Did Billy the Kid really exist

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Q.� Upbringing

A.� The family moved to Kansas and Colorado and the father died in about 1863. Mother and two sons then moved to Marion County, Indiana, where she met William Henry Harrison Antrim from Indiana. They married in 1873. Young Henry went to school in Wichita, Kansas, where he was said to be a well-behaved pupil.

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Q.� So how did things go bad

A.� Catherine developed 'galloping consumption' in 1874 and died in September when Henry was 14. He moved in with the family of one of his classmates, Chauncey Truesdell.� Chauncey's father, Del, owned the Star Hotel where Henry worked as a dishwasher and waiter to earn his room and board. On 23 September a man named Shaffer, nicknamed Sombrero Jack, stole a bundle of laundry and gave the bundle to Henry to hide for him.� Sheriff Harvey Whitehill caught Henry with the bundle and arrested him.� Henry spent two days in jail... and escaped up the chimney.

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Q.� A fugitive, then

A.� Yes.� Henry - who by this time was calling himself Billy as an alias - fled, probably to Arizona. He was also known as Kid Antrim at this time.� Eventually the two names merged, and he became known as Billy the Kid.

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Q.� More criminal escapades

A.� On 17 August, 1877, Billy killed his first man - Frank 'Windy' Cahill.� Cahill had been arguing with Billy in a dance hall, and they took the fight out into the street. He was no match for Cahill, who was a big man, so Billy grabbed Cahill's gun and shot him in the stomach. Billy was arrested, tried, convicted and put in prison ... but he escaped and fled for New Mexico. There, he got caught up in the so-called Lincoln County War.

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Q.� What's that

A.� This was a time of political strife and financial power struggles in New Mexico. In January, 1878, Billy joined the ranch staff of John Tunstall, who had just established the Lincoln County Bank. Other people wanted Tunstall dead ... and he was shot after allegedly firing on Sheriff Brady's posse. Billy vowed vengeance on every man who participated in that murder.

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Q.� And ...

A.� Most of the men died violently - including Sheriff Brady, whom Billy killed in a gunfight. On 17 July, 1878, Billy was besieged in a house by he replacement sheriff, George Peppin, and nearly 100 men. Then two squadrons of solders were called in and the horse was set on fire. Billy, incredibly, escaped, but was arrested the next March. It was then that he started using a new name that he scratched on the wall of Lincoln County Courthouse: William Bonney.

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Q.� Trial

A.� On 8 April, he was tried on two murder charges, including the death of Sheriff Brady. He was found guilty of both and sentenced to hang.� But he escaped.

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Q.� How

A.� He had been playing cards with guard Jim Bell through the bars of his cell.� The other guard, Bob Ollinger, was having lunch in the saloon across the street.�Billy 'accidentally' dropped his cards on the floor and asked if Bell could pick them up because it was hard for him to do with handcuffs on. When Bell bent over, Billy reached through the bars, grabbed his gun and wounded him. The Kid was able to slip out of the cuffs and then killed Bell. Ollinger ran back and Billy - by this time upstairs with a rifle - shot him, too.

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Q.� So who got him in the end

A.� On 14 July, 1881, Sheriff Pat Garrett and deputies Poe and McKinney rode to Fort Sumner, New Mexico. Garrett and Billy had a mutual friend, Pete Maxwell, who lived there. At 11pm Garrett went inside to talk to Maxwell. Later, a man stepped into the bedroom where Garrett was sitting on the bed. It was Billy, who presumed the man in the dark was Maxwell. Garrett drew his gun, shot into the dark, jumped aside, and shot again. One of the shots hit Billy in the heart, killing him. Billy The Kid is buried nearby.

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By Steve Cunningham