November 2018 44 The Fine Line continued from page 43 The final straw, was a bit of family revenge when 20-year-old Bob Dalton shot down and killed a cowboy named Charlie Montgomery who had stolen his girl, his cousin Minnie Johnson. The Daltons tried to shrug this off by painting the dead cowboy as just another outlaw in their district, but too many folks had known that Montgomery had worked hard and faithfully for a local rancher, and the Dalton deputies would soon lose their badges. No matter, for by the beginning of 1890 they had already started forming the gang that consisted of themselves and local drifting cowboys. For the next two years, until that fateful morning of October 5, 1892, they were known throughout the Indian territory for train holdups and robbing banks. Their fatal mistake was the attempt to rob two banks in their hometown of Coffeyville where the townsfolk knew them well from the time that they served as frontier lawmen. The rest of the story is pretty well known and needs no retelling here, except to note that only Emmett of the notorious outlaw brothers would survive, despite terrible wounds and a stretch in prison before coming out a law-abiding, prosperous businessman in Southern California. Then there was the case of Henry Newton Brown, portrayed by the writer's friend "Big Bill" William Smith in the 1969 "A Restless Man" episode of Death Valley Days, and arguably the most notable case of an outlaw- turned-lawman-turned-gunman again. Like so many other Old West personalities Brown lived an extremely unsettled life. Born in 1857, he was orphaned at an early age and sent to live with an uncle in a Missouri that would soon be consumed in the Civil War. In his late teens, Brown, tired of the internecine Civil War that continued in that state long after Appomattox, drifted west stopping first in Colorado, then moving on to Texas, and finally settling down as a ranch hand at John Tunstall's ranch in Lincoln County, New Mexico, where he quickly made the acquaintance - and friendship of two other young men. One of them was Charles Siringo, the author of "Texas Cowboy: or, Fifteen Years on the Hurricane Deck of a Spanish Pony.” The other was a post-adolescent from New York City who had recently been hired by Tunstall after fleeing from a killing in Arizona. His name - William Bonney aka Billy the Kid. Like the Kid, Brown found himself backing his benefactor Tunstall and his associate, fellow Englishman and local Attorney Alexander McSween in the Lincoln County War against wealthy landowner Lawrence Murphy and Sheriff William Brady. When Brady's gunmen murdered Tunstall in cold blood, Brown, having built up a reputation as a hard-shelled gambler and gunman, joined the Kid in his murderous ride of revenge against Murphy and Sheriff Brady. Cornered at the home of McSween on the afternoon of July 15, 1878, Brown watched as Murphy's men set McSween's house on fire, and when McSween tried to surrender he was gunned down in the streets of Lincoln. An outraged Brown joined the Kid in shooting their way out, but tiring of life constantly on the run, he subsequently parted ways with Billy the Kid in the aftermath, drifting back to Texas where he worked a number of years as a cowboy and occasional lawman until he decided to move on once more, riding north towards the Kansas cow towns. It was sometime in July 1882 when Brown, sporting two ivory-handled revolvers and a worn Winchester drifted into the ruckus of Caldwell, Kansas. Only a few years earlier a gun battle had occurred that was said to be many times worse than the recent fracas in Tombstone at the O.K. Corral. In this gun battle, the town marshal was killed, as was an innocent bystander who had tried to stop the violence but paid for it with his own life. The Texas cowboy who had initiated the violence was cut down by the tubercular friend of the slain marshal and a few of his compadres. Since then Caldwell had been almost totally devoid of law and order. It is said that when Brown initially volunteered to serve as a Caldwell lawman, he had been warned by one of the town council that it would be his funeral. He laughed it off and signed on. As stated by Gerry and Janet Souter in their 2014 Guns of Outlaws: "Caldwell was a little hairy cow town every bit as dangerous as Dodge City or Abilene. Law enforcement required a firm hand, so Henry Brown's speedy method of conflict resolution with the butt end of his Colt suited the town fathers just fine. He was appointed assistant town marshal, and in a few months swapped up to become the town marshal of Caldwell, Kansas. The new authority burnished off his rough edges and he became a model citizen." After killing a couple of roughnecks who had been disturbing the new found peace of the community, and for his role aiding in the pursuit and shooting of Indian chief Spotted Horse, who had gone on the warpath and was threatening Caldwell, the grateful town elders presented their new marshal with a brand new silver and gold Winchester Model 1873 rifle with the inscription: "Presented to City Marshal H. N. Brown for valuable services rendered on behalf of the citizens of Caldwell, Kas A.N. Colson, Mayor, Dec.1882." For a time Brown seemed to prosper in Caldwell. Admired and beloved by the citizens of his new community, he seemingly cleaned up his act, seemingly mended his ways, tipped his hat to ladies on the street, became a prominent fixture in the community, and then he fell in love with Alice Maude Levagood, the pretty daughter of the town bricklayer. Brown married her and tried to settle down but his past would soon catch up with him with the arrival of an old friend and a visit to the town by an old blind phrenologist. The old friend was Charlie Siringo, who with his wife, had arrived in Caldwell to open up an Oyster Bar Saloon and Ice Cream parlor. Spotting Brown on the streets of Caldwell, Siringo smiled and hurried over to greet his old friend but to his amazement and amusement Brown turned pale, and pleaded with Siringo not to ever bring up his past. Knowing how lives changed in the Old West, where an outlaw could become a respected citizen and vice versa, Siringo promised his old friend that he would keep silent. For a time Brown could breathe much easier, but then about a year later, in the holiday season of 1883, the old blind phrenologist came into Caldwell and did a presentation at the local Town Hall. Brown did not want his skull examined and was visibly reluctant when the old phrenologist, at the behest of the citizenry in the audience, called him up. The citizens seemed amused as the phrenologist proceeded to tear apart the character of the man they liked and respected, but Brown himself was in a state of panic, barely able to keep himself composed. It didn't help matters when the phrenologist ended by telling Brown he would meet up with a bad ending, i.e., that he would be swinging from the gallows. The citizens laughed at the old man, and thought little of what was done and said, but unbeknownst to them or even to Siringo, Brown's old double life had indeed come back to haunt him. Wanting to please his new bride but unable to do so even on the salary given him by the grateful town government of Caldwell, he, together with his deputy, a Texas ex-lawman and old acquaintance of his named Ben Wheeler hatched a plan to rob the bank in the nearby town of Medicine Lodge. So one evening in April 1884, less than two years after Brown had first ridden into Caldwell, he, his deputy Wheeler, and two cowboy acquaintances rode west to Medicine Lodge in what they thought would be a bloodless, easy bank robbery in a town not protected by a lawman with the stature of Brown. But from the outset, things went terribly wrong. Rushing into the bank, it was said that Brown looked on horrified as Wheeler and one of the cowboys opened fire, killing the bank president and a cashier who managed to lock the vault before he died. Empty handed, they quickly rode out of town and just as quickly were trapped in a box canyon by an aroused posse which then apprehended them and took them back to town to face the gallows. In that Death Valley Days episode Bill Smith, as Marshal Henry Brown, is riddled with gunfire in the presence of his wife as he rushed out of the bank. Not exactly so. While Henry Brown did NOT end up, swinging from the gallows as predicted by that old blind phrenologist, his deputy Wheeler and the two cowboys did swing. As for the disgraced Marshal Brown, knowing his fate, he quickly penned a note off to his wife. When the mob rushed the Medicine Lodge jail to drag him and his men off to the gallows, Brown chose to make run for it and was promptly shot down by the gunfire of the vigilante mob. It is said that Siringo was not surprised but definitely saddened at the fate of his old friend. In part two we'll examine the stories of the notorious Burt Alvord, played by Dr. Buck Montgomery in the PBS Arizona special "Outrageous Arizona" and of little-known Texas outlaw-turned-lawman-turned-outlaw John Larn as well as several other hard cases. The one Dalton brother who became a lawman — and died a lawman, Frank. Legends of America Henry Newton Brown The Daltons may have been born with the outlaw blood in their veins considering that they were cousins of the notorious Youngers. Almost all of them, Frank, Bob, and even little Emmett all joined up in the U.S. Marshals service in Indian (Oklahoma)territory in the late 1880s and served the famed “Hanging Judge” Isaac Parker as deputy marshals. But only one of them, Frank, stayed true to law and order. Frank’s record as a lawman was exemplary, enforcing the law, settling disputes and forcing whiskey runners out of the territory.