1 Yes and No depending on whos accounts you hear or read
2 A lot, but some truth is in there
3  Arkansas Dave was a questionable figure by most accounts.  Most think he was a slimy POS, just depends on who or what you read.  He was not a good guy though.

From my reading...

A lot of the things you see in Young Guns actually did happen, but as with most movies the timelines are messed up and they add their own spin to the relationships.  I believe Ark Dave was real and I believe he did spend some time with BTK after the LCW.

I think the relationship between Garret and The Kid was exaggerated.

Dave Rudabaugh was very real.  He was also hated by men like Doc Holliday(bad card game/gambling issue) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dave_Rudabaugh

The extent of Billy and Pat's relationship isn't really known.  Some of the people who lived in Fort Sumner claimed they were very good friends and even horse thieved together.  Others say they were casua aquaintances at most.  The casual aquaitanance position seems to have the most support.  

The YG movie's aren't bad.  There's a LOT of historical inaccuracies but not as bad as some Hollywood versions.  There's a lot in there that really happened.  The scene where they are trapped in a burning house?   Really happened, although Billy wasn't thrown out of the attic in a trunk.  He and several others snuck out under cover of darkness and shadows and when they were spotted the enemy opened up on them.  The first guy out, Harvey Morris, was killed immediately but Billy and several others got away by running off into the darkness and down into the river.  McSween, the guy who was gatling gunned in that scene, was shot down in his own doorway, along with two or three Mexicans but it was by pistols and rifles.  

Dave Rudabaugh did exist but where they got the "Arkansas" part, nobody knows.  His real nickname was "Dirty" Dave Rudabaugh.  He was a scoundrel by all accounts and although he was captured with Billy the Kid, he got away and went to Mexico.  He continued to be his usual self and pushed people around one too many times and they cut off his head.  There are a couple of photos of a Mexican holding his head.  Also, Dave Rudabaugh has a very unique distinction.  He is the only man known to have been arrested by Pat Garrett, Bat Masterson and Wyatt Earp!

Billy the Kid is dead, and he aint never comin back.

Your new here arnt ya?

TAG

- Clint

Too bad that portion of history wasn't better documented. Funny how lots of those crossed paths but know body knew.

The facial recognition stuff is BS.  Who cares, we know what BTK looked like.  The real questions are why do certain municipalities deny the requests to exhume and do a DNA study?

I have a buddy an ARFCOM'er here with a photo of almost every gunslinger know minus the James and BTK on a porch together.  The Earps, the Mastersons, Judge Roy Bean....Maybe I'll get him to take a pic and post it one day.

Because if what is considered fact now changes, places that used to make money off of the link to BTK may cease to make the money.

After only reading a 1/4 way through this post by the OP.I give you much credit for your passion and dedicated detective work.Major props,much like metal detecting/research which I do.

Yes that is the reason, but the internet has killed that for those towns.  It's the only reason we still have this mystery.

One thing that I've learned is that history isn't nearly as "established" as I had assumed.  For example, I know I've read that Rudabaugh was arrested by Garrett, Masterson and Earp but the Wikipedia article says Earp never arrested him.  You would think something like that would be easily verifiable but apparently it isn't.  

I also know that I've read most of the BTK books and watched most of the BTK documentaries but when I go and read the same source material the writers of those books and documentaries read, I find something different.  For example, I've seen several prominant historians state that Paulita Maxwell said the tintype of Billy the Kid looks nothing like him.  That's how it was stated by these historians.  There is only one quote from Paulita Maxwell on that tintype and she basically says that she never liked the image because it didn't do him justice.  She said it made him look uncouth and that when he was in town he was always clean and well dressed.  She was basically comparing the way he looked fresh off the range to how he looked when cleaned up and in town.  She never said anything remotely suggesting that the guy in the tintype did not look like the Billy the Kid she knew yet that's how her statement is portrayed by these historians.

Those pictures look nothing like Emilio Estevez.

FAKE!!!!!!!!!

Yeah and Wikipedia is the last place you should trust for info on this subject.  I'd like to IM you before I go to New Mexico.  Seems like you have already done a lot of what I wanted to do.

I grew up 30 miles from there and never knew that....

Great post guys, I love the old west stories.

I spent quite a bit of time on my job working around the Tombstone area and to a chance to see all of the historical landmarks, very cool.

Cool thread!

I dated a girl in HS who claimed to be a direct descendant of BTK.

Had the same last name, red hair, and a disposition to match.

Are you famous now?

He may not be famous but he shot her

Great post ... always been interested in BTK.   Thanks for sharing OP,

The fellow sitting on the horse must be Tom O. Folliard.  Looks just like him and he is in Lincoln.Tom was six feet tall and weighted 180 lbs when killed.  I think it's a wonderful picture.

There is very little chance that the kid and Garrett ever "rode together".  They knew one another, but that's about as far as it went.  The kid had a very distinct circle of friends and none of them were friends of Garrett.  When Garrett knew the kid he was bar tending in Fort Sumner.  The kid knew him because he liked to play cards in there...usually in Beaver Smith's saloon where Garrett worked. The kid played three card monte.

My source is Leon Metz who has written on the subject.

I own Sallie Chisum's personal collection of tintypes.  I've discovered her family who live not far from where I found the photos.  They are still ranchers and have photographs related to the Chisum family taken around the time of the Lincoln County War.

Here is my photo, a tintype of Sallie Chisum that she owned.

http://i200.photobucket.com/albums/aa23/GermVMA211/Chisum%20Family/Newgroupingofcollection073.jpg

Here's a known picture of her:

http://i200.photobucket.com/albums/aa23/GermVMA211/Chisum%20Family/SourceBillypictures005.jpg

Are they the same woman?  Why sure they are.  My photo shows her at about 20 and the earlier, often published one, she is about age 16.  I think the two pictures are reversed from oneanother.  She is probably wearing the same lace collar.

More pictures of Sallie Chisum:

http://i200.photobucket.com/albums/aa23/GermVMA211/Chisum%20Family/Newgroupingofcollection078.jpg

http://i200.photobucket.com/albums/aa23/GermVMA211/Chisum%20Family/SallieChisum-Copy.jpg

The photo of the elder Sallie has her name written on the reverse and was found within the archieve in Sallie's brother's family who live and are ranchers in Oregon.

Here is their photo of the Long House, at the South Springs Ranch.  The names of the people is written on the reverse.  This was taken in 1887, six years after the Kid was killed.

http://i200.photobucket.com/albums/aa23/GermVMA211/Chisum%20Family/SouthSpringsR1.jpg

http://i200.photobucket.com/albums/aa23/GermVMA211/Chisum%20Family/Newgroupingofcollection007.jpg

This is a famous and often published photo.  I copied this from an original at the living Chisum family ranch.  Note it was taken at the same day and probably just before the one posted above. The family who own the originals of these two pictures recall when they sold Sallie Chisum's collection, which had been forgotten, that I discovered and purchased.

tag

Here are a few photos of Sallie's first husband, William Robert.  He was a German banker's son and educated.  He was about five years older than Sallie.  They met in Anton Chico where Robert was working in a dry goods store which he owned.  Sallie was attending a finishing school there.  She lived in a professor's home who was also a preacher.  He married the blushing couple.  They had two boys, John E. and Fred T.  Their first child, Reinhardt, died soon after he was born. The marriage lasted about ten years.  They divorced after the family lost Sallie's beloved South Springs Ranch.  In 1890, Wm. Robert took 3,000 head of Chisum bred short horned cattle to the XIII Ranch (later XI) in SW Kansas which he eventually purchased.  His father, John E. Robert Sr. died in Pritz, Germany  in about 1887 and Robert took his family home to meet his widowed mother.  In the 1920's Wm. Robert moved back to Germany where he died....not sure when it happened.  There is some evidence that he and Sallie had some kind of a reconcilation before she died.  She kept his name on her tombstone, even tho they had been apart for over 40 years.

Wm. Robert spent time time as a Prussian soldier before he immigrated and Sallie saved several pictures of him, both in uniform and in "mufti".

http://i200.photobucket.com/albums/aa23/GermVMA211/Chisum%20Family/LittleFredandothers019.jpg

http://i200.photobucket.com/albums/aa23/GermVMA211/Chisum%20Family/BillypicturesMarch407009.jpg

http://i200.photobucket.com/albums/aa23/GermVMA211/Chisum%20Family/RobertfamilyandPink003-1.jpg

The little boys on trikes are Fred the tow head and John who was darker and three years older.  I believe they purchased the bikes in a family trip to German, probably to visit William's mother who was a recent widow.

Wow. Thanks for posting those.

Fascinating stuff! Thanks for posting!

One of the best posts I've ever seen on this site.

Thanks guys

Man people's eyes back then just seem to show how hard life was.

Nice collection. Thanks for sharing it here.

Very interesting.

When Sallie and Wm. Robert divorced he took her children.  They were not allowed to see their mother until after they graduated from high school which they attended in Hutchinson, Kansas. They visited her and then went to German to attain a "classical" education.  Sallie must have been broken hearted when her children, who were still young, where taken from her.  Fred, her youngest had one son and because his mother, Sallie, had not been able to raise children he gave his son, William Lee Roberts to her and she raised the boy.  He eventually had several children as well.

Here is young Fred.  The photo taken in the Netherlands when the family visited Mr. Robert's family.  He btw: was an only child.  


http://i200.photobucket.com/albums/aa23/GermVMA211/Chisum%20Family/LittleFredandothers004.jpg

Isn't Fred a cute little shaver!  You can also see him standing on the picket fense in the photo of the Long House and sitting on his tricycle in the group pic, which I was allowed to copy at the Haley Memorial Library in Midland, TX.

BTW: in the image of the Long House the couple behind the fence on the left are Walter Pitzer Chisum and his new wife, Inez Simpson.  They married in Dodge City, Kansas in 1887.  It was within their family that I found the pics of the Long House.  They live in Oregon.  I found Sallie's collection in Oregon.  

Sallie not only collected photos of her family some I've posted above, but also pics of her friends, including the gang who called themselves the Regulators.  Billy the Kid was a member and eventually became the leader of the group, but it didn't start out that way.  The first leader was Richard "Dick" Brewer, and then after he was killed the leader became Frank McNab and then after  his death Doc Scurlock and finally the Kid.  Eventually the members of the Regulators went their seperate ways and Billy became a member of a new and much smaller gang who were pretty hard core criminals, they included Dan Dedrick, Dirty Dave Rudabaugh, Tom Pickett and Billy Wilson.  Sallie never got a pic of Pickett, but she got all of the others.  There are no other pics of Rudabaugh and Wilson except for hers, which I now own.

I'm going to show Sallie Chisum's collection of the Regulators.  I'm pretty sure about the identity of most of them as they are others to match them to, but there might be come contriversy about my identifications, but they all came from the same source.  Something that an observer must keep in mind. I'll show these in several posts.  They do indeed paint new light onto the images that the public has of Billy and his bunch.

RICHARD BREWER:
http://i200.photobucket.com/albums/aa23/GermVMA211/Regulators/Newgroupingofcollection036.jpg

FRANK MCNAB:

http://i200.photobucket.com/albums/aa23/GermVMA211/Regulators/BTKandGWMorganpics040.jpg


DOC SCURLOCK:


http://i200.photobucket.com/albums/aa23/GermVMA211/Regulators/DocSurlock.jpg


BILLY BONNEY, aka. BILLY THE KID:

http://i200.photobucket.com/albums/aa23/GermVMA211/Regulators/BillyBonney.jpg

More Regulators

HENRY N. BROWN:

http://i200.photobucket.com/albums/aa23/GermVMA211/Regulators/Newgroupingofcollection012.jpg

TOM O. FOLLIARD:

http://i200.photobucket.com/albums/aa23/GermVMA211/Regulators/Newgroupingofcollection054.jpg

JOHN MIDDLETON:

http://i200.photobucket.com/albums/aa23/GermVMA211/Regulators/BirdsandnewBillypicks07021.jpg

There are a few pictures of Brown and Folliard, but this is the only one of Middleton and up until now there have been no images of him.  I have two.  One I found within Sallie's collection, the one seen here, and the other in the photographer's collection that I found in the historical society in his hometown.  So I have two of them found found about 2,000 miles apart!

Thanks for posting all this....great thread.

As you look at Sallie's collection one can see that many of the photos look similar.  I think they were taken on the same day.  The subject is often shown in front of a similar background and the same distance from the lens.  Most are 3/4 pictures, but some are straight on.  I think those must have been made by an assistant.  Tintyper's ofter used an assistant since things happened pretty rapidly when they started the picture making process.  Almost all of these pictures are in nearly new condition.  

Here are a few more:

YGINIO SALAZAR: http://i200.photobucket.com/albums/aa23/GermVMA211/Regulators/YginioSalazar001.jpg

GEORGE COE:

http://i200.photobucket.com/albums/aa23/GermVMA211/Regulators/Newgroupingofcollection110.jpg

FRANK COE: (what balance is off, sorry) http://i200.photobucket.com/albums/aa23/GermVMA211/Regulators/FrankCoe003.jpg

Thanks for taking the time to post this.

BIG JIM FRENCH:  

http://i200.photobucket.com/albums/aa23/GermVMA211/Regulators/JimFrench.jpg

CHARLIE BOWDRE:

http://i200.photobucket.com/albums/aa23/GermVMA211/Regulators/Newgroupingofcollection014.jpg

DAN DEDRICK:

http://i200.photobucket.com/albums/aa23/GermVMA211/Regulators/DanDedrick.jpg

When I took some of these pictures I didn't understand white balance so the tint does't look right in some.

Yeah, not to jack this very interesting thread but my own unstudied opinion on about 99% of
all the old pics I've ever seen from this period has led me to conclude that maybe...just maybe... because
the art of photography was in its infancy and the all photographers were basically so new at their art, there were
few accepted standards other than attempting to record people without having them look like a bunch of
raving idiots or lunatics with big, laughing, cheesy smiles & over-the-top poses so commonly seen today.

Many of us grew up being told to say "CHEESE" for the camera, right?  I'm thinking if any of those people in those old photos or those who took those photos saw pics from today...they'd think we'd all lost our minds.

Just my own interpretation of the differences in the 'style' of the photographers of then and now.  It may have NO basis in reality.  Would appreciate hearing the OP's thoughts on the matter...again without hijacking this thread.

One thing you can't change is your eyes and from my research Pat Garret went to Maxwells house knowing Billy would be around because the Maxwell girl was pregnant with the kids child. Garrett waited in ambush for the kid and blew the piss out of him with a shotgun (not the noble handgun against handgun) this is why he didn't mind the hasty burial as he knew the kid was not going to show up in Lincoln. The maxwell girl marrys a ranch hand and 6 months later her kid pops out, when the child gets older he looks surprisingly like the Known tintype of the kid. Any photo that doesn't have the same eye configuration as that childs photo or the kids known photo is a fake claiming to be Billy the Kid.

Mysteries at the Museum had a manuscript from a guy in Europe who had happened to know a lot about Butch Cassidy, possess one of Butches guns and guess what even after extensive facial reconstruction still had Butch's Eyes.

Great posts, OP!  I don't know much at all about Billy the Kid and didn't know that searching for authentic images of him was such a big deal.  Very interesting read--thanks for posting.

Steve Sedwerwall (who has done some FANTASTIC research into BTK) and Sheriff Sullivan attempted to have some bodies exumed for DNA testing.  They succeeded in exhuming John Miller, who is less well known than Brushy Billy but taken more seriously as possibly having been BTK.  They wanted to exhume BTK's mother and compare the two people's DNA.  

[/quote]

My side of the McCarty clan were born and raised in and around Indianapolis, IN.  My GGGgrandfather was William McCarty born in 1802 in Indianapolis.  He had four boys, William Henry, Elijah (my great great grandfather) John and Robert M.  I can't recall William Henry's birthday, he was the eldist and Elijah was born in 1840. The McCarty family lived in and around Indiana, Kentucky and Missouri.  William Henry and John joined the 6th Volunteer Indiana Infantry in 1862.  Elijah stayed home to help around the farm,  William Henry survived the war and is buried in Red Bluff, CA. He died in 1928 and Elijah in 1929.  Elijah knew my father and he would tell me stories about the old gent, always called "gramps".  Gramps told my dad that he had a brother who died in Andersonville.  He also mentioned that we were related to Billy the Kid, but no one in my family were proud of that fact and all talk of the kid was hushed.  

Eventually I discovered that William Henry McCarty and John joined the army on the same day and that John was captured at Chickamagua on about 10 Sept 1863.  He was sent to Andersonville.  John Ransom, in his diary of that place recalls a mess mate who he called John McCartney of the 6th Kentucky.  He mentioned him several times.  Not sure he was my great great uncle John McCarty or not, but am sure that he died in that place on 6 Nov 1864. He made it for over a year!  I've seen his tombstone.  Family bible, now lost, showed birthdays of all of them, but can't recall how far back it went.  It was my great grandfather's and he was born in 1870 so it may not have mentioned the kid or John McCarty, but I did see Catherin's name written in there, but that doesn't really mean anything.

If I am related to the Kid then his father would have been John McCarty and the Kid would have been named after John's favorite brother William Henry McCarty (also the kid's real name).  There is a direct "Y" chromosome linkage between me and the kid's grandfather.  I told this to Mr. Sederwall and explained that he could have my DNA, but he declined.  Anyway its not a sure thing that my McCarty's are also the kid's.  Might be tho.

Here's a pic of the kid and my grandfather McCarty.  I think they look alike.  

http://i200.photobucket.com/albums/aa23/GermVMA211/McCartys/Joeandhismom003.jpg    http://i200.photobucket.com/albums/aa23/GermVMA211/McCartys/TheKidasinlife.jpg

Those old tintypes used a long exposure.  The cameras didn't even have a spring loaded shutter.  They simply loaded the prepared plate of polished iron into the camera and removed the lens cap.  Photo took  6 to 8 seconds, sometimes longer. So the subject had to hold very steady and they seldom smiled.  This makes them appear dower, but they weren't. They probably laughed more than we do today, they weren't hampered by political correctness and made fun of just about everything.

There are very few photographs of John S. Chisum, the famous New Mexico rancher.  Here is a new one that was saved by Sallie Chisum.  John is standing in the back row on the left side, our left. He is smiling!


http://i200.photobucket.com/albums/aa23/GermVMA211/Chisum%20Family/Newgroupingofcollection117.jpg

It is difficult to know exactly what happened that night in Pete Maxwell's bedroom.  There were several men there including Kip McKinney and John Poe both wrote about the shooting later. I like Poe's story and it jibes pretty well with Garrett's account.  If Poe is right then Garrett used his .45 and put one round in the kid's heart.  Garrett said he hit the boy in the "ventrical"...shot the top of his heart off.  Instant loss of blood pressure would have rendered the kid immediately unconsiousness and he would have been out cold when he hit the floor.  Then Garrett, in a panic snapped off another round that hit an intable.  Poe and Kip ran into the room guns drawn.  Maxwell, screaming rolled out of bed pulling the covers with him. Garrett wasn't really sure who he'd just shot. They ran outside expecting to be mobbed by the citizens and the Maxwell family.  There was a general pandimonium.

Apparently both Paulina and Deluvina Maxwell (former Navajo slave) ran into the room and lit a candle.  The kid was lying face down dead as a doornail.  They turned him over.  Deluvina went ballistic and pounded on Garrett's chest with her fists calling him a p** pot.  She had to reach up high because she wasn't very tall and he was 6/4.  Paulita didn't say much, but later on she reported that she picked up the Kid's pistol and placed it on a table.....it disappeared.  It would have been a new Colt Thunderer or Lightening and someone probably grabbed it...who knows?  Or maybe there was no gun at all. He did have a knife which he planned to use to cut a chunk of steak from off of a beef that was hanging outside.  That knife sold not long ago for $7,000.

Some men picked up the kid and took the body to a carpentry shop and layed him on a workbench.  Sederwall told me that the body bled a lot, which would mean that the heart was still pumping. I'm not sure of that because he layed on the floor for some time....maybe over an hour before they picked him up.  (I think.)  Women cleaned up the body and dressed him.  They placed candles around the boy  and sat with him the entire night long.  The next day, the 15th, they held a morning inquest and the three lawmen were exhonorated from wrong doing and they left town as soon as they could.  A grave was  dug and they buried him not far from the graves of his friends, Bowdre and Folliard in the Old military cemetery, but a little ways from where the soldiers were buried.  His grave was marked with a wooden marker that was eventually removed and the exact location of the grave was forgotten. For a long time people knew where it was tho, and they'd put flowers on it. It probably wasn't far from the markers we see today. Are his bones still there?  I don't know, they may have been washed away during the floods, but they won't allow you to dig down there.  Let the kid lay in peace.  He certainly didn't get much of it while he was alive.  

Paulity did marry and had a child, a boy not long after....six months sounds about right.  She and the kid, as the story goes, were planning to elope to Old Mexico and I think that's true.  The Kid hung around too long tho and paid the price.

Are either Brushy Billy or Jim Miller really the Kid?  I doubt it. Too many people were there and attested later to the boy's death.  Garrett put in for the reward, which he eventually collected...twice. Nor did Billy show up anywhere else.  He probably would have since he liked the limelight and he would have made his presence known, even in Old Mexico.

Thanks very much.  I defer to your educated conclusions.  Great thread!