CHAPTER XVIII
THE TRIAL AND EXECUTION OF JACK MCCALL

Who was Jack McCall and why did he kill Wild Bill Hickok?

The reader who has perused these pages thus far must have overcome surprise at anything of a mortuary nature that happened in those blood-drenched days. We have seen that on the evening before his murder Wild Bill had a premonition of his doom at the hands of an assassin. Yet little did he suspect, evidently, that the creature destined to strike him down was a man not yet twenty-five years of age, and one with whom he had engaged in a friendly game of cards earlier on that fatal afternoon. Had his attention been directed to McCall, or had he the least suspicion of his murderous design, it is safe to conclude that he would not have been slain, and that his deadly pistol would have had one more notch scratched on its ivory handle.

Wild Bill died a victim of his own reputation. Deadwood in 1876 was a prey to lawlessness. A succession of gunmen had been attracted thither, as they always are to points where there are a flow of gold and laxity of law enforcement. Things had reached the stage in July of that year when the better class of residents had decided, by all means at their command, to put an end to the existing bloody state of affairs.

The citizens sought to preserve order without resorting to lynch law, and after the Hinch murder trial, which took place upon a pile of logs in the middle of the street, the question of choosing a marshal was considered. As Wild Bill had arrived in June and his official acts at Abilene and at Hays City were known and appreciated, a suggestion was made to offer him a large salary and have him duplicate his Kansas record. Tim Brady and Johnny Varnes, two of the undesirables, got Jack McCall drunk and then told him that Bill was to be marshal of the town and that all gun-play would stop. It was said at the time, and never denied, that they told Jack that the boys could not afford to have Wild Bill Hickok created marshal and that they would give him two hundred dollars if he would slip across the street and shoot Bill. They gave him twenty-five dollars in dust on account and promised to pay him the remaining one hundred and seventy-five dollars when the bloody work had been performed.

Doc Peirce has given the writer a minute description of the assassin. He says that Jack McCall was known as Broken Nose Jack and that he was “the most repulsive-looking man I have ever met. He was cross-eyed and his nose had been broken by being struck with a six-shooter. He told me he was raised in Louisville, Kentucky, but came to the plains when a youth and joined a band of buffalo hunters down on the Republican River in Nebraska. He was a queer specimen of the genus homo. I have seen him do some generous deeds while sober, but he was a demon when drinking. I camped with him a short time and studied him well. He had a dual personality.”

After McCall shot Wild Bill he ran out of the saloon, snapping his pistol at Harry Young, the barkeeper, as he fled. We have already seen that the other charges in McCall’s pistol were dead, and so Harry Young lived to write his reminiscences under the title, “Hard Knocks.” McCall ran for some distance up the main street and attempted to hide in a meat market owned by Jacob Shoudy. Some reports have it that he was seized by Isaac Brown; others say that it was Calamity Jane who found him hiding behind a quarter of beef and captured him. McCall, after being taken, was confined in an old log cabin and kept under heavy guard.

At McDaniel’s Deadwood Theatre that evening a meeting of citizens was held at which preparations for the trial were made. There was no legal court at Deadwood, and in the absence of duly qualified officers of the law it was decided to conduct the trial according to the forms of self-constituted tribunals outside the pale of established legal jurisdiction. This gathering, to the number of one hundred, was presided over by W. L. Kuydendall, who, having stated the object of the meeting, was chosen as judge.

The proceedings were then adjourned until nine o’clock on the following morning. Colonel May was chosen to conduct the prosecution. A. B. Chapline was selected by the prisoner to defend him, but Mr. Chapline being too ill to go on with the case, Judge Miller was named in his stead. Arrangements were next made for obtaining a trial by jury. A committee appointed by the judge selected thirty-three residents, and from the names thus submitted a trial jury of twelve men was to be drawn. A recess was then taken until two o’clock in the afternoon.

Meanwhile, there were insistent demands for the lynching of McCall. Yet those who were for abiding by the findings of the jury held sway. The thirty-three names submitted by the committee were written on slips of paper and placed in a hat. With the drawing of each name, the person responding thereto was examined as to his qualifications to serve as an unprejudiced juror in the case.

J. J. Bump, Edward Burke, L. D. Bookaw, J. F. Cooper, S. S. Hopkins, L. A. Judd, John Mann, J. H. Thompson, Alexander Travis, K. F. Towle, J. E. Thompson, and Charles Whitehead, were appointed jurymen and selected the last named as their foreman.

Several witnesses were placed on the stand and testified as to the killing, while others were examined as to their knowledge of the characters of the murdered man and of his assassin. The prisoner was asked if he had a statement to make.

“Yes, I have a few words to say,” he responded. “Wild Bill killed my brother and I killed him. Wild Bill threatened to kill me if I ever crossed his path. I am not sorry for what I done; if I had to I would do the same thing over again.”

This story of Jack McCall’s to the effect that Wild Bill had killed his brother was, it was disclosed at a later day, the invention of Judge Miller, his counsel. At the trial, Judge Miller made the following appeal to the jury:

“Men, comrades, you have been chosen to decide the guilt and punishment of one of your own companions. Look upon the honest countenance of this poor boy who is being tried for his life because he struck down the assassin of a dearly beloved brother. Note, particularly, that unflinching and innocent eye, which could not possibly belong to a man who could do any wrong.”

One of the comments of a correspondent who was present at the trial was to the effect that “the eye, face, and in fact everything about the prisoner denoted villainy and iniquity as an innate part of his nature.”

Colonel May made an eloquent speech as the prosecutor.

“If this is not murder, then there never was murder committed,” he said in part. “The deceased in his bloody winding-sheet from his mountain grave demands that a proper punishment be meted out to his villainous assassin.”

It was currently reported that the jury first stood one for conviction and eleven for acquittal. Indeed, one lenient juror proposed that the prisoner be fined twenty-five dollars. After being out for one hour and thirty minutes the jury handed in the following verdict: “We, the jurors, find the prisoner, Mr. John McCall, not guilty.”—Charles Whitehead, foreman.

And so ended the farcical trial of the murderer of Wild Bill Hickok. It was charged that the jury had been bought, but it is quite unlikely that this was the case. Judge Muller’s able defence, coupled with the fact that the taking of a human life was not then considered a heinous offence, doubtless prompted the jury to bring in the absurd verdict recorded.

Jack McCall’s acquittal, however, did not finish the case. At the conclusion of the trial, Colonel May announced that two hundred ounces of gold dust had been surreptitiously passed to and accepted by the jury. Furthermore, he declared he would follow the assassin until justice was done.

As soon as McCall was released he left Dead-wood and went to Laramie, Wyoming. While intoxicated one day he made the statement that Wild Bill had never killed his brother; that his entire defence had been invented by his counsel. As he was now in a region where law prevailed, he was arrested and arraigned before Judge Blair, who held him for trial at Yankton. He was brought to the bar in the following January. The court appointed General W. H. H. Beadle and Oliver Shannon as counsel for the defendant. They pleaded in his behalf the clause in the constitution which provides that no man shall be put in jeopardy of life or limb twice for the same offence; but it was decided that this did not govern in this case, for the reason that the trial at Deadwood was illegal and therefore not recognized by law.

When Jack McCall was on the witness stand the attorney for the prosecution subjected him to a grilling cross-examination.

“Why didn’t you go in front of Wild Bill and shoot him in the face like a man?” he asked coldly.

“I didn’t want to commit suicide,” replied McCall, amid laughter.

This was a significant compliment to Wild Bill’s pistolry.

After a trial which continued for several days, beginning November 27, 1876, McCall was finally found guilty of murder in the first degree. An appeal was taken to the territorial Supreme Court, but the verdict of the trial court was affirmed. Jack McCall was duly sentenced to death and he was hanged on March 1, 1877.

On the day following the execution U. S. Marshal Burdick received the following letter:

This letter was from a sister of Wild Bill’s assassin. Jack McCall had left home six years previously, a mere boy. He had turned gambler and ruffian, and had trodden the primrose path that leads to the scaffold.

THE END

FOREWORD

It has not been the purpose of the writer to novelize Wild Bill Hickok. That has already been done, and rather effectively. So picturesque was the man, and so astounding his exploits, that it is little wonder he should have fallen into the hands of the fictioneers, who straightway made of him something of a Homeric figure. It has been my constant purpose to find out what was real, and what imaginary, in the tales about him that have been current for upward of sixty years.

Wild Bill was a fascinating personality to all who knew him. The mere mention of his name never failed to bring a crash of brasses from the orchestra. His friends never ceased to chant his praises as an honest man, an incredibly accurate pistol shot, and an individual who was without fear in the presence of danger. This is a good deal to say of any man, but it must be admitted that these encomiums have a solid basis of fact.

Wild Bill was no common gun-toter. He was not a bad-man, as the West defined the term in the ’60’s and ’70’s. That fact should be steadily borne in mind. It may be stated also that despite the implication of his pseudonym Bill never indulged in profane language—although he had a fine voice for it. In the opinion of the great marshals, peace officers, and fighting men of the West—men such as Bat Masterson, Bill Tilghman, and Buffalo Bill Cody, themselves renowned—Wild Bill was the greatest gun fighter and the most famous peace officer of the frontier.

When Sir Robert Walpole said all history is a lie he must have had prescience of certain pioneers who have published recollections of Wild Bill. If Hickok had known intimately all the illuminati of the last frontier who have written intimately of him, he must have had a very varied acquaintanceship. Curiously, writers now so young they must have been in their swaddling clothes while Bill lived, have reported astounding interviews they had with him—interviews which must have taken place at the cradle side.

A number of border scriveners have claimed to have known him at Dodge City—even to have seen him blot out several “six-shooter sharps" in that hamlet. Now, it is more than likely that he was never in Dodge City at all. He visited the locality as a scout when the only inhabitants were prairie dogs and coyotes, but the town of Dodge was founded only three years before Bill was assassinated, and his goings and comings during this period are accurately accounted for.

Recently, a pioneer furnished the writer with a minute account of how Bill, at crime-wrung Deadwood, sent four desperadoes to their homes on high with two shots each from his brace of pistols—and three of the men named as victims actually served as pallbearers at his funeral! I have sought to expose such legends as these in their proper places. However, all such flights of fancy emphasize a fact not to be overlooked: if a bad man was looking for trouble at all times Bill was (as Henry James said of that voluptuous little ink-lady George Sand) remarkably accessible.

How many men did Wild Bill kill? Aside from Indians, the estimated number has ranged all the way from fifteen to seventy-five. This does not include the soldiers he slew as a sharpshooter during the Civil War.

The writer would not care to be pinned down to a definite figure. The reason is that, after the computation has passed, say, a dozen, you come upon perturbing doubts and insistent questionings. Buffalo Bill used to count off thirty-five killings on his fingers; but it should be remembered that he never learned the truth as to the “McCanles gang massacre,” when three men were killed instead of the ten he tallied. Some fearsome fabricating, indeed, has gone on.

It has, in truth, been found impossible to investigate successfully all the reports of Bill’s powder-and-shot activities. There is a legend, for example, coming from Julesberg, Colorado, which sets forth that he bumped off a “sharp” on the field of picture-card finance; but no verification could be discovered. There is a tale, long afoot, of his having shot a whisky glass out of a man’s hand who referred to him, in a factious and familiar way, as Wild Bill. “Mr. Hickok” was the proper and organized custom of addressing him. And, too, a war-jig with guns is reported from Denver, but no facts could be discovered that verify that tragedy. Likewise, an incarnadine affair in a hotel at Leavenworth, when Bill spilled enough blood to paint a buggy. He may have engaged in all these six-shooter stampedes; but, on investigation, they all seem to be little else than skilfully varnished inventions.

It will readily be divined, however, that for a festively disposed individual—one, for example, who couldn’t hit a flying haystack with a ten-bore bird gun—to make Bill a target for pistol practice was downright suicide. And that, it appears, is what happened on numerous occasions; but as to Bill himself, he never missed the vital spot. Luck is enamoured of efficiency, even with pistols.

While Wild Bill was singularly free from those sins of the spirit, vanity and boastfulness, it must be admitted that, in the matter of dress, he had a flair for the bizarre. And, what was not altogether a general virtue of the time, he had an attachment for soap and water. Furthermore, he delighted in broadcloth and fine linen. Yet he dressed according to the mode of the border, not after the fashion and frumperies of the “besotted East.” All those who took notice of his attire observed that his shoe leather was ever of the best quality of French calf. But on the plains he laid aside these niceties and invariably wore a buckskin suit and moccasins.

Edward F. Colborn, of Salt Lake City, Utah, lived on the border a good part of the vermilion days that knew Wild Bill. Lately, the writer asked Mr. Colborn for his recollections of Bill’s everyday appearance.

“I can see Bill,” was the reply, “through the eyes of memory. Tall, erect, with long brown hair that swept in profusion to his shoulders: aquiline nose, high cheek bones, high forehead. His attire was generally that of the Mississippi steamboat gambler—a long-tailed cutaway coat of dark cloth; wide blue trousers, narrow at the bottom; a fancy vest; high-heeled boots with taps under the trousers; a leather belt with two white-handled ‘cap-and-ball’ Colts; a white shirt, a string tie, a graceful carriage, a moustache that drooped a little, and a poise and calm confidence that only good ancestral blood could give. He was to that country, the great plains, what John Oakhurst was to the Mother Lode in California in the ’50’s.”

Believing, doubtless, that this might be misleading, Colborn added, “I don’t think that Bill ever did a crooked thing in gambling or anything else. Everybody in those days gambled; so did Bill. Poker and faro-bank were the games, and with the cattle trade in ’73 came hazard, Mexican monte, and chuckaluck. There were gamblers by profession, but Bill was not of them. He was a man of little speech. Modesty of manner and avoidance of the limelight were among Wild Bill Hickok’s chief characteristics.”

Considering the admirable work of the photographers, it might seem unnecessary to have devoted so much space to what his contemporaries remember of his appearance. Yet while the photography is admirable—and Bill was neither gun nor camera shy—what General Custer, General Miles, Henry M. Stanley, and others had to say of him is illuminating. It may be as well, at this place, to add an interesting sidelight. The writer lately asked Gilbert S. Robinson, who married Bill’s step-daughter, what impression Hickok made on him at their first meeting.

“When he came to my home in Cincinnati,” replied Mr. Robinson, “and I first laid eyes on the world’s greatest pistol-fighter—with his long frock coat and high hat—I thought he was a preacher!”

What the writer’s investigations have been able to add to the store of fact regarding Wild Bill is disclosed in these pages. The most difficult problem encountered was the famous fight with the “McCanles gang of horse-thieves,” which took place on the afternoon of July 12, 1861.

It is the opinion of the writer that the mystery of that “renowned slaughter” has at last been cleared up as effectively as it ever will be. The enigma will never, I believe, be wholly solved. When David C. McCanles’s own son, Monroe—who, as a twelve-year-old boy, was an eye-witness of the tragedy—is unable or unwilling to give a plausible account of the happening, then one can do no more than make deductions from what facts can be verified. But in checking up Wild Bill’s activities other perplexities were encountered—notably how James Butler Hickok came to be called Wild Bill, and the canard that Calamity Jane was his sweetheart. These have been satisfactorily settled. Other facts and fictions have been looked into and suitably classified.

Frank J. Wilstach.

320 Manhattan Ave.,
New York, N. Y.

CHAPTER I
THE PRINCE OF PISTOLEERS

For the past sixty years Wild Bill Hickok has been accepted on the last frontier as having been the greatest of all pistol shots. For speed in drawing and accuracy in firing, he had no equal. Buffalo Bill, speaking of his friend with whose pistol practice he was through their long association quite familiar, said in his memoirs that “he was the most deadly shot with rifle and pistols that ever lived.”

He began the use of firearms when he was a mere lad and it is certain that during the last twenty years of his life there was never a moment when either a pistol or rifle was not within reach of his hands. George Ward Nichols asked him in 1865 where he learned to shoot so perfectly, and he replied:

“I always shot well, but I came to be perfect in the mountains by shooting at a dime for a mark, at bets of half a dollar a shot.”

Nichols, desirous of having this famous marksman give him an example of his ability, told him that he would like to see him shoot. Wild Bill drew one of his revolvers and pointed to a letter O in a signboard which was affixed to the stone wall of a building on the opposite side of the way.

“That sign is more than fifty yards away,” Bill remarked. “Pll put six shots into the inside of the circle, which isn’t bigger than a man’s heart.”

And then it was that Bill, without raising his pistol to sight it with his eye, discharged six shots at the mark. It was found upon examination that all six had perforated the circle.

This story by Nichols is ample evidence that it was thus early in life that Bill had perfected his accurate aiming from the hip, which was the wonder of all who witnessed his marksmanship.

Emerson Hough, in his novel, “North of 36,” tells of a similar incident occurring while Wild Bill was marshal of Abilene. Mr. Hough, in this narrative, says that “all the army men rated Hickok as the best shot with rifle and revolver that the West ever saw.” Yet, he oddly states that while Bill was engaged in spotting the letter O he “ raised one of his weapons to a high level and fired.” All who have seen his pistol work declared that he fired from the hip. Although Bill was the least boastful of men, he has frequently been heard to say that he never missed a mark. Of course, one should always take with ample sprinkling of salt all such statements reported as coming from him, but it may be that he was amazingly self-assured regarding his pistolry.

When it came to shooting at a human mark, Bill’s many pistol battles are sufficient evidence that he was highly proficient—marvellously so. He is credited with killing from fifteen to seventy-five men, but this latter figure would naturally include his slayings, as a sharp-shooter, in General Price’s army, as well as his Indian killings.

Outside of his wolf-hunting exploits near his home at Troy Grove, Illinois, where he achieved considerable local fame on account of the accuracy of his marksmanship, the first public test of his ability came when he applied to General Jim Lane for membership in his famous Red Legs at Leavenworth, Kansas. The Red Legs were an unofficially organized troop of guerrilla cavalry enlisted on the abolitionist side to resist by force any invasion of Kansas by armed bands raiding from pro-slavery Missouri. Prentiss Ingraham gives a detailed account of this incident:

“Failing in an effort to secure employment at once in Kansas, whither he had gone in search of adventure, Hickok sought to enlist with the Red Legs. This aggregation numbered some three hundred men, all thoroughly armed and mounted but not having the wherewithal to purchase a horse and complete outfit, he was, greatly to his distress, refused as a Red Leg Ranger.

“A few days after this the Red Legs went out on the commons to shoot with rifles and pistols for prizes, and our youth determined to get into the ring if possible. To attract attention when any one shot and did not drive the bull’s eye he laughed in a satirical way, till at last one of the Red Legs turned fiercely upon him and said:

“‘Look a hyar, boy, you has too much laugh—as if you c’u’d do better, and dern my skins even ef yer haint a Red Leg I’ll give you a chance to shoot. Ef yer takes ther prize, I’ll pay yer put-up dust, an’ef yer don’t, I’ll take the hickory ramrod o’ my rifle an’ welt yer nigh to death. Does yer shoot on my terms?’

“'I will, and beat you, too,’ was the quiet response.

“All eyes were now turned on the tall, handsome youth before them, for several had determined to try his mettle after the shooting for having laughed at them, and now they gazed on him with increased interest. There were three prizes, viz.: a fine horse, a saddle and bridle for the first; a rifle and belt, with two revolvers and a bowie-knife for the second, and a purse of one hundred dollars for the third. He had some little money and said quietly: ‘Til pay the fees, for I want no man to give me money.’

“‘Then shell out,’ the stranger remarked. ‘It’s fifteen fer the first, ten fer the second, and five dollars fer the third prize, an’ ther boys hes all chipped in, an’ ef yer don’t win, boy, they’ll all see me larrup you.’

“All knew and greatly feared the speaker, Shanghai Bill, for he was a desperado of the worst type, a giant in size and of enormous strength and ever ready to get into a brawl. The boy smiled at his words, paid his thirty dollars, which left him with three in his pocket, and after the Red Legs had shot, took his stand and raising his rifle quickly fired. The first to start the cheering was Jim Lane himself, who cried out:

“‘By heaven! The best shot in three hundred.’

“‘It’s a accident; besides, Gineral, ther’s two more to be shooted,’ growled Shanghai Bill.

“The two more were then shot in the same quiet way as before and the bullets went dead centre.

“‘I’ve got the horse, saddle and bridle toward becoming a Red Leg, General,’ said the boy quietly, addressing Lane.

“‘You have, indeed. Now see if you can win the arms. I believe you can,’ was Lane’s reply. These were to be shot with pistols and at twenty paces, the best two in three shots, and once more three dead-centre bull’s eyes were scored by Wild Bill. The men now became deeply interested in the youth and watched eagerly for him to come to his third trial, which was to be with a rifle at a moving object a hundred yards off. This object was a round piece of wood painted red, which was to be rolled like a wheel along the ground, and at this three shots were allowed. Just as the man started it in motion, a crow flew over the field above the heads of the crowd, and instantly raising his rifle he fired and brought it down. He then seized the weapon held by Shanghai Bill and throwing it to a level sent a bullet through the red wheel ere it had stopped rolling.”

This sounds almost too good, but the same story has come from various sources much after the same fashion. Indeed, if there was not a conspiracy of the time to hoist Wild Bill on to a purple throne of shining glory as a pistoleer, we may safely accept it as a fact. Buffalo Bill in rating him above Doctor Carver, whom I used to see perform marvels with firearms, gives him the topmost place among pistol shooters. Any man who could out-shoot Carver was indeed a miracle-worker with powder and balls, and Buffalo Bill made this statement at the time when the redoubtable doctor (who was a dentist) was in his employ and likely to take umbrage if he did not agree with Buffalo Bill. And Carver was no patient violet when his own prowess was put in question. He had a high estimate of his own importance as a pistol and rifle shot, and justly so.

There are, however, stories that gained general currency that are too tall for acceptance. One of these is to the effect that Wild Bill and Charles Utter—known as Colorado Charlie—were once freighting supplies out of Wichita. Utter, somewhat of a wag, had riled a teamster to such a pitch that the angry man hurled a big stone at him, which would have killed him had it hit its mark. But, the story goes, as the missile left the teamster’s hand Wild Bill’s gun flashed. The bullet struck the stone, and turned it from its course. It was a masterly shot and won the applause of all.

No wonder!

And yet Bill made shots only a little less phenomenal. The late Joseph Wheelock, the actor, once told the writer that when he was a young man he had seen Wild Bill stand between telegraph poles and fire simultaneously with a revolver in each hand, hitting both poles. Another of Bill’s feats was to cut a chicken’s throat with a bullet from a distance of thirty paces, without breaking its neck or touching the head or body. He was also wont to amuse his friends by driving the cork into a bottle without breaking the bottle-neck. He was able to hit a dime at fifty paces nine times out of ten. These feats are all the more remarkable when it is taken into account that he fired from the hip without taking deliberate aim.

The old residents of Hays City teem with stories of Bill’s pistolry. One day he was walking along the street when he observed a ripe apple hanging on a tree. Pulling two revolvers from their holsters, he shot with his left hand and nipped the stem. As the apple fell his right-hand revolver pierced it with a bullet. On another occasion he was riding in from the fort with General Custer. Bill pointed out a knot on a telegraph pole, remarking that he wanted to see how many bullets he could put in it as he rode by at a gallop. He fired all six chambers of his revolver, and every bullet hit the knot. This telegraph pole was pointed out for many years by the residents of Hays City as an example of Bill’s remarkable marksmanship.

During the last years of his life, according to Ellis T. Peirce, Bill used two Colt’s-45 calibre cap-and-ball revolvers without triggers. He was a pulse shot. When he grasped the butt of his revolver his thumb would rest on the hammer, and the instant he had drawn the weapon clear of the holster its own weight would cock it. Bill had only to lift his thumb—and there was another death to record. The hammers were ground smooth so they would slip easily under the thumb when pressure was removed.

Both of these famous guns have disappeared. Wild Bill was wearing a new revolver when killed at Deadwood, a large Smith & Wesson. The ivory-handled gun found on his body was taken by Charlie Storm, a Jewish gun-fighter of Deadwood, when the latter went south to fight Luke Short. But Short was too quick on the draw, and Storm is still down there! Charlie Utter, Wild Bill's companion in Deadwood, took the Smith & Wesson for a keepsake, and Wild Bill's Sharps rifle was buried beside him.

CHAPTER II
ANCESTRY AND EARLY MANHOOD