, where he was to be
tried for the killing of Sheriff Brady and Buckshot Roberts. When the Kid
and the lawmen arrived at Rincon, just hours away from Mesilla (by coach),
a mob confronted them. The lawmen didn't know if it was a rescue attempt or
a lynch mob, so they told the Kid if
the mob rushed them that he would be shot first (so much for being innocent
until proven guilty in a court of law, here the lawmen were ready to make
their own verdict). Most likely, by the description of the
mood of the crowd, it was to lynch him. The next morning the Kid was loaded into a coach and
made the trip to Mesilla, and arrived in one piece.
The first trial began on March 30th, with
the bias Judge Bristol presiding and attorney Ira Leonard appointed to
defend the Kid. The first case was the killing of Buckshot Roberts, which
Leonard was able to get thrown out, stating that the murder took place not
on federal land, but private and therefore, the government had no jurisdiction.
The prosecution didn’t make too much of a fuss, they knew the Kid would be found guilty for
the murder of Brady.
The following day, the Kid was tried for
the death of the Lincoln County Sheriff, William Brady. Even though the Kid
was one of six involved in the shooting of the sheriff, he was the only
one to be indicted, and placed on trial. The Kid didn’t stand a chance in
this courtroom. The
judge dismissed attorney Leonard, because he was doing too good of a job
defending the Kid, and replaced him with two unprepared attorneys, who had no
sympathy for their client: John D. Bail and Albert Fountain (who was a
supporter of the Santa Fe Ring and hated rustlers). To make matters worse
for the Kid,
there were prejudice witnesses testifying against him, including Bill Mathews, one
of those responsible for Tunstall’s death. Yet, the Kid had no witnesses
summoned to testify in his behalf. Then the judge put the final nail in his
coffin, by telling the jury:
“If he was present, encouraging, inciting,
aiding in, abetting, advising, or commanding this killing of Brady, he is as
much guilty as though he fired the fatal shot. As to you what would or would
not be a reasonable doubt of guilt, I charge you that belief in the guilt of
this defendant to the exclusion of every reasonable doubt does require you
to so believe absolutely and to a mathematical certainly. That is to
justify a verdict of guilty it is not necessary for you to be certain that
this defendant is guilty as you are that 2+2= 4. Merely, a vague conjecture
or a bare possibility that the defendant may be innocent is not sufficient
to cause a reasonable doubt of his guilt.”
In plain English, “if you do not find the
defendant guilty, you’re all a bunch of idiots!” and that’s exactly what
they did. On April 13th, the Kid was brought before the judge and was asked if
he had anything to say. The Kid said no. The judge then sentenced the Kid to
death on May 13, 1881 between the hours of 9 am and 3 pm. He would be taken
to Lincoln for execution and hanged “by the neck until his body be dead.”
But the Kid wasn’t about to give up just yet; his new attorney, Albert
Fountain, was willing to appeal the case if the Kid could bear his expenses.
When the Kid returned to his cell, he wrote a letter to Rudabaugh’s
attorney, Edgar Caypless, concerning the suit for his horse. If he could regain
possession, he would sell her and have money for attorney fees.
Unfortunately, Caypless didn’t follow through. The Kid’s only hope now was
his cunning abilities and lots of luck.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Bell, Boze
Bob The Illustrated Life and Times of
Billy the Kid Second Edition,
Tri-Star-Boze Production, Inc. 1996
Nolan, Frederick The West of Billy the Kid
University of Oklahoma Press,
Norman 1998
Nolan, Frederick The Lincoln County War, A
Documentary History University
Oklahoma Press, Norman 1992
Tuska, Jon Billy the Kid: His Life and Legend
University of New Mexico Press,
Albuquerque 1994
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