Brushy Bill - The Truth?

In case you are wondering, the "MIDI" file you are listening to is called "Billy Barlow", written in 1834...does the name "Billy Barlow" sound familiar??

One man who lived in Hico, Texas, and went by the name of Oliver P. "Ollie" Roberts, AKA "Brushy Bill," claimed to be Billy the Kid. His story has been told since 1955 in a variety of books. Dr. C. L. Sonnichsen wrote "Alias Billy the Kid" from materials furnished by William Morrison, who was Brushy Bill Roberts lawyer in Brushy Bill's attempt to procure a pardon for the crimes of Billy the Kid from Gov. Thomas Mabry in 1950. The pardon was not granted. Roberts died shortly thereafter.

Later, William A. Tunstill of Roswell wrote "Billy the Kid and Me Were the Same." Judge Bobby E. Hefner has penned "The Trial of Billy the Kid," a fictional trial weighing the truth of evidence presented on behalf of Brushy Bill.

Hefner, a former municipal judge, comes down on the side of Brushy Bill, concluding "... Billy will live forever in our hearts and minds. He died of old age. But he will forever be Billy the Kid." It should be noted that Hefner owns the Billy the Kid Museum in Hico, Texas.

The Billy the Kid Outlaw Gang, is a group of interested residents and historians, who like to get together and tell the truth about Billy the Kid, argue about the legends and continue a good-willed but occasionally heated debate about Brushy Bill.

To summed it up: "... how we know Brush Bill was not our Billy the Kid - to make it concise: (1) Brushy Bill was only 2 years old in 1881, (2) Billy the Kid was ambidextrous, an ability to use both hands equally well. Brushy was left-handed, he was not ambidextrous. (3) Billy could speak fluent Spanish, Brushy could not even understand Spanish, (4) Billy was literate and wrote a beautiful handwriting (Brushy was illiterate)."

Gang founder Maryln Bowlin, who operates the Old Fort Sumner Museum, said the museum has a copy of one page from the Roberts' family Bible, which shows Oliver P. Roberts' birth date as 1879. A photo in Hefner's book shows Brushy Bill's headstone and the birth date is listed as 1868. While living, Brushy Bill claimed he was born in 1859.

The left-handed, right-handed argument results from publication of a tintype of Billy the Kid, the only known photo of William Bonney, which is really a mirror image. When published correctly, Billy's pistol is on his right side.

Besides speaking fluent Spanish, Billy the Kid was literate and did write in quite easy-to-read handwriting. He penned several letters to Gov. Lew Wallace, attempting to remind Wallace of his promise of a pardon.

Bowlin said local Fort Sumner residents, who include a good number of descendants of those who knew Billy the Kid, generally believe Garrett killed the Kid. One woman recalls taking Deluvina Maxwell, a woman who knew Billy the Kid, to visit Billy the Kid's grave.

"That's what convinced me," the woman told Bowlin. "If Billy the Kid wasn't really buried there, I don't think she would have been visiting his grave."

Evidence against Brushy Bill Roberts' Claim that he was Billy the Kid.

Written by BTKOG member Lucas Speer

• Brushy Bill Roberts couldn't speak Spanish, while Billy on the other hand was very fluent in both English and Spanish. During his meeting with Governor Mabry on November 29, 1950 in Santa Fe, NM. Supposedly Brushy was asked a question in Spanish and he couldn't even understand it. Does that sound familiar?
• Brushy Bill Roberts was practically illiterate. Billy on the other hand was very literate and had an excellent handwriting, as can be seen in his numerous letters to Governor Lew Wallace seeking a pardon. According to author W.C. Jameson "Evidence suggests Roberts possessed only rudimentary reading and writing skills. His wife, Melinda, wrote letters for him. Examples of his penmanship in possession of the authors show a scrawl not unlike that made by a four year old child." This statement is further evidence against Brushy and is supported by most Hico locals as well.
• Brushy Bill Roberts had bluish gray eyes with tiny spots of brown in them. It is well documented that Billy the Kid had clear blue eyes.
• In 1940 Brushy Bill Roberts announced to the world that he was a member of the James Gang. Now is it just me or does he sound like he might have had an identity crisis?
• According to Brushy's niece Mrs. Geneva Pittmon Brushy Bill was born on August 26, 1879. She also said she has the family Bible records to prove it. There is a rumor circulating that Geneva Pittmon was actually Brushy's step niece. This is totally false! She was definitely his niece and was a Roberts before she got married. According to her family Bible records Oliver (Brushy) was her dad's (Tom Roberts) brother. If Brushy was born in 1879 then that would mean he was only two years old in 1881 when Billy the Kid was killed by sheriff Pat Garrett.

More Evidence Against Brushy (As told by himself in his interviews with William Morrison)

• Brushy- "We tried to get Tunstall to ride for it when we saw how big the posse was. They had us outnumbered, but John wouldn't ride away from it. He said they wouldn't do anything to him, but I knew better. Me and Brewer and Widenmann and Middleton rode off a safe distance to watch, leaving Tunstall with the horses. I could tell by the way that posse came galloping up on us that there was gonna be trouble. We sat our horses off in some brush watching when Dolan and his boys rode up on Tunstall. They formed a circle around him and then they shot Tunstall in cold blood."
• Fact: Jimmy Dolan was not with the posse that killed Tunstall.
• Brushy- "None of the Murphy boys were present at the funeral of John Tunstall when we buried him behind his store. It was a good thing for them that they stayed away. Tunstall was a good man. He was good to me and he treated me like a gentleman. I lost the best friend I ever had the day they killed him. I swore that day at the funeral that I would make them pay for their dirty deed."
• Fact: Billy the Kid did not attend Tunstall's funeral, because he and Fred Waite were still in jail after being arrested by sheriff Brady while accompanying constable Antonacio Martinez to Dolan's store to serve warrants for the arrest of Tunstall's killers.
• Brushy- "Fred and I jumped over the wall and ran into the street where Brady was lying. I took my pearl-handled .44 off his body, the one he'd taken from me when he arrested me on cattle rustling warrants. I'd paid twenty-five dollars for that pearl-handled colt down in San Antone and I thought a lot of that gun. Matthews fired a rifle from behind the wall where he was hiding. The bullet caught me high on my hip, tearing the flesh when it went through me, then it clipped Waite through the leg. We got back over the wall, then we found our horses and rode hard away from Lincoln. I wasn't hurt much, but Waite was laid up for a few days. Brady and his men were armed with rifles and six-shooters. They would have killed us if they had gotten the chance."
• Fact: It was Jim French who jumped over the wall with Billy, not Fred Waite. It should also be mentioned that Billy was retrieving his rifle that Tunstall had given him from Brady's body as well as any arrest warrants he might have been carrying for McSween or members of the Regulators, not a pearl-handled .44 like Brushy claimed.
• Brushy- "Just down the street I saw Mrs. McSween and her lawyer Chapman, walk up to Evans and Dolan and Campbell. Words were said and then Dolan and Campbell pulled their six-shooters. They shot lawyer Chapman in cold blood. Me and Tom were standing right there and we saw the whole thing."
• Fact: Susan McSween was not present when Chapman was killed. If Brushy were really present and had saw the whole thing like he claimed, then he definitely should have known this.
• Brushy- "Early the next morning, Charlie Bowdre went out to feed the horses. When he stepped through the opening where the front door had been, Garrett and his posse fired from ambush without any warning. Charlie wore a big hat like mine. I figure they thought Charlie was me since it was early and the light was bad. Bowdre took a bullet and called out to us. He ran back through the opening and fell dead right there at my feet with bullets flying him that were meant for me."
• Fact: According to the first-hand accounts by members of the posse who were actually there, Charlie Bowdre fell dead in the snow outside of the cabin, not inside at Billy's feet as Brushy claimed. Brushy also later claimed that the fight with Garrett's posse took place in the panhandle. Not only did he mess up allot of important details, but he had his capture taking place in Texas instead of New Mexico!
• Brushy- "When we filed out the door (At Stinking Springs) I saw Tip McKinney, Tom's cousin, and I asked him how it went for Tom. He told me Tom was dead, and he sounded like he was proud of it."
• Fact: Kip mcKinney's name was Kip, not Tip as Brushy said. It is also documented that Kip McKinney was not a posse member and was definitely not at Stinking Springs when Billy was captured, so how could Brushy have talked to him?
• Brushy- "Mrs. Maxwell asked them to unchain me from Rudabaugh so I could go in the other room to be with the Indian girl. They refused to do it. They suspected it was a trick to let me escape, and they knew about the trick I could pull with handcuffs."
• Fact: Mrs. Maxwell asked them to turn Billy lose so that he and Paulita could say goodbye. According to author Frederick Nolan, Paulita Maxwell was half French and one-quarter Irish on her father's side and one-quarter Hispanic on her mother's side. She was definitely not an Indian girl as Brushy said.
• Brushy- I hobbled through the door and around the corner to where Frank Lobato was waiting with two horses. He helped me into the saddle and we rode quietly away from the adobe, keeping the house between us and Maxwell's."
• Fact: Aside from Brushy's fantasy gunfight with Garrett and his two deputies on the night Billy was killed, this is perhaps Brushy's biggest error. Frank Lobato definitely did not bring him two horses, because he was not in Fort Sumner the night Billy was killed. This can be proven by Frank Lobato himself in a 1937 article called "Only One Man Living Who Saw 'Billy the Kid' in Both Life and Death" which appeared in the Clovis News Journal. Lobato said in this article that he was working on the old Pig Pen Ranch southwest of Melrose at the time of Billy's death, but that his mother, Marie Lobato was present and saw the body of Billy the Kid the morning it was laid to rest in the little cemetery down the valley. This proves he was definitely not there and that more than likely Brushy completely made this up as well as the rest of his ridiculous claim.
• Another big mistake Brushy made occurred during his interview with Governor Mabry, while seeking a pardon for the crimes of Billy the Kid. During this interview Roberts was asked if he killed deputies Bell and Ollinger when he escaped from the Lincoln County courthouse on April 28, 1881. He replied "I didn't do any shooting that day, I just got on my horse and rode off." How ridiculous! Even the most ardent Brushy supporters have to admit that the real Billy the Kid killed both Bell and Ollinger when he escaped.
• Another hole in Brushy's story is his fictitious character named Billy Barlow. He claimed that Garrett actually shot and killed a friend of his who looked a whole lot like him and then passed Barlow's body off as his. Even the most seasoned and respected Brushy Bill Roberts researchers/supporters admit that there is absolutely no concrete evidence to support that Billy Barlow ever existed. It should be noted that he has never been found in the Census records at the time. Brushy's friend and fellow fraud J. Frank Dalton made up a similar fairy tale by claiming that Bob Ford actually shot a man named Charlie Bigelow instead of Jesse James. Is it possible that Brushy Bill and J. Frank Dalton were just two old timers seeking fame? Yes it is, and very likely in my opinion. I wonder if they didn't dream up Billy Barlow and Charlie Bigelow together on one hot Texas afternoon over a couple of cold beers, Lol!

Left: The original headstone on Brushy's Grave. Right: Brushy's grave as it looks today.

(Photos courtesy of Lucas Speer.)

Those wanting to read newer books on Brushy Bill's claim should get two books: "Billy the Kid: 'Killed in New Mexico - Died in Texas" by Jannay Valdez, and "The Return of the Outlaw Billy the Kid", by W. C. Jameson and Frederic Bean.

Back to the top