John Simpson Chisum
Subtitle: cattle king of the Pecos revisited
By: by Clifford R. Caldwell.
Publisher: Sunstone Press
Published: 2010
Place of publication: Santa Fe
Language: eng
Number of pages: 225
ISBN-13: 9780865347564
Subjects: Chisum, John Simpson, -- 1824-1884; Chisum, John Simpson, -- 1824-1884 -- Family; Ranchers -- Pecos River Valley (N.M. and Tex.) -- Biography; Ranch life -- Pecos River Valley (N.M. and Tex.) -- History -- 19th century; Cattle trade -- Pecos River Valley (N.M. and Tex.) -- History -- 19th century; Pecos River Valley (N.M. and Tex.) -- Biography; Pecos River Valley (N.M. and Tex.) -- Social life and customs -- 19th century; Pecos River Valley (N.M. and Tex.) -- Genealogy
Genres: Biography; Genealogy
Description: John Simpson Chisum left a trail across the American West so wide that a blind scout could follow it. Although his track can be picked up effortlessly, the gaps and sketchy information about the man leave us with but half of the story. John Chisum's life story seems to have been defined by his association with Billy the Kid and a singular, epic cattle drive across the barren expanses of West Texas to New Mexico. Ask anyone on the street about John Chisum and they are apt to bring up The Chisholm Trail. In an unlucky twist of historical circumstance the totally unrelated Chisholm trail which covered roughly the same path as the Kansas Trail, the Abilene Trail, or McCoy's Trail and was named for Jesse Chisholm would be forever confused with John Chisum's Western Trail. Perhaps the noted historian Harwood P. Hinton, Jr. said it best over a half century ago when he penned "A definitive biography of John Chisum may never be written, for there is quite a paucity of information not only concerning his life but also his stock dealings, which spanned the Southwest for thirty years." Not at all unlike the saga of legendary personalities of the American West such as Billy the Kid the story of the life and times of John Chisum has become "so contaminated with hypothesis and folklore that what remains of his story is little more than a blurred picture of a misrepresented and uninterpreted individual... living in the shadows of a bygone era" -- Back cover.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references and index.
Table of contents: title: John Simpson Chisum, the beginning; title: The Texas cattleman; title: John Chisum, cattle king of the Pecos; title: Chisum's Pecos war; title: War in Lincoln County; title: The final years; title: Epilogue; title: Appendix 1: The Chisum family origins & genealogy; title: Appendix 2: The persistent myth; title: Appendix 3: Sallie Lucy Chisum; title: Appendix 4: Other Chisum family.