Amador ledger. (Jackson, Amador County, Calif.) 1875-19??, 1908-12-11
A NOTORIOUS OUTLAW
Fearless "BilIy the Kid" Who
ReveIed In Carnage.
ONLY A BOY, YET A TERROR.

western Territories Was but Twen-
ty-one When He Met Death at the
Hands of Sheriff Pat Garrett.
When General Lew Wallace was
governor of New Mexico and the war
that ragged for several years between
the rival cattle companies was at its
height BILLY the Kid" had reached
the flood of his murderous career. He
arrived in Lincoln county to take sides
in the cattle warfare, known and
feared in every range town and min
ing camp in the southwestern terri
tories.
Pure wanton love of carnage was all
that attracted him to Lincoln county.
With the band of desperadoes he led
he raided ranches, "shot up" towns.
killed, burned houses and committed
outrage after outrage with the blind
recklessness of a maniac. Fear was
extinct within him. He cared no more
for detachments of cavalry than he
did for covering sheriffs.
Affairs in New Mexico finally came
to such a pass that half the cattlemen
paid the youthful desperate tribute.
1t was only after Pat f. Garrett was
made sheriff of Lincoln county and the
author of "Ben-Hur" General Wal
lace) urged that fearless gun fighter
and gambler to capture Billy the Kid
that q determined effort was made to
end his reign of terror
The obstacles that Garrett had to en-
counter called for all his headlong en-
ergy and nerve. Billy had the entire
countryside in a state of abject terror;
friends were ready to give him timely
warning of pursuit; ranchmen dared
not deny him lodgment or conceal
ment.
Pat Garrett undertook the capture in
October, 1880, and on Dec. 20 he sur
rounded the Kid and his band in a
deserted house near Sinking Springs.
After a siege lasting most Of the day
the outlaws ammunition was exhaust
ed. Billy the Kid surrendered. He
and his four followers, surrounded by
great force of armed men, were taken
W Las NCSuo anu IhClSC W SANTA II Z
for safe keeping.
An array of indictments charging
murder confronted him. He was tried
on one Indictment and acquitted, then
tried on another and convicted. He
carried himself throughout with sheer
ing defiance After he had been SEN
fenced to hang Garrett took him to
Fort Stanton, near Lincoln. Two depu-
ties armed with WincheSters were as
signed to guard him in the temporary
Jail in the Murphy & Dolan store build
ing.
In some mysterious fashion the
Kid possessed himself of a revolver,
shot down his guards, seized their
weapons and appeared at the window.
When another guard appeared the
prisoner riddled his body with buck
shot. Then he called to an old man on
the plaza to bring him file. Filing
off one of his shacEles, he called for a
horse. One was brought and he es-
capped.
For nearly three months after that
Billy the Kid led a fugitive life.
Garrett logged him patiently and final
ly got wind Of his hiding place-the
ranch Of Peter Maxwell, near Fort
Sumner. 1t was nearly midnight when
Garrett and two deputies quietly APP
preached the Maxwell hacienda. Gar
rett crept into the room where Max
we'll was sleeping. Softly awakening
the sleeper he questioned him concern
ing the whereabouts of the Kid.
At that moment the hunted youth
sprang into the room. calling out in
Spanish, "Quien va?" C'Who comes
thereby 1t was Billy. He was I'M
armed. and as he reached for his rife
Garrett shot him. The body of Will
liam Bonney BILLY the Kid was bur
led in the military cemetery at Fort
Stanton July 10, 1881. His age at the
time of his death was twenty-one years
seven months. There his body is to-
day. though in later years corpse was
exhibited throughout the west as that
OF the famous young outlaw.-Harper's
Weekly.