The Anaconda standard. [volume] (Anaconda, Mont.) 1889-1970, 1895-02-27
BOTH ABLE KILLERS.
A Pistol Game in Which Two Bad Men
Got Themselves Entancled.

A Pistol Game in Which Two had Men
Got Themselves Entangled
zone of the things that strikes a tender
foot with SURPRISE" said a western land
surveyor to the New York Sun man, lis
the way the tough men in the far west,
when they happen to run counter to men
of their own kind, will refrain from shoot
ing until one gets the drop on the other.
So quick and ready are the shooting men
of the real sort that when facing
each other on guard neither one can
fire so quickly that the other will
not return the shot before falling.
Thus it may happen that two bad men who
have sworn death to each other may meet
often without exchanging shots because
neither one can catch the other unpre-
pared. Take the case of Wild Bill and
Jim Currie, for example. Both men of
undoubted nerve and skill, they were enc
mics for years-by some accounts they
exchanged shots once at long range--but
they never pulled triggers on each other
at close quarters, and when Bill was as
sasslnated by n wretch years afterward at
Deadwood il closed the feud.
"Clay Allison, the New Mexican dead
shot and mankiller, found one man who
wasn't afraid to stand up to him, and was
just quick with his gun as himself.
That man was Mace Bowman, some time
a deputy sheriff of Colfax county. They
spent a whole afternoon togeth err, each
trying to get the drop on the other, but
neither one could accomplish it. 1t was a
performance, though, of a kind to make
an inexperienced man shiver. There was
bad blood between them, and this after
noon, when they met in Lambert's bar
room and got to drinking, the en-
mi hlrW 10 IL
perfectly understood between them
that if either one got the drop
the other, the slower man, would die, and
this being agreed on both men maneu-
vered for an opening. Facing each other
with such plea SAINT intentions they
laughed and joked and drank together,
all the time watching each other like cats.
As diversion in the proceeding they
would lay their pistols, the barrels cross
ing, on the bar counter, step back to the
other side of the room, and then, at an
agreed signal, make a rush for the pistols.
But neither could seize his weapon quickly
enough to get the advantage of the other.
Once as they we're taking a drink to-
gether Bowman, with his whiskey half
way to his lips, suddenly smashed the
glass TO the counter and drew his pistol
But as it came up Allison's revolver met
ii half way. The men were looking into
each others eyes, and a sign in either's
that a trigger was to be pulled would have
meant the death of both men, which was
more killing than either one wanted.
This dalliance with death went on
through the afternoon, until at last. at the
coming of evening, the two men becoming
savage, declared that they would bring the
duel to an issue. They cleared the room of
spectators, and had already taken their
places in corners dIagonally OPP
posite to begin shooting, when w.
f.. Moreley of Cimarron, a strong
friend of both men, rushed in
between them at the risk of his life and
by eXpostulations and entreaties m an
aged to get them off the idea of the duel
and mutually to agree to separate without
further trouble. So the two contestants
backed out of the room at opposite doors
and rode out of town different ways, saw
ing an encounter which would almost
certainly have resulted in the death of
both"