There was a time when the American Old West was ruled by lawlessness, guns, and the outlaws that thrived there. One of the most infamous gunmen and outlaws of the time was Billy The Kid. He lived a life that was hard and fast. Billy The Kid began committing crime at just 16 years of age and soon became a notorious outlaw in the New Mexico and Arizona territory.
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00:00Billy the Kid is one of the most notorious Wild West outlaws in history.
00:04That's extra impressive when you consider that he died at just 21 years old.
00:08How did he become a legend in such a short time?
00:11Here's the sad true story of Billy the Kid.
00:13What makes you think this story is sad, boy?
00:18Historians know very little about the outlaw's early years.
00:21According to the book Billy the Kid, A Short and Violent Life, his mother, Catherine, was
00:25an Irish immigrant to New York City.
00:27That's where Henry McCarty, better known as Billy the Kid, was born in 1859.
00:31No one knows the exact month or day for sure.
00:34It's also unknown if his parents were married or if his father was ever in the picture.
00:38Billy probably spent the first six years of his life in the Irish slums of Manhattan or
00:42Brooklyn.
00:43The conditions would have been horrific.
00:45In the 1860s, when Billy was growing up there, almost 300,000 people lived in one square
00:50mile.
00:51The Irish were only allowed to rent the worst of the worst tenements, and Billy easily could
00:55have lived in a 12-by-12 room with 20 other people.
00:59Disease was rampant in the slums, and the mortality rate for Irish children was 25 percent.
01:04The fact that Billy made it to 21 could almost be seen as a miracle, considering his origins.
01:08While his later life would have been characterized by Wild West violence, his childhood would
01:13have been marked by the poverty and brutality of New York's ghettos.
01:17By the time the Civil War ended, Billy and his mother moved to Indianapolis.
01:20She was single by this point, and started a relationship with a man named William Antrim.
01:25In 1870, the whole group relocated to Wichita, Kansas.
01:28It was there that Billy's life took a positive turn.
01:31His mother, Catherine, ran her own laundry business, which must have been successful
01:35because she was able to purchase land outside of town.
01:37Her boyfriend, William, built a cabin and a storm cellar, probably with the help of
01:41Billy and his younger brother, Joe.
01:43There was every indication that Catherine had put down roots and that Billy would grow
01:46up living a happy, secure life surrounded by family.
01:50Wonderful.
01:51But that didn't happen.
01:53Unfortunately, Billy was soon dealt a devastating blow.
01:57In 1871, Catherine was diagnosed with tuberculosis.
02:00At the time, many doctors thought the drier climates could cure a person of TB, so the
02:04family packed up their belongings and moved to the New Mexico territory.
02:09Billy was only 14 when his mother died of TB.
02:11While William officially became their stepfather, he wasn't interested in raising the two boys.
02:16He found separate foster homes for the brothers, then abandoned them.
02:19At this point, it seems Billy was still a good, law-abiding kid.
02:22He found honest work at a hotel, where he washed dishes and waited tables.
02:26Despite earning a living, he also managed to go to school.
02:30But something soon changed in Billy.
02:32History Net reports that he first stole some food.
02:34Then, a few months later, he was involved in a prank with a friend who stole a bundle
02:38of clothes.
02:39However, someone turned Billy in for the crime.
02:42The sheriff didn't want to do anything more than scare the boy straight when he put Billy
02:45in a cell for a couple of days, but Billy took it very seriously.
02:49He managed to climb up the chimney and escape.
02:51Now he had no family, and, in his mind at least, he was a fugitive from the law.
02:56Billy was now a teenager living alone in a very dangerous part of the country.
03:00Regardless of his age, there were a million ways to die in the West.
03:03"...outlaws, angry drunk people, scorned hookers, hungry animals, diseases, major and
03:08minor injuries, Indians, the weather, you can get killed just going to the bathroom."
03:12According to Legends of America, two years after escaping jail, Billy met a blacksmith
03:16named Frank Quindy Cahill, who liked to pick on the kid.
03:20One day, the insults went too far.
03:22On August 17, 1877, History reports, Cahill called Billy a pimp.
03:27Billy responded by calling Cahill a son of a bitch.
03:30The blacksmith jumped Billy, threw the teenager to the ground, and pinned him.
03:33Panicking, Billy pulled out a gun and shot Cahill.
03:36He died the next day.
03:37One witness said Billy had no choice but to use self-defense.
03:41The kid didn't stick around to make his case.
03:43Now he really was a fugitive.
03:45Billy joined various gangs and made most of his money through cattle rustling.
03:49But one day, he stole some horses and was thrown in jail.
03:52The horse's owner, an Englishman named John Tunstall, came to see Billy in a cell.
03:57After they talked, Tunstall dropped the charges and gave him a job.
04:00It was like the family Billy had been missing for so long.
04:03Tunstall may have been the closest thing to a father Billy ever had.
04:07But Tunstall was involved in an escalating feud over territory.
04:10On February 18, 1878, a posse shot and killed Tunstall in cold blood in front of Billy.
04:16The story of the kid swearing vengeance over his father figure's grave is a myth, but Billy
04:20was now part of a blood feud known as the Lincoln County War.
04:24Over the next five months, both sides would participate in various shootouts and revenge
04:28killings.
04:29Billy is credited with a higher body count than he actually had, although he definitely
04:33killed at least a few people, including a sheriff.
04:36By the end of the war, which his side lost, Billy was known as one of the best gunmen
04:39in the West.
04:40According to Legends of America, in 1879, New Mexico Territory Governor Lew Wallace
04:46heard Billy would be willing to surrender and testify against other outlaws if his charges
04:50were dropped.
04:51The two eventually met to discuss the situation, and Governor Wallace offered Billy a seemingly
04:55straightforward deal.
04:57You testify against everyone involved in this damn war, and I'll pardon you.
05:04The kid agreed to testify.
05:05According to their arrangement, Billy would be arrested for show, then spend time in jail
05:09until a trial dates.
05:11Billy's evidence was enough to convict at least one major bad guy, but the district
05:14attorney refused to follow Wallace's orders that he be released afterward.
05:19So without a pardon, Billy had no choice but to escape jail once again, and continue living
05:24on the run.
05:25Billy the Kid, A Short and Violent Life says that the pardon might have meant a chance
05:29at legitimate prosperity.
05:31Billy was hardly the worst person in the West, but according to the book, the law singled
05:35him out for special treatment.
05:37Billy should have been a free man at that point.
05:39Instead, with outstanding warrants, he returned to what he knew best, a life of crime.
05:44He formed his own gang of outlaws and started rustling cattle again.
05:47For a year, he lived around Fort Sumner.
05:49There, he became friends with a local bartender named Pat Garrett.
05:53History Net even reports that it's more than possible Garrett joined Billy and his gang
05:57on some of their cattle raids.
05:58But the West was often one big gray area when it came to who was a good guy and who was
06:03a bad guy, so it wasn't that shocking when Garrett was elected Lincoln County Sheriff.
06:07Suddenly, Garrett was in charge of actively tracking down his old friend.
06:11It was a complicated pursuit, and numerous people were shot and killed, but not Billy.
06:16The sheriff set up many traps and ambushes in an attempt to apprehend Billy, but the
06:20Kid seemed to have an animal instinct that warned him of danger.
06:24That instinct didn't last long.
06:25On December 23rd, just days after Governor Wallace put a $500 reward on Billy's head,
06:31Garrett and his posse captured the Kid alive.
06:33Billy took it in stride, telling a reporter from his jail cell,
06:36"...what's the use of looking on the gloomy side of everything?
06:38The laugh's on me this time."
06:40By this time, Billy the Kid had become a folk hero to some and an evil outlaw to others.
06:44In addition to endless newspaper articles written about him, there were plenty of people
06:48on street corners and barstools sharing tall tales about the Kid.
06:51"...I'll shoot you, and kill your people, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom.
06:55And your sheriffs, maybe."
06:56Pew, pew, pew.
06:59Billy spent months in a Santa Fe jail before his trial began in April 1881.
07:04While he'd committed plenty of crimes by then, the charges were for killing Sheriff William
07:08Brady during the Lincoln County War.
07:10The jury deliberated for exactly one day before finding Billy guilty.
07:14The sentence was death by hanging, and the execution date was set for May 13th.
07:19He had no intention of sticking around for that.
07:21Billy was in irons and under constant surveillance by two guards, James Bell and Robert Olinger,
07:26on the second floor of the courthouse.
07:28Garrett, who knew the Kid's reputation for successful escape attempts, was taking no
07:32chances.
07:33But somehow, Billy got his hands on a gun.
07:35Guards have no solid proof, but it's thought either one of his old gang members hid a pistol
07:39in a toilet, or he took it off of Bell himself.
07:42The Kid took out Bell first, then grabbed a shotgun and waited at a window for Olinger,
07:46who headed toward the courthouse when he heard the shots.
07:49Billy called out,
07:50"'Hello, Bob,' and blasted him.
07:51Billy then stole a horse and raced out of town.
07:54Against all odds, he escaped custody yet again, but it would be his last time.
07:58The next time, Pat Garrett wouldn't take Billy the Kid alive.
08:02Garrett later wrote that people were upset he didn't seem to be very concerned about
08:05recapturing the Kid, but the sheriff said he was, quote, "'quietly at work,' maturing
08:10his plans of action."
08:11It's almost unbelievable that with his head start and ability to go almost anywhere, Billy
08:15never left New Mexico territory.
08:17Instead, he returned to Fort Sumner and didn't bother to keep a low profile.
08:21Within three months, Garrett was on to him.
08:23On the night of July 14, 1881, the sheriff and his posse went to rancher Peter Maxwell's
08:28house to ask if he knew where the Kid was.
08:30Maxwell absolutely did.
08:32Billy was on his way over with some beef for dinner.
08:34Garrett was in Maxwell's dark bedroom, talking to him, when Billy showed up at the door.
08:38Sensing someone else in the room but unable to see his old acquaintance-turned-adversary,
08:43Billy pulled his gun and asked, "'Who's that?' in Spanish."
08:45Garrett later wrote about that moment.
08:47It was the first time during all Billy's life of peril that he ever lost his presence of
08:51mind or failed to shoot first and hesitate afterwards.
08:54It would be the mistake that killed him.
08:56Garrett let off two shots.
08:57One of the bullets hit Billy right in the heart.
09:00After years of escaping one dangerous situation after the next, Billy the Kid was dead at
09:04the age of 21.
09:05Billy the Kid barely spent two decades on Earth, and he was only famous for a brief
09:10period of time.
09:11But that didn't stop people from taking his name and image and turning it into whatever
09:14they wanted it to be.
09:16According to Billy the Kid the Endless Ride, within a year of his death, dozens of novels
09:20and nonfiction accounts buried light on facts were published.
09:23Even Pat Garrett wrote a biography of Billy.
09:25Each subsequent generation used Billy to represent something different.
09:29In the 1920s, with the Wild West officially in the past, books presented him as the Robin
09:33Hood of a lost pastoral world.
09:35Other decades cast him as a frontier superhero, homicidal maniac, or a martyred symbol of
09:40freedom.
09:41There have been more than a dozen movies and even a ballet devoted to him.
09:44Plus, he still makes millions for the tourism industry in New Mexico.
09:47However, some people truly refused to let Billy die, because they claimed to actually
09:52be the outlaw.
09:53Vintage News says that one person, Brushy Bill, was taken somewhat seriously.
09:57Living in Texas in the 1940s, he managed to convince the locals, some of the Kid's contemporaries,
10:02and a lawyer that he was, in fact, the outlaw.
10:04Brushy Bill petitioned the governor of New Mexico for a pardon, but the governor was
10:08not convinced.
10:10Brushy Bill stuck to the story until he died in 1950, and even requested that his tombstone
10:14include the line, aka, Billy the Kid.
10:17More than 160 years after Billy the Kid was born, his legend is still going strong, and
10:22it shows no signs of slowing down, even if that legend is based on both fact and fiction.
10:27It doesn't matter what's true!
10:30It matters the story they tell when you're gone.