Post by Deleted on May 9, 2010 17:30:17 GMT 10
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. - Legend has it that Billy the Kid was gunned down by a sheriff in 1881. But was he?
Homer Overton will tell you that the dead man was an unwitting impostor, a drunk shot point-blank in the face by two unlikely chums — the lawman and the legendary gunfighter himself.
Overton learned this some 63 years ago, at age 9, from the widow of the sheriff, Pat Garrett
Overton’s sworn statement was offered as evidence for exhuming the body of the Kid’s mother, Catherine Antrim, to compare her DNA with that of a Texas man who claimed until his death in 1950 that he was William Bonney, known in Western lore as Billy the Kid.
Authorities in Lincoln County, where the Kid was convicted of killing a sheriff in the 1870s, want to know if that man — named Ollie “Brushy Bill” Roberts, of Hico, Texas — was the real Billy the Kid.
A hearing on the exhumation petition is set for Jan. 27 in Silver City, where Antrim is buried. Town officials oppose disturbing the gravesite.
The widow's tale
Coroner’s jurors concluded in 1881 that Garrett killed Bonney that July in the Fort Sumner bedroom of Pete Maxwell, son of New Mexico land baron Lucien B. Maxwell.
Garrett’s widow, Apolonaria Garrett, told Overton and a buddy that her husband and the Kid shot a drunk passed out in a street. With no face left, the drunk was just a body that could be passed off for Bonney, Overton’s court affidavit says.
Overton’s boyhood friend, Bobby Talbert, has not been located for comment.
Lincoln County Sheriff Tom Sullivan has said it is important to determine what is true and what isn’t. He has noted that Garrett’s image is part of the logo on Lincoln County sheriff’s department uniforms.
Overton lives in Alta Loma, Calif., where he issued a notarized sworn affidavit Dec. 27, 2003, that was filed in court in Silver City a week ago.
The affidavit says the boys visited Apolonaria Garrett in the summer of 1940, about 32 years after her husband was shot to death in 1908 near Las Cruces
Homer Overton will tell you that the dead man was an unwitting impostor, a drunk shot point-blank in the face by two unlikely chums — the lawman and the legendary gunfighter himself.
Overton learned this some 63 years ago, at age 9, from the widow of the sheriff, Pat Garrett
Overton’s sworn statement was offered as evidence for exhuming the body of the Kid’s mother, Catherine Antrim, to compare her DNA with that of a Texas man who claimed until his death in 1950 that he was William Bonney, known in Western lore as Billy the Kid.
Authorities in Lincoln County, where the Kid was convicted of killing a sheriff in the 1870s, want to know if that man — named Ollie “Brushy Bill” Roberts, of Hico, Texas — was the real Billy the Kid.
A hearing on the exhumation petition is set for Jan. 27 in Silver City, where Antrim is buried. Town officials oppose disturbing the gravesite.
The widow's tale
Coroner’s jurors concluded in 1881 that Garrett killed Bonney that July in the Fort Sumner bedroom of Pete Maxwell, son of New Mexico land baron Lucien B. Maxwell.
Garrett’s widow, Apolonaria Garrett, told Overton and a buddy that her husband and the Kid shot a drunk passed out in a street. With no face left, the drunk was just a body that could be passed off for Bonney, Overton’s court affidavit says.
Overton’s boyhood friend, Bobby Talbert, has not been located for comment.
Lincoln County Sheriff Tom Sullivan has said it is important to determine what is true and what isn’t. He has noted that Garrett’s image is part of the logo on Lincoln County sheriff’s department uniforms.
Overton lives in Alta Loma, Calif., where he issued a notarized sworn affidavit Dec. 27, 2003, that was filed in court in Silver City a week ago.
The affidavit says the boys visited Apolonaria Garrett in the summer of 1940, about 32 years after her husband was shot to death in 1908 near Las Cruces
www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3947244/
So, did Billy the Kid die at the hands of Pat gerret, or did he live to a ripe old age and die as an old man?