Much has been written about peace officers, including a host of stories about Texas Rangers, U.S. marshals, and many town marshals from years past. The history and exploits of constables, another large group of peace officers, have remained largely untold. This book traces in some detail the history of Texas constables, from January 1823, when the first law enforcement officers, two constables, were appointed in Stephen F. Austin’s Colony, to the present day. In addition, a brief history of the origin of the office in medieval France and England and its role in colonial America is given in an ... View More...
An historical account of the many criminals, characters, and shady ladies who gravitated to Tombstone, AZ in the late 19th century. Illustrated with B&W photos, some rather grainy but fascinating nonetheless. 175 pages. View More...
The book begins with Buck's early life, the shooting of Barney Riggs, and his move to Columbus, New Mexico. Continues with the followup on the Villistas and the Columbus Raid, prohibition, and the Depression. Signed by the author.
"The Arizona Rangers" is the first documented history of the Rangers ever published and fills a sizable void in the annals of Arizona Territory. Bill O'Neal's enthusiasm for his subject and his respect for those remarkable men who wore the five-pointed star are apparent in every word of his thoroughly researched, well written manuscript. He has accurately portrayed the story of the Arizona Rangers against an authentic background of turn-of-the-century Arizona. 222 pages, indexed. View More...
Immortalized in the classic novel and films, the real "Rooster" Cogburn was as bold, brash, and bigger-than-life as the American West itself. Now, in this page-turning account, Cogburn's great-great-grandson reveals the truth behind the fiction--and the man behind the myth. . .He was born in 1866 in Fancy Hill, Arkansas, the descendant of pioneers and moonshiners. Six foot three, dark eyed, and a dead shot with a rifle, Franklin "Rooster" Cogburn was as hard as the rocky mountain ground his family settled. The only authority the Cogburn clan recognized was God and a gun. And though he never pa... View More...
Republished from the original penned by Capt. Elkins by his family. Recounts his Civil War experience as well as his Ranger service in West Texas. Life in the wild west, capture of Cynthia Ann Parker and many other interesting events. View More...
The life and letters of Lt. T.C. Robinson, Washington County Volunteer Militia Co. A. Covers his service during the 1870's. Signed, no. 160 of 500 copies.
Some of the law officers who served the West during the last half of the nineteenth century drifted from one side of the law to the other and sold their talents to whichever side offered the most advantage. Others used their positions as cover for their criminal activities.The lawmen in this book were serious offenders against the laws they had at one time sworn to uphold. Their skills were honed in range wars and family feuds and polished along the cattle trails, in the saloons and banks, and on the trains of the West.Some of them did good work enforcing the law when that was their job. Other... View More...
The truth about the OK Corral Gun Fight and other events in which Wyatt Earp and his brothers participated. This is the story compiled from the files of the "Tombstone Epitaph" for the years 1880-1882, as told by this newspaper's early editors. 65 pages. View More...
Jacob B. 'Billy' Mathews performed a leading role in what is arguably the most notorious chapter in the history of the American West: New Mexico's Lincoln County War of the 1870s. In carrying out orders from some of the primary figures in the conflict, namely J.J. 'Jimmy' Dolan or Sheriff William Brady, Mathews took part in pactically all of the significant events of the war.What is known about his life before the Lincoln County War is quite meager, and much of what has been published about him is incorrect. The author seeks to rectify the inaccuracies as well as to provide new information on ... View More...
Butch Cassidy and his gang pulled off the longest sequence of successful bank and train robberies in the history of the American West, then disbanded and scattered across North and South America to meet their colorful ends. Or did they? After all of the dust settles from the legends, rumors, and stories, we're left with the burden of deciding which stories to believe and which are better left for the telling -- around a campfire, under cover of starlit night, with just enough wildness left in the air to take us back. 51 pages. View More...
A collection of people labeled as "runaways", that were advertised in "The Pennsylvania Gazette". This included servants, convicts, and apprentices, all of which were often European immigrants. 187 pages.
The life and exploits of George Washington Arrington were remarkable. Soldier, spy, Texas Ranger, Texas sheriff, rancher--he was all of these and his life spanned two of the most tempestuous times of this nation's history--the War between the States and the passing of the western frontier.Author Jerry Sinise recounts the life of adventure that began when Arrington joined the Confederate Army at sixteen years of age, through the dangerous Indian and outlaw years of the Texas frontier, into the settlement years of the Texas Panhandle, and into the 20th century as a Canadian, Texas, rancher.Sinis... View More...
This book presents a thoroughly researched, well-documented, and entertaining history of United States marshals in New Mexico and Arizona during the tumultuous territorial years. Included in the story are notable lawmen such as John Pratt, John E. Sherman, and Creighton M. Foraker and gunfighters like Billy the Kid, "Doc" Holliday, and the Earp Brothers. With detailed accounts of many other lesser-known lawmen and criminals, Ball gives a well-rounded history of the mundane as well as the spectacular incidents in the lives of these lawmen during the unstable territorial years. 315 pages, indexe... View More...
Texas writer-historian Mike Cox explores the origin and rise of the famed Texas Rangers in Time of the Rangers.Starting in 1821 with just a handful of men, the Rangers' first purpose was to keep settlers safe from the feared and gruesome Karankawa Indians, a cannibalistic tribe that wandered the Texas territory. As the influx of settlers grew, the attacks increased, and it became clear that a larger, better trained force was necessary.Taking readers through the major social and political movements of the Texas territory and into its statehood, Cox shows how the Rangers were a defining force in... View More...
Famous as the "Bandit Queen" of the old West, Belle Starr was a proud and hot-tempered woman who wore six-guns over her velvet skirts and associated with the notorious Younger brothers. Her daughter Pearl Starr operated bordellos in Arkansas, and achieved almost every ambition -- except the respectability she craved.
Guided by recently discovered papers and family histories preserved by descendants of the Starrs, author Phillip Steele looks behind the myths to reconstruct the true story of two of the most colorful characters in America's old West.
The work describes how sensation-hungry news... View More...
This is the saga of the historical 1871 Nevada State Prison Break as six of the twenty-nine escapees fled south. After killing a Mail Rider near Sweetwater, Nevada, they travelled on into California's Eastern Sierra Nevada where their atrocities continued.
Hearing of their deeds, a posse from Benton Hot Springs followed the six desperadoes to beautiful Monte Diablo Lake above Long Valley. A murderous gun battle took place September 23, 1871.
Not long after the shootout, local Mono and Inyo County residents renamed the site where Robert Morrison and Mono Jim were killed - Convict Lake. 73 pa... View More...
The exploits of the outlaw Sam Bass led to his legendary status of an amiable rogue who took on the widely disliked railroad corporations and who followed the code of the outlaw by refusing to give up his companions to the pursuing lawmen. Beginning his life of crime by robbing stagecoaches in the Black Hills of the Dakota Territory, Sam Bass and his gang were soon holding up trains in Nebraska and Texas. The chase for Bass in 1878 throughout Texas was unequaled in the state's history and ended with the famous gunfight on the streets of Round Rock, Texas. 412 pages, full name index.
Names i... View More...
Relates the history of the Apache Indians and of the Apache Wars of the 1800's. The Apache Wars ended with the surrender of their leader Geronimo. The parts played by Apaches Geronimo and Cochise, United States Army officers, Oliver Otis Howard, George Crook, and Nelson A. Miles, and many others are given in the narrative. Today the ruins of Fort Bowie, Arizona, stand as a monument commemorating the struggle of the Indians to maintain their way of life in the face of the white man's determination to conquer the wilderness. 88 pages. View More...
This book is a reprint of an extremely scarce, out-of-print 1931 edition, with added section of rare photographs of frontiersmen with whom Captain Thomas H. Rynning came in conflict. Capt. Rynning was without a doubt one of the most colorful and exciting personalities of the American West. His life-story, as told to Al Cohn and Joe Chisholm, is as fascinating a tale as ever came out of the Frontier era; an era in which run-of-the-mill heroes stood little chance. He was a cowboy, an Indian fighter, an officer in the Roosevelt Rough Riders, penitentiary warden and captain of the Arizona Rangers.... View More...
