Melody Groves - Before Billy the Kid: The Boy Behind the Legendary Outlaw

New Mexico native Melody Groves loves anything western. Enchanted by the land where she grew up, she has explored ghost towns, ridden steeds across deserts, and lived in a pecan orchard. Winner of numerous honors, including the prestigious National Press Women Award, she writes fiction and nonfiction and for western magazines.

Melody lives life to the fullest. A world traveler, she also lived on Guam and later in the Philippines during the Vietnam War. The Southwest has always been in her heart, the Wild West especially. She has tried her hand at bull riding (eight seconds is a long time) and spent ten years as a gunfighter reenactor performing in Albuquerques Old Town. She has battled good guys, bad guys, shrewy wives, and dumb husbands.

Her novels include Border Ambush, Sonoran Rage, Arizona War, Kansas Bleeds, Black Range Revenge, and Trail to Tin Town. She also authored She Was Sheriff and Lady of the LawThe Maud Overstreet Saga. Her nonfiction titles include Ropes, Reins and Rawhide: All About Rodeo, Butterfields Byways: Americas Longest Mail Route across the West, Hoist a Cold One! Historic Bars of the Southwest, and When Outlaws Wore Badges.

She lives in Albuquerque, New Mexico, and in her spare time plays rhythm guitar with the Jammy Time Band.

S OMETIMES A MERE THANK YOU IS NOT ENOUGH TO ACKNOWL edge the help someone has given in such a daunting undertaking as writing about Billy the Kid. But a big thanks and my heartfelt appreciation will have to suffice. My cowboy hat is off to the following:

Bob Boze Bell for graciously and generously allowing use of his work.

Ralph Estes for his work on Billy and his awesome book, The Autobiography of Billy the Kid.

Drew Gomber and Scott Smith for information and inspiration.

Kathy Wagoner, Phil Jackson, Judy Avila, Dennis Kastendiek, and Don Morgan for their amazing editorial and critiquing skills.

Silver City History Museum for being so accommodating and helpful in providing photos.

Wichita-Sedgewick Historical Society for easily and quickly allowing use of one of their treasure troves of photos.

Tara Woodruff for sharing such an amazing photo of her great-great grandfather.

Candy Moulton for her information about western trails.

Patti Hersey for allowing use of her husbands map.

Don Bullis and Johnny Boggs for their wide-ranging knowledge of western facts and always being willing to share not only their wisdom but also their notions about Billy.

Myke Groves for his support, wonderful photos, and driving the bus.

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de Aragn, Ray John. Billy the Kid Meets His Ghost. Albuquerque, NM: Event Horizon Press, 2015.

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Through the years many historians and writers have lost sight of the fact that the Kid was just that: a kid.

M ICHAEL W ALLIS, AUTHOR OF B ILLY THE K ID : T HE E NDLESS R IDE

L IKE MANY CHILDREN OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY , B ILLYS beginnings are shrouded in mystery. It isnt clear exactly where or when William Henry McCarty was born.

Later on I told people a lot of different ages, Billy stated to a reporter when asked about his age. Mostly because I wanted them to think I was old enough to be taken seriously. [Sheriff Pat] Garrett and [writer Ash] Upson wrote that I was born in 1859and they gave me the same birthday as Upson, November 23. I think I was actually born a little later than that, maybe 61 or 62, but what does it matter?

It matters quite a bit. Maybe not to him, but it does to myriad historians and Billy aficionados who want to understand this American icon. Generally, historians have believed he was born in 1859. That date is most likely wrong due to Ash Upson, who wrote a great deal of Sheriff Pat Garretts book, The Authentic Life of Billy the Kid. Upson attributed his own birthday of November 23 to Billy and randomly picked 1859 as his birth year.

New research points to Billy being born in May 1861. If he was indeed born then, that would explain why he looked so young as an outlaw. Many accounts spoke of peach fuzz on the upper lip when he was supposedly eighteen, and so many friends said he looked younger than he was reported to be. Did Billy truly know his birth date? Doesnt sound like it. As was customary, births, marriages, and deaths were all recorded in a family Bible, passed down through the generations. Unfortunately, no such McCarty family Bible has ever been found.

Historians cannot agree on the place and date of the Kids birth, simply because no one has found any compelling evidence for the claims. The Billy the Kid Outlaw Gang organization is offering $500 to the first person who finds irrefutable proof of Henry McCartys birth, his father, and where he was born. No one has yet claimed the reward.