Dead man 's hand - wikipedia Dead man 's hand For other uses, see Dead man 's hand ( disambiguation ). `` Aces and eights '' redirects here. For other uses, see Aces and eights ( disambiguation ). The card hand purportedly held by Wild Bill Hickok at the time of his death : black aces and eights The makeup of poker 's dead man 's hand has varied through the years. Currently, it is described as a two - pair poker hand consisting of the black aces and black eights. These and an unknown hole card were reportedly held by Old West folk hero, lawman, and gunfighter Wild Bill Hickok when he was murdered. Contents 1 Earliest details 2 Hickok 's hand 2.1 The make - up 3 Legacy 4 See also 5 References Earliest details The expression `` dead man 's hand '' appears to have had some currency in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, although no one connected it to Hickok until the 1920s. The earliest detailed reference to it was 1886, where it was described as a `` full house consisting of three jacks and a pair of tens ''. Jacks and sevens are called the dead man 's hand in the 1903 Encyclopaedia of Superstitions, Folklore, and the Occult Sciences. Edmond Hoyle refers to it as Jacks and eights in 1907. Hickok 's hand What is considered the dead man 's hand card combination of today gets its notoriety from a legend that it was the five - card stud hand held by James Butler Hickok ( better known as `` Wild Bill '' Hickok ) when he was shot in the back of the head by Jack McCall on August 2, 1876, in Nuttal & Mann 's Saloon at Deadwood, Dakota Territory. Reportedly, Hickok 's final hand included the aces and eights of both black suits. The make - up According to a book by Western historian Carl W. Breihan, the cards were retrieved from the floor by a man named Neil Christy, who then passed them on to his son. The son, in turn, told Mr. Breihan of the composition of the hand. `` Here is an exact identity of these cards as told to me by Christy 's son : the ace of diamonds with a heel mark on it ; the ace of clubs ; the two black eights, clubs and spades, and the queen of hearts with a small drop of Hickock 's blood on it. '' Hickok biographer Joseph Rosa wrote about the make - up of the hand : `` The accepted version is that the cards were the ace of spades, the ace of clubs, two black eights, and the queen of clubs as the ' kicker '. '' However, Rosa said that no contemporaneous source can be found for this exact hand. The solidification in gamers parlance of the dead man 's hand as two pairs, aces and eights, did n't come about until after the 1926 publication of Frank Wilstach 's book Wild Bill Hickok : The Prince of Pistoleers -- 50 years after Hickok 's death. Legacy The Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department Homicide Division, the Los Angeles Police Department CRASH squad, and the Armed Forces Medical Examiner System all use the dead man 's hand in their insignia. The western - themed collectible card game Doomtown makes it the highest rank in the game, with the Jack of diamonds as the fifth card. See also Dead man 's hand in popular culture References ^ Jump up to : `` Was Wild Bill Hickok Holding the Dead Mans Hand When He Was Slain ; The Straight Dope article ; retrieved March 2013. Jump up ^ Discussion ; July 3, 1886, article in the Grand Forks Daily Herald ; at Linguist List online ; retrieved February 2013. Jump up ^ Cora Linn Morrison Daniels, et al ; editor ; Volume 2. Jump up ^ Edmond Hoyle ; Hoyle 's Games ; 1907 ; p. 405 Jump up ^ Wild Bill Hickok : The Prince of Pistoleers ; Frank J. Wilstach ; 1926. Jump up ^ Wild Women of the West ; Signet ; 1982 ; p. 77. Jump up ^ Wild Bill Hickok : Gunfighter ; Joseph G. Rosa ; p. 163. Jump up ^ Wild Bill Hickok : The Man and his Myth ; Joseph Rosa ; 1996. Jump up ^ `` Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department ''. Archived from the original on 16 March 2015. Retrieved 20 March 2015. Jump up ^ `` Office of the Armed Forces Medical Examiner ''. Archived from the original on 15 May 2012. Retrieved 20 March 2015. Jump up ^ ( 1 ), Doomtown : Reloaded Rules o ' Play, Alderac Entertainment Group, 2014. American Old West Notable people Explorers and pioneers John Bozeman Jim Bridger William Clark Davy Crockett John C. 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Question: where did the term aces and eights come from
Answer: The earliest detailed reference to it was 1886, where it was described as a "full house consisting of three jacks and a pair of tens