Henry McCarty was born in Manhattan on November 20, 1859. Henry and his older brother Joe, born in 1854, were both illegitimate. Their father was Edward McCarty, a married man with two daughters and a son in Brooklyn. Although Henry had a short life, his brother Joe lived to be 76 years old. Henry grew up to use the names Henry Atrim, William Bonney, and Billy the Kid. According to the New York police "Michael" Henry McCarty was a delinquent as a small boy.
Henry and Joe's mother, Catherine also had the last name McCarty but was no relation to their father Edward McCarty. Catherine was an Irish immigrant who arrived in 1846 at 17 years of age, to escape the Irish potato famine.
In 1873 Henry was sent to a foster home in New Mexico that belonged to a 31 year old farmer named Michael H. Antrim. Henry's mother Catherine and brother Joe also went to New Mexico. Catherine was dying of tuberculosis and was looking for someone to care for her boys and William needed help on his farm. Catherine married William Antrim in Sante Fe on March 1, 1873. Catherine died at age 45.
Henry worked at a boarding house owned by Sarah Brown. Henry's step-father, William Antrim, remembered him as a cruel little thief who was born to be bad. He said upon buying Henry his first pocket knife he killed the neighbors kitten. Henry's first two convictions were for stealing. The first got him a licking and the second which was for stealing cloths valued at $70, he was sentenced to jail. He escaped with help from his friends.
In September 1876 Henry was 17 years of age, was back in New York along with his brother Joe. It was here that he stabbed to death an acquaintance, Thomas Moore, a 20 year old Irish immigrant. After the stabbing it was thought that the boys father Edward McCarthy returned the boys to their stepfather out west.
August 17, 1877, Henry was at Camp Grant in Arizona where he was then called Kid Antrim. It was here that he got into an argument with Frank P. Cahill and shot him at close range. Frank survived long enough to make a statement naming Henry Antrim as the man who shot him. Frank Cahill was unarmed. In November of 1877 at 18 years of age Henry Antrim became a wanted outlaw.
After Cahills murder Kid Antrim headed for Arizona to Mesilla and then Lincoln County. It did not take long for Henry to meet up with the criminal element and get into rustling cattle. He met the likes of John Kinney, head of the cattle rustling in New Mexico, who with Jesse Evans, James McDaniels, Frank Baker, Sam Perry, James Whittacer, and Tom Hill rustled, robbed, and even murdered in the southwest territory.
John Kinney had 22 charges filed agaist him for murder, assault, and stealing cattle. He opened a butcher shop as a means of selling stolen beef quickly. Jesse Evans had 10 charges and James McDanils 7 for murder, larceny and horse stealing. Henry Antrim was listed among their gang before moving on and later working for John Tunstall.
The Lincoln County War
Two men controlled Lincoln county, John Dolan and Lawrence Murphy who owned the only store. When ranchers like Charlie Bowdre and Dick Brewer found themselves in debt to the store, Dolan and Murphy took their property. John Tunstall joined forces with Alexander McSween against Dolan and Murphy by opening a general store. They used Tunstalls money and McSweens influence as a legal advisor but the loss of the money and the business was the start of the Lincoln county war where John Tunstall and Alexander McSween would loose their lives.\
After John Tunstall was murdered, his hands formed a vigilante group called the Regulators. William Morton and Frank Baker were present at Tunstalls murder and were choosen by McSween as the first two victims of the Regulators. John B. Squire the only Justice not under control of Dolan and Murphy issued the warrants. Of the eleven Regulators Henry Antrim, Dick Brewer, J.G. Spurlock, Samuel Smith, James French, John Middleton, and William McClosky were present at Morton and Bakers execution.
McClosky knew they were going to kill the prisoners and stated that they would have to kill him first before they could shoot the prisoners so they did just that. Henry Antrim and Charlie Bowdre rode ahead and McClosky was shot in the back of the head by McNabb. The other seven Regulators fired one bullet each into Baker and Murphy before Henry and Bowdre could ride back. The second shared murder was Sheriff Brady on April 1,1878 who McSween wanted killed because he carried warrants for his arrest and attachement of his cattle.
Sheriff Brady and Deputy George Hindeman were killed and Henry now called "William Bonney" and James French were wounded by Billy Mathews.
William Bonney knew Mathews and was firing at him during the killing and was the only man not to put a bullet into the dead lawmen. William Bonney alias Kid alias William Antrim was on the arrest warrant. The other Regulators left New Mexico and William Bonney was the only one to stand trial for the murders.
The battle at the McSween home was the end of the Lincoln Country war. The house was set afire and Robert Beckwith was shot while asking them to surrender. McSween and the others where shot as they tried to escape with only Bonney getting out alive. Beckwiths killing has been blamed on Bonney but he had not fired at him.
February 1879 Sue McSween's attorney, H.S. Chapman, was killed in Lincoln. Governor Lew Wallace, who later wrote "Ben Hur", requested the district attorney to drop all charges against Bonney in exhange for his testimony against Dolan, Murphy and Campbell for Chapmans death. Bonney did not testify. After hearing that Campbell and Jesse Evans had escaped jail at Fort Stanton, fearing for his life he left town.
William Bonney had many women friends in his short lifetime. One of them was a Juana Montoya who gave birth to a child Alexander in 1879, possibly Bonney's. Abrana Garcia also bore him a child but the most famous was Nasaria Yerby who was born in New Mexico in 1862. She was the mistress of Thomas Yerby and had a son by him named Juan. Her second child Florentina was a year old in 1879 when Billy was spending time in Fort Sumner. People in New Mexico say Florintina did not deny her outlaw parent.
Billy moved on to northwest Texas in 1881. The Panhandle was ideal because there were only three cities and no established law without riding several hundred miles to the nearest courthouse. William Bonney and his men choose Tascosa where Kid Dobbs and Charlie Reasor went to work for local ranchers and decided to stay. Billy and his gang stole cattle brazenly from the ranchers and but none were brave enough to complain for fear of harm coming to their families. They hired men like Pat Garret who knew Billy, and John W. Poe to go after him.
Bonney was captured at Stinking Spings and taken to the Sante Fe jail. Tony Neis and Robert Olinger returned him to Mesilla for the trail of the Brady and Hindermans deaths. While sheriff Pat Garrett was out purchasing lumber for the gallows, Deputies James Bell, and Robert Olinger were killed by Bonney in his escape. Bonney shot his next victim, Joe Grant, in a bar in Sumner. Grant had been making threats and when Bonney arrived he knew Grant was drunk. Billy asked to look at his fancy weapon and spun the cylinder, noticing he had three empty chambers. He set the cylinder for the next three shots to be on empty chambers to give himself the advantage in the fight and returned the gun. He then began insulting Grant who fired two blank cartridges before Bonney shot him in the forehead.
On July 14, 1881 Pat Garrett and John Poe were in Fort Sumner looking for Billy, who was sharing a room with Celsa Gutierrez. Celsa was the sister of Pat Garrett's first wife. She offered to fix him some meat if he would go out on the porch and get it. He left with no hat or shoes, and no gun, only carrying a small knife to cut the meat. Pat Garrett and Poe were at the Maxwell ranch looking for him and Pat walked into in the dark room. Pat heard Bonney ask, "who were these men" and recognized Bonney's voice and shot. Poe feared he may have shot one of Maxwells men by mistake but it was William Bonney's body they found in the dark room. He is buried in a nearby military graveyard, but it is not known which grave is his.
Billy the Kid 1859-1881
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