Volume 16 , Issue 36

1896 Talk About Outlaw Doolin

In The Wichita Daily Eagle, page 6, dated 26 January 1896 (about six months before Bill Doolin was shot), we found this article with more information on the Oklahoma outlaw, Bill Doolin.

Back in January of 1896 Bill Doolin was still the subject of much discussion. There were several stories about him, among them was one that he made a bargain with Nix for half the reward and allowed himself to be captured was still going the rounds in 1896. An attempt to add to its plausibility was made by calling attention to the fact that Mrs. Bill Doolin, who was in town a day or two since then, had suddenly departed. If Doolin made any such bargain it would prove a sorry one for him. Nix was no longer in a position to grant Bill Doolin any favors. The last description of Bill Doolin's nobility of character is the following from the Blackwell Times-Record:

John Hunter, living three miles west of town had known Bill Doolin for years, and in the years past, when John was boss of a big ranch here in the strip, Bill Doolin worked under him and for adjoining outfits. John says that Doolin was always one of those honest, brave, kind hearted fellows that won the love and respect of every man on the range. He was known as "Ma" Doolin, on the range, this motherly term being applied to him on account of the kindness and care shown by him to any cowboy who was sick or in trouble.

"Whenever Doolin heard of a cowboy being sick he would saddle his horse and regardless of the distance, ride to the camp where the invalid lay, and away beyond the selvage of civilization, in the rude cow-camp, far from the gentle civilizing influence of woman, "Ma" Doolin with all the tenderness of a mother would carefully nurse the sick back to health and strength again. This gentleness of heart forever endeared him to the cowboys who in after years married and settled down, and probably accounts for the number of friends he had scattered throughout this territory.

"But Doolin was as brave as he was kind, and his sympathetic nature often called his bravery into action,a nd finally led to his becoming outlawed. Did space permit, an interesting account could be written of the numbers affairs wherein Doolin came to the rescue of the weaker side in those frontier difficulties, his idea always seeming to be tao take side of the under dog in the fight. A dead shot and quick with a gun, and no conception of the meaning of fear, he became an eyesore to that class of semi-cutthroats, deputy United States marshals, and they finally procured a warrant for his arrest. Dreading the fate of being dragged to Ft. Smith, Arkansas, for trial, and not wishing to kill them, Doolin went scouting, or in other words he kept hid out from he officers, and it was said he joined the outlaws for protection against Uncle Sam's creators of outlaws."   |  View or Add Comments (0 Comments)   |   Receive updates ( subscribers)  |   Unsubscribe

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