Pat Garrett and the Man Hunt
By Emerson Hough in 1905
In the annals of the American West, the figure of the frontier sheriff often remains obscured, overshadowed by sensationalized tales of bloodshed and violence. These men, tasked with upholding the law in a land often devoid of it, frequently shunned self-promotion, preferring to fade into the background as civilization slowly encroached upon the wilderness. Yet, the archetype of the frontier sheriff – a steadfast individual dedicated to pursuing wrongdoers and fostering a safe environment for settlers to establish homes, build communities, and cultivate a society – stands as a historically significant and compelling character. To truly grasp the essence of this figure and the perilous nature of man hunting in a region teeming with dangerous individuals, let us delve into the narrative of one such lawman: Pat Garrett.
Patrick Floyd Garrett, widely known as Pat Garrett, entered the world in Chambers County, Alabama, on June 5, 1850. His Southern roots ran deep. In 1856, his family relocated to Claiborne Parish, Louisiana, where his father thrived as a substantial landowner. In that era and locale, the elder Garrett, like many of his peers, held slaves and staunchly opposed the sweeping changes that followed the cataclysm of the Civil War.
The Garrett family’s once-substantial holdings dwindled after the untimely death of young Garrett’s father. The family resources, already strained by the war’s economic upheaval, were further depleted when his mother passed away shortly after. Despite these hardships, the two Garrett plantations still encompassed nearly three thousand acres of fertile Louisiana soil. On January 25, 1869, a tall and slender eighteen-year-old Pat Garrett, armed with nothing but his intellect and physical prowess, embarked on a journey to seek his fortune in the untamed West.
Garrett’s path led him to Lancaster in Dallas County, Texas. There, he secured employment with a large ranch owner in the southern part of the state. However, the allure of the open range soon beckoned. He joined a cattle drive heading north, following the well-worn trails alongside countless other young men seeking adventure. The herd originated near Eagle Lake, and Garrett accompanied it as far as Denison. It was in Denison that the tales of the even wilder life of the buffalo hunters on the vast plains of the Texas Panhandle began to captivate him. For three winters, from 1875 to 1877, he traversed between the buffalo hunting grounds and the burgeoning settlements, becoming deeply entrenched in the rugged lifestyle of the frontier.
In the autumn of 1877, Pat Garrett once again set his sights westward, this time with the intention of pushing deeper into the uncharted territory. Accompanied by two intrepid companions, he ventured across the wild and largely unexplored Panhandle. They left their wagons near a landmark known as the "Yellow Houses" and never returned, abandoning their belongings in pursuit of something more elusive. Armed with heavy Sharps rifles, ample ammunition, and reloading tools, they possessed only the essentials for survival. Their beds consisted of saddle blankets, and their sustenance came from the wild herds that roamed the plains. Driven by a thirst for adventure, they traversed the unknown landscape until they reached the small Mexican settlement of Fort Sumner, New Mexico, nestled along the Pecos River, in February 1878.
Upon their arrival in Fort Sumner, Pat Garrett and his companions found themselves with a mere dollar and a half between them. They entrusted the meager sum to Garrett and sent him to the local store to inquire about food. Learning that meals cost fifty cents each, they could only afford three. Instead, Garrett opted to purchase flour and bacon, enough for two or three meals for the trio. They set up camp on the riverbank, content with their meager provisions and unconcerned about the uncertainties of the future.
As they finished their humble breakfast, they noticed a cloud of dust rising from a cattle herd further up the river. They observed a group of cowboys working the herd, separating cattle for some unknown purpose.
"Go up there and get a job," Pat instructed one of his companions. The man complied, but returned with the news that the foreman was not hiring.
"Well, he’s got to have help," Pat declared, rising to his feet and heading upstream himself.
Garrett, at the time, stood at an imposing six feet four and a half inches, possessing a slender build. Due to his unusual height, he often had to improvise by adding buffalo leggings to his trousers to achieve the desired length. Gaunt, dusty, and unshaven, he presented a formidable appearance. When he approached the herd owner and requested work, the man was both apprehensive and intrigued. He initially declined, but Garrett firmly stated that he intended to work, regardless of the foreman’s reservations. Something in Garrett’s calm demeanor captured the cowman’s attention. "What can you do, Lengthy?" he inquired.
"Ride anything with hair and rope better than any man you’ve got here," Garrett replied, casting a critical glance at the other cowboys.
After a moment of hesitation, the cowman relented. "Get in," he said. Pat did just that, and he remained there. Two years later, he was still in Fort Sumner, a married man.
Soon after his marriage, Pat Garrett relocated from Fort Sumner and established a homestead a mile east of the burgeoning town of Roswell, New Mexico, near a spring on the banks of the Hondo River, in the heart of the then-untamed plains. There, he acquired land, eventually amassing over 1,250 acres.
However, the quiet life of a frontier farmer was not to be his destiny. His friend, Captain J. C. Lea of Roswell, approached him with a proposition: to run for sheriff of Lincoln County. Garrett accepted the challenge and won the election. He received warnings and threats from the hardened outlaws who infested the region, informing him that any attempt to serve warrants on them would result in his death. Undeterred, Garrett, still relatively unknown in the sparsely populated territory, pressed forward. He quickly gained the unwavering trust of the governor, who instructed him to proceed without being hindered by technicalities, to dismantle the gangs that had plagued the region for years, rendering life and property unsafe and turning the territory into a mockery of civilization. Rumors circulated that Garrett sometimes arrested outlaws first and obtained warrants later, relying on his trusty six-shooter as his primary form of legal authority. He effectively took the responsibility of establishing law and order in southwestern New Mexico into his own hands, operating as the embodiment of the entire legal system. At times, he even personally funded the boarding of his prisoners. He was the state, and his word carried weight, even among the most hardened criminals he apprehended. He often held prisoners who, under the strict letter of the law, he could not legally detain. Yet, he held them regardless, and every prisoner knew that they were safe in Pat Garrett’s custody and that if Pat promised to deliver them to a specific location, he would do so, no matter the obstacles.
After his initial term as sheriff and U.S. Deputy Marshal, Pat Garrett returned to ranching for a period. In 1884, his reputation as a formidable lawman had spread far and wide. He organized and commanded a company of Texas Rangers in Wheeler County, Texas, establishing his headquarters in Atascosa and the surrounding areas for a year and a half. His fame as a man hunter led to his employment by a cattle detective agency, as the region became more civilized and people started to safeguard their livestock. He was offered a substantial sum of ten thousand dollars to dismantle a notorious band of raiders operating in northern Texas, and he succeeded. However, he discovered that his true purpose was to eliminate certain individuals rather than capture them. Unwilling to participate in acts of personal vengeance, he resigned from the agency and accepted a position with the "V" ranch in the White Mountains.
In the spring of 1887, Garrett returned to Roswell. There, he founded the Pecos Valley Irrigation Company. He was the first to recognize the potential of artesian water in the area, where the great spring rivers emerged from the ground. Through his efforts, wells were drilled, revolutionizing the entire valley. He ran for sheriff of Chaves County but was defeated. Frustrated by his first political setback, he left Roswell, selling his land for a fraction of its future value. By the early 1900s, the land was flourishing with crops and fruits, worth sixty to one hundred dollars per acre.
Garrett then moved back to Texas, settling near Uvalde, where he once again invested in an irrigation project. He spent five years there, ranching and losing money. W. T. Thornton, the governor of New Mexico, summoned him and offered him the position of sheriff of Doña Ana County to fill the unexpired term of Numa Raymond. He was subsequently elected to two full terms as sheriff of Doña Ana County, establishing an unparalleled record of bravery and effectiveness among frontier lawmen.
In December 1901, President Theodore Roosevelt, having heard of Pat Garrett, met him and was immediately impressed. Without hesitation, he appointed Garrett as a customs collector in El Paso, Texas. For the next four years, Garrett served as a respected and honest customs official, known for his unwavering integrity.
Garrett’s enduring legacy, however, rests primarily on his confrontation with and killing of the notorious desperado, Billy the Kid. The details of this undertaking offer a revealing glimpse into the methods and challenges faced by a frontier sheriff in bringing a dangerous criminal to justice.
When the Kid and his gang murdered the agency clerk, Bernstein, on the Mescalero Reservation, they committed a crime on United States Government land, a violation of federal law. A United States warrant was issued to Pat Garrett, then a U.S. Deputy Marshal and sheriff-elect, tasking him with apprehending the perpetrators. Garrett took up the pursuit, locating the gang near Fort Sumner, at the ranch of Wayne Brazel, approximately nine miles east of the settlement. The Kid’s associates included Charlie Bowdre, Tom O’Folliard, Tom Pickett, and Dave Rudabaugh, all hardened criminals with a penchant for violence. Rudabaugh had recently escaped from jail in Las Vegas and murdered his jailer. None of the gang members hesitated at murder, and they were now eager to eliminate Garrett, closely monitoring his movements.
One day, Pat Garrett and his posse were riding east of town when they encountered Tom O’Folliard, who was mounted on a swift horse. A chase ensued, lasting several miles. Garrett eventually found himself alone in pursuit of O’Folliard, firing at him twice. O’Folliard later admitted to firing twenty shots at Garrett with his Winchester rifle, but the distance and the difficulty of shooting from horseback prevented either man from being hit. O’Folliard failed to learn from this encounter. A few nights later, he rode into town in the company of Tom Pickett.
Alerted to their arrival, Garrett, accompanied by another man, lay in wait, concealed in the shadows of a building. As O’Folliard approached, he was ordered to surrender, but instead, he reached for his gun. In that instant, Garrett shot him through the body. "You never heard a man scream like he did," Garrett recounted. "He dropped his gun when he was hit, but we didn’t know that, and as we ran up to catch his horse, we ordered him again to throw up his hands. He said he couldn’t, that he was killed. We helped him down then and took him into the house. He died about forty-five minutes later. He said it was his fault and that he didn’t blame anybody. I’d have killed Tom Pickett right there, too," Garrett concluded, "but one of my men shot right past my face and blinded me for the moment, so Pickett got away."
The remaining members of the Kid’s gang were now holed up in a stone house. Their location was reported by the rancher whose property they had recently vacated. The manhunt continued methodically. Garrett and his men, only two or three of whom he considered completely reliable, surrounded the house just before dawn. Charlie Bowdre was the first to emerge, and his life as an outlaw came to an abrupt end. Three bullets pierced his body. He stumbled back into the house, but his injuries were fatal. The Kid reportedly told him, "Charlie, you’re killed anyhow. Take your gun and go out and kill that long-legged son-of-a-bitch before you die." He placed Bowdre’s pistol in his hand and pushed him out the door. Bowdre staggered feebly toward Garrett’s position. "I wish—I wish," he began, gesturing toward the house, but he could not articulate his final wish. He died on Garrett’s blankets, which had been laid on the snow.
Earlier, Garrett had shot and killed one horse that was tied to the door beam. With another remarkable shot, he severed the rope securing the second horse, freeing it. He considered these two shots among the best he had ever made, a testament to his exceptional skill with both rifle and revolver. Two horses remained inside the house, but the dead horse blocked the doorway. Pickett urged the gang to surrender. "That fellow will kill every man that shows outside that door," he warned. "He’s killed O’Folliard, and he’s killed Charlie, and he’ll kill us. Let’s surrender and take a chance at getting out again." The others, demoralized by the recent shootings, agreed.
Garrett went to the ranch house to fetch food for his men. The aroma of cooking proved too tempting for the hungry outlaws, who had nothing to eat. They raised a dirty white rag on a gun barrel and offered to surrender. One by one, they emerged and were disarmed. That night, the prisoners were held under guard at the Brazel ranch, while Charlie Bowdre’s body, wrapped in blankets, lay outside in the wagon. The following morning, Bowdre was buried in the small cemetery next to Tom O’Folliard. Little did the Kid know that he would soon join them.
The men surrendered on the condition that they would be taken to Santa Fe. At great personal risk, Garrett honored his promise, taking them through Las Vegas, where Rudabaugh was wanted. Half the town surrounded the train at the depot. Garrett informed the Kid that if the mob stormed the train, he would hand him a six-shooter and ask for his assistance in fighting them off.
"All right, Pat," the Kid replied cheerfully. "You and I can whip the whole gang of them, and after we’ve done it, I’ll go back to my seat, and you can put the irons on again. You’ve kept your word." There is little doubt that he would have honored his word, but Deputy Malloy of Las Vegas intervened at the last moment, jumping onto the engine and pulling the train out of the yard.
Billy the Kid was tried and sentenced to be executed. Governor Lew Wallace had promised him a pardon, but the pardon never arrived. A few days before his scheduled execution, the Kid, as previously documented, killed his two guards and escaped, returning to his familiar haunts around Fort Sumner.
"I knew now that I would have to kill the Kid," Garrett confided to the writer, recalling the bloody events as they visited the region together. "We both knew that it must be one or the other of us if we ever met. I followed him up here to Sumner, as you know, with two deputies, John Poe and ‘Tip’ McKinney, and I killed him in a room up there at the edge of the old Cottonwood Avenue."
He spoke of events that had transpired long ago. It was difficult to locate the site of the building where the Kid’s gang had been captured. The structure itself had been torn down and removed. As for the old military post, once a prominent landmark, it now presented a scene of utter desolation. Not a single inhabitant remained. The once-grand avenue of cottonwoods, once four miles long, was now overgrown and neglected, and the parade ground had reverted to sand and sagebrush. After searching for some time, they located the site of the old Maxwell house, the culmination of a long and dangerous manhunt. Garrett identified the location, now a rough quadrangle of crumbling earthen walls.
"This is the place," he said, pointing to a corner of the grass-covered oblong. "Pete Maxwell’s bed was right in this corner of the room, and I was sitting in the dark and talking to Pete, who was in bed. The Kid passed Poe and McKinney right over there, on what was then the gallery, and came through the door right here."
They paused, reflecting on the desolate spot, surrounded by the vast, unforgiving desert. The ruins of what had once been a thriving settlement served as a stark reminder of the vanished frontier.
"I got word of the Kid up here in much the way I had once before," Garrett continued. "And I followed him, resolved to get him or to have him get me. We rode over to the edge of the town and learned that the Kid was there, but of course, we did not know which house he was in. Poe went in to inquire about it, as he was not known there like I was. He did not know the Kid when he saw him, nor did the Kid know him.
"It was a glorious moonlight night; I can remember it perfectly well. Poe, McKinney, and I all met a little way out from the edge of the place. We decided that the Kid was not far away. We went down to the houses, and I put Poe and McKinney outside of Pete Maxwell’s house, and I went inside. Right here was the door. We did not know it then, but just about then, the Kid was lying with his boots off in the house of an old Mexican just across there, not very far away from Maxwell’s door. When he came in, he told the Mexican to cook something for him to eat. Maxwell had killed a beef not long before, and a quarter was hanging up under the porch out in front. After a while, the Kid got up, got a butcher knife from the old Mexican, and concluded to go over and cut himself off a piece of meat from the quarter at Maxwell’s house. This is how the story arose: he came into the house with his boots in his hand to keep an appointment with a Mexican girl.
"The usual story is that I was down close to the wall behind Maxwell’s bed. This was not the case, for the bed was close to the wall. Pete Maxwell was lying in bed, right here in this corner, as I said. I was sitting in a chair and leaning over toward him as I talked in a low tone. My right side was toward him, and my revolver was on that side. I did not know that the Kid was so close at hand or, indeed, know for sure that he was there in the settlement at all.
"Maxwell did not want to talk very much. He knew the Kid was there and knew his own danger. I was talking to him in Spanish, in a low tone of voice, as I say, when the Kid came over here, just as I have told you. He saw Poe and McKinney sitting right out there in the moonlight but did not suspect anything. ‘¿Quién es?’—’Who is it?’—he asked as he passed them. I heard him speak and saw him come back into the room, facing toward Poe and McKinney. He could not see me, as it was dark in the room, but he came up to the bed where Maxwell was lying and where I was sitting. He seemed to think something might not be quite right. He had in his hand his revolver, a self-cocking .41. He could not see my face, and he had not heard my voice, or he would have known me.
"The Kid stepped up to the bedside, laid his left hand on the bed, and bent over Maxwell. He saw me sitting there in the half-darkness but did not recognize me as I was sitting down. My height would have betrayed me had I been standing. ‘Pete, ¿Quién es?’ he asked in a low tone of voice, and he half-moved toward me with his six-shooter. That was when I looked across into eternity. It wasn’t far to go.
"That was exactly how the thing was. I gave neither Maxwell nor the Kid time for anything further. One thought flashed over my mind at once: I had to shoot and shoot at once, and my shot must go to the mark the first time. I knew the Kid would kill me in a flash if I did not kill him.
"Just as he spoke and motioned toward me, I dropped over to the left and rather down, going after my gun with my right hand as I did so. As I fired, the Kid dropped back. I had caught him just about the heart. His pistol, already pointed toward me, went off as he fell, but he fired high. As I sprang up, I fired once more but did not hit him and did not need to, for he was dead.
"I don’t know that he ever knew who It was that killed him. He could not see me in the darkness. He may have seen me stoop over and pull. If he had had the least suspicion of who it was, he would have shot as soon as he saw me. When he came to the bed, I knew who he was. The rest happened, as I have told you. There is no other story about the killing of Billy the Kid which is the truth. It is also untrue that his body was ever removed from Fort Sumner. It lies there today, and I’ll show you where we buried him. I laid him out myself in this house here, and I ought to know."
Twenty-five years had passed, leaving their mark on the region. They entered the small, barbed-wire enclosure of the cemetery where the Kid and his companions were buried. The cemetery lacked headstones, and its records were lost to time. Once again, Garrett searched through the saltgrass and greasewood. "Here is the place," he announced. "We buried them all in a row. The first grave is the Kid’s, and next to him is Bowdre, and then O’Folliard."
This was the sole remaining testament to the conclusion of the manhunt. So passes the glory of the world! In this desolate resting place, in a forgotten graveyard swept by the wind, lay the remnants of once-infamous bad men who had ruled through terror over a significant portion of the Western territory. Even the headboard that had once marked the Kid’s grave, riddled with bullet holes by cowards who would never have dared to confront him in life, was gone. It was unlikely that anyone familiar with their location would ever visit the graves again. Garrett observed them in silence for a moment, then turned and retrieved a canteen from the buckboard for a drink. "Well," he said quietly, "here’s to the boys, anyway. If there is any other life, I hope they’ll make better use of it than they did of the one I put them out of."
Emerson Hough, 1907 – Compiled and edited by Kathy Alexander/Legends of America, updated April 2024.
