The Life and Death of Wild Bill Hickok
The story of Wild Bill Hickok, a legendary gunslinger from the American Frontier, has been largely untold in modern history.
Tom Clavin
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The Life and Death of Wild Bill Hickok
Their names are legends on the American frontier: Daniel Boone, Davy Crockett, Kit Carson, Wyatt Earp, Buffalo Bill Cody, and Wild Bill Hickok. We probably know the least about Wild Bill Hickok. Why is that? During his lifetime, no one’s fame burned brighter than his, yet today, Wild Bill’s life and times are a mystery to many. In Wild Bill, my new book about Wild Bill Hickok, the largely untold story of the greatest gunfighter of them all is finally revealed.
(correction_with_script)
James Butler Hickok was born in May 1837 in Illinois. The Hickok family originally hailed from New England and were fierce abolitionists. On their Illinois farm, Hickok’s father not only sheltered runaway slaves but in daring nighttime rides transported them via the Underground Railroad to safety further north. Young James and his brothers went on many of these rides to fool bounty hunters and were sometimes shot at while making a desperate escape. Ironically, when the Civil War began, James would be the only Hickok family member to serve in the Union Army.
Before the war, though, James left the farm for Missouri and Kansas and points west. “I am a pilgrim and a stranger and I am going to wander til I am twenty-one and then I will tarry a little while” the young James Hickok wrote to his mother Polly. He became a wagon driver, a teamster, and occasional scout with the U.S. Army. On one of the wagon trains west Hickok met a boy named Billy Cody. As the trek progressed, Cody met one of the drivers, who identified himself as James B. Hickok, “a tall, handsome, magnificently built and powerful young fellow, who could out-run, out-jump and out-fight any man in the train.” One evening, Cody ran afoul of “a surly, overbearing” teamster twice his size, who knocked the boy down with one swat. Cody got up holding a pot of coffee, and he threw the scalding contents in the face of the man, who in turn “sprang at me with the ferocity of a tiger, and undoubtedly would have torn me to pieces.”
What prevented this was the appearance of Hickok, who knocked the teamster down. He warned, “If you ever again lay a hand on that boy—little Billy there—I’ll give you such a pounding that you won’t get over it for a month of Sundays.” Hickok may have saved Cody’s life—an act that would be reciprocated a decade later.
When the Civil War broke out, the anti-slavery Hickok signed up with the Union Army. His activities included scouting and being a member of a unit of sharpshooters. But his most effective role was as Union spy disguised behind enemy lines. Time and again Hickok risked his neck to glean important information about the Confederate Army. One time, while dressed as a Confederate officer with General Marmaduke’s rebel division:
For a time during his spying activities, Hickok reunited with Cody. The latter was seventeen when his mother died in November 1863． Up to that point in the war, Cody had worked as a freight hauler and ridden with the Red Legs as they attacked settlements in Missouri. The reasoning of his unit, commanded by a man named Chandler, was that this pursuit was justified; since “the government was waging war against the South, it was perfectly square and honest, and we had a good right to do it,” Cody recalled. “So we didn’t let our consciences trouble us very much.” His military status changed after his mother’s death. He “continued my dissipation about two months,” and then “one day, after having been under the influence of bad whisky, I awoke to find myself a soldier in the Seventh Kansas.” Apparently, in a blackout, he had enlisted in the regiment—also known as Jennison’s Jayhawkers—and he went off to war.
Cody recalled in his first autobiography, “Judge my surprise when I recognized in the stranger my old friend and partner, Wild Bill, disguised as a Confederate officer.” Hickok informed him that he was disguised as an officer from Texas attached to General Marmaduke’s division of Price’s army. He gave to Cody what information he had collected in recent weeks and letters to bring back to Union commanders. Cody hoped he would return with him, but Hickok said, “I am getting so much valuable information that I propose to stay a little while longer in this disguise.”
It was after the war that the man now known, because of his hair-raising exploits, as Wild Bill Hickok became the first true gunfighter on the American frontier. The event that made his reputation took place in Springfield, Missouri in July 1865． A man from Arkansas, Davis Tutt, was unhappy about losing money to Hickok in a poker game and walked away with his gold watch, telling everyone he would display it as he walked across the town square. Sure enough, late that afternoon, Tutt was back in the Springfield town square, brandishing the pocket watch. Witnesses noted that a few minutes before six o’clock, Hickok was observed entering the town square from the south. In his right hand was one of his Colt Navy pistols. By the time he had drawn to within a hundred feet of Tutt, the latter was alone in one corner of the square, as townsfolk had rushed for cover in surrounding buildings. Dozens of pairs of eyes watched the scene unfold. “Dave, here I am,” Hickok said.
In one last attempt to avoid a fight, he holstered the pistol and advised, “Don’t you come across here with that watch.”
Did Tutt underestimate Hickok, or, with all those witnesses, he could not possibly hand over the watch? He may have been debating his options as his right hand came to rest on his holstered gun. He turned sideways, and Hickok did the same. This was a maneuver associated with a traditional duel, but this wouldn’t be the old-fashioned Alexander Hamilton versus Aaron Burr kind of challenge, where the two men pace off, turn to each other, and each formally takes a shot, perhaps deliberately missing his opponent because just showing up and going through the motions was enough to have honor satisfied.
This would be a quick-draw, shoot-first-and-ask-questions-later event. A few seconds passed, then Tutt’s hand jerked and his pistol came with it. In a smoothly coordinated series of motions, Hickok lifted his Colt, balanced the barrel on his bent left arm, and pulled the trigger the same instant Tutt tugged his. In an abrupt and hushed silence, the gun smoke was swept away by the evening breeze. Then Tutt cried out, “Boys, I’m killed!” He began to move, staggering, toward the courthouse. He got as far as the porch, then weaved back into the sunbaked, dusty street. He fell and may have been dead before he hit the ground. The bullet had entered Tutt’s torso between the fifth and seventh ribs and struck his heart. Hickok watched the man die as he holstered his pistol. The story spread across the frontier like a prairie fire that there was a man named Wild Bill Hickok in Missouri who might well be the fastest gunslinger on the American frontier. For once, a story with such a swift circulation was true.
From that day forward, Wild Bill Hickok was the most famous and feared gunslinger on the frontier. In fact, the most famous western heroes to much of America in the years after the Civil War were Hickok and George Armstrong Custer. The two became fast friends when Hickok was hired as a scout for the dashing colonel’s 7th Cavalry. But taking a special shine to Hickok was Custer’s young and beautiful wife, Libbie. Upon meeting him at Fort Riley she was immediately smitten.
“Physically, he was a delight to look upon,” is how the description begins in Following the Guidon, her memoir published in 1890．
“Tall, lithe, and free in every motion, he rode and walked as if every muscle was perfection, and the careless swing of his body as he moved seemed perfectly in keeping with the man, the country, the time in which he lived. I do not recall anything finer in the way of physical perfection than Wild Bill when he swung himself lightly from his saddle, and with graceful, swaying step, squarely set his shoulders and well-poised head, approached our tent for orders. He was rather fantastically clad, of course, but all seemed perfectly in keeping with the time and place. He did not make an armory of his waist, but carried two pistols. He wore top-boots, riding breeches, and dark blue flannel shirt, with scarlet set in the front. A loose neck-handkerchief left his fine firm throat free. I do not remember all his features, but the frank, manly expression of his fearless eyes and his courteous manner gave one a feeling of confidence in his word and his undaunted courage.”
For Hickok, in the following years, there were gunfights galore. Sometimes, he shot men in the course of doing his job as one of the frontier’s first lawmen, in Hays City and Abilene and as a deputy U.S. marshal roaming the prairie. Other times, it was purely self-defense, because Hickok would suddenly encounter a man or group of men looking to establish their own reputations by killing the fastest gun in the West. Whatever town he was in, Hickok walked down the middle of the street, avoiding doorways and alleys, and he always carried two Colt .45 pistols, a derringer, a Bowie knife, and a shotgun. Adding to his distinctive look was that Hickok always wore a black sombrero and yellow moccasins.
As with most gunfighters, time caught up to Wild Bill Hickok. He was only 37 and living in Deadwood, South Dakota, when on August 2, 1876—only weeks after his friend George Armstrong Custer was killed at Little Bighorn—he decided to spend the hot afternoon playing cards in the cool interior of a saloon. The cowardly Jack McCall entered the saloon. For once, Hickok was not seated with his back to the wall.
Quietly and unobtrusively, McCall eased himself behind Hickok. Rich dealt cards to the three other men. Hickok held in his hands a pair of aces, a pair of eights, and a queen. At about 4:10, McCall stepped forward and placed the muzzle of a .45-caliber revolver against the back of Hickok’s head and pulled the trigger. There was the sudden loud sound of a shot, and McCall cried out, “Damn you, take that!” Hickok jerked forward. He was motionless for a few moments, then fell sideways out of the chair. Hickok still held two aces, two eights, and a queen—forever to be known as Dead Man’s Hand.
Wild Bill Hickok packed a lot of exciting adventures into his short life. With exciting details and many colorful characters, those adventures can be found in my book Wild Bill by Tom Clavin, just published by St. Martin’s Press. Ask for it at your local bookstore.