Legends of the Old West - BUTCH & SUNDANCE Ep. 3 | “The Wild Bunch”

Episode Date: November 11, 2020

Butch Cassidy becomes the leader of a gang known as the Wild Bunch, and Sundance becomes a key member of the outfit. The gang robs banks and trains, and with every heist, the members become more famous. Soon, the Pinkerton Detective Agency is on their trail, and Butch pitches a plan to flee to South America. Join Black Barrel+ for bingeable seasons with no commercials: blackbarrel.supportingcast.fm/join For more details, visit our website www.blackbarrelmedia.com and check out our social media pages. We’re @OldWestPodcast on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Benefits vary by card. Other conditions apply. Butch Cassidy sat on the last step of the stairs that led up to the payroll office. He stared down at his boots. They were in desperate need of a good shine. Across the street, a whistle blew as the train pulled into the station. The paymaster and his clerk tromped down the stairs and squeezed past Butch. They entered the station, and a few minutes later, they walked back with two sacks and a large satchel. As Butch sat on the bottom step, he looked like a miner who worked for the Pleasant Valley Coal Company. His dingy overalls were the classic uniform.

But then Butch pulled his pistol and stuck it in the paymaster's face. Butch said to drop the money. The paymaster complied. The clerk dropped the bag and ducked into the store on the first floor of the building. Elzy Lay was handling the horses when he saw a heavyset man come out of the store to see what was happening. Still holding the reins, Elzey stepped onto the porch and calmly put a gun against the man's ribs. Without a peep, the man stepped back through the door. Butch grabbed the sacks from the paymaster and the clerk and threw them to his partner.

Then he tried to get on his horse. She took off in a fright down the street, leaving him cradling the satchel. Elsie was somehow able to capture the terrified horse. Still carrying the heavy satchel, Butch finally climbed into the saddle. The storekeeper appeared on the porch with a shotgun. Before he could get off both barrels, Butch and Elsie galloped out of town in a cloud of dust. But we also sell merch. And organizing that was made both possible and easy with Shopify.

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From Black Barrel Media, this is Legends of the Old West. I'm your host, Chris Wimmer, and this is a four-part series about two of the most famous outlaws in American history, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. This is Episode 3, The Wild Bunch. The Wyoming State Penitentiary was a formidable-looking building just west of the town of Laramie. Beyond its sandstone walls stood a 12-foot-high wooden fence. Beyond that was the open range. The tower guards could see anyone coming or going for miles. Butch didn't try to escape.

He knew better than to tempt fate. Butch was inside for two years, and he swore to make the best of his time. He was sentenced to hard labor and spent his days cleaning out the barns and pens where the prison's livestock was held. As a fit young man, he probably helped build part of the stockade and a couple watchtowers. He hoped for a parole or pardon, so he kept his head down and stayed out of trouble. If there were good times to be had, they were participating in the weekly rodeos. Because of Butch's expertise at wrangling, he became a popular inmate with prisoners and guards alike. On Sundays, folks from Laramie were invited inside the walls to watch Butch and the

other prison cowboys rope and ride. Butch may have even played a game or two of baseball. Next to horse racing, it was the nation's favorite sport. Outside the prison walls, It was the nation's favorite sport. Outside the prison walls, an international crisis raged. It was later called the Great Panic of 1893. The value of silver dropped as more and more of the ore was mined. The failure of several railroads and a company that manufactured rope caused a panic in the stock market. Banks called in loans, and when people rushed to withdraw money,

the American economy collapsed. In the West, ranches, railroads, and mines went bankrupt. But in prison, Butch was sheltered from the financial troubles of the outside world. And by the time he was released in January 1896, the American economy was on the mend. Prisoners with good behavior rarely served the full term, and Butch was a model prisoner. When he learned he might get out early, he sent a letter to the governor petitioning for a pardon. The governor was

initially hesitant. He was friends with the cattle barons who drove the Johnson County War. Butch had stolen cattle from the governor's friends, so the governor wanted an assurance that Butch would not go back to rustling if he were set free. Butch thought about it and then gave an honest answer. He couldn't do it. If he assured the governor that he wouldn't go back to rustling, he'd only end up breaking his word.

But he made the governor a counteroffer. If the governor gave counteroffer. If the governor gave him a pardon, Butch wouldn't rob or steal anything in Wyoming. The governor was impressed with Butch's honesty and forthrightness, and he signed the pardon. On January 19, 1896, Butch Cassidy walked out of prison and never returned. He went straight back to Brown's Hole in Colorado and back to his outlaw friends. In short order, he had to rob a bank to pay his old lawyer to help his old friend Matt Warner. Butch had robbed his first bank seven years earlier, in 1889.

It was the San Miguel Valley Bank in Telluride, Colorado, and he'd done the job with Matt Warner and Tom McCarty. Now recently, Matt had taken a job scaring would-be miners in northeastern Utah, not far from the Colorado border. He was supposed to drive them out of the area before they staked their claims. But one night, he and his partner got into a scrape. They'd been told to scare off a couple guys who were asleep in a tent. Matt and his partner approached the tent and fired in its direction, but the shots didn't force the miners to run. The miners grabbed their guns and fired back.

During a brief shootout, Matt and his partner killed the two miners. To make matters worse, Matt knew the two guys. It was his job to scare them off, but he had no intention of killing them. The whole thing just went bad. Matt and his partner were thrown in jail in the closest town to the shootout, but because of the threat of vigilantes, they were transferred to Ogden, Utah, where the trial would be held. When Butch got wind that his old friend was in need of a good lawyer, he called Douglas Preston.

Preston was the man who had unsuccessfully defended him against the charge of stealing a $5 horse, which had landed Butch in prison. The trouble was, Matt Warner was broke and couldn't pay for the lawyer's services. Butch gathered his wild bunch and said it didn't matter. Matt was a friend. They'd rob a bank to pay for the lawyer's services. they'd rob a bank to pay for the lawyer's services. Butch had promised not to do any thieving in Wyoming, so he chose Montpelier, Idaho, 15 miles west of the border. Butch, his new friend Elzey Lay, and a cowboy named Bob Meeks rode north from Brown's Hole to Montpelier and went to work at a nearby ranch.

As soon as they were familiar with the town's bank and the lay of the land, they quit their jobs. The ranch owner thought they were the best cowboys who'd worked for her in quite some time. She did wonder why they always carried guns, but when she saw them in town the afternoon of August 13, 1896, she would not have imagined they were there to rob the bank. The bandits tied up to the hitching post outside the bank. Bob Meeks stayed with the horses as Butch and LZ stepped through the door with their pistols drawn. Inside, Butch lined up the customers and tellers along the wall, and LZ stuffed bills and coins into a sack. He pulled more money out of the vault and stuffed the sack until it was bulging.

Before leaving the bank, LZ casually lifted a Winchester rifle off the wall. As he and Butch walked outside, Butch told the folks not to move for at least ten minutes or there would be severe repercussions. LZ and Butch loaded up and the three bank robbers rode out of town. At Montpelier Pass, they changed to fresh horses. The posse had no chance of catching them. A lone sheriff and his deputy continued on. It was told that gunfire was heard throughout the canyons that wound back to Brown's Hole.

The local newspaper reported the deaths of the sheriff and his deputy on a Sunday. On Monday morning, they showed back up in town, worn out and empty-handed, but alive and well. Butch now had the money to pay Matt Warner's legal expenses, but Matt's experience in court would be no better than that of his friend. friend. Matt Warner's trial began on the morning of September 8, 1896. The following day, there was an article in the Salt Lake City Herald that stated, it is alleged that the bank was robbed by Cassidy and his gang to secure funds for Warner's defense, and that one of the attorneys in the case had already received $1,000 of bank money. Attorney Preston from Rock Springs says the inference is a malicious falsehood. And there might have been a falsehood, the $1,000. It was said that as much as $16,000 of heist money ended up in the pockets of attorney Douglas Preston. Preston was able to convince the judge to reduce the charges from first-degree murder to second-degree murder, but that was the best he could do.

Matt Warner was found guilty of involuntary manslaughter and sentenced to five years hard labor. After the failed experiment to get Warner off the hook, Butch and Elsie went back to Brown's Hole. Elsie married a woman named Maude Davis, and Butch began a relationship with Ann Bassett. Ann was one of two daughters of the family that owned the Bassett Ranch, and Bassett Ranch was a kind of informal headquarters for entertainment in the area. and Bassett Ranch was a kind of informal headquarters for entertainment in the area. The Bassett family, and Butch by extension, hosted horse races and dances and dinners,

and one of the special dinners was Thanksgiving. Butch and his burgeoning wild bunch dressed in formal attire and helped serve drinks and food to guests from across the valley. And one of those guests was a young cowboy named Harry Alonzo, but most folks there knew him as the Sundance Kid. This early meeting, maybe the first of the two bandits, would have been muted by the onset of winter. It was late in the year 1896, and the outlaws would have largely hunkered down until spring.

As the weather warmed, Butch contemplated his most audacious robbery to date. But for his partner in the job, he trusted only Elsie Lay, not the Sundance Kid. On April 21, 1897, Butch dressed himself in dirty overalls and planted himself at the bottom of the stairs that led to the payroll office of the Pleasant Valley Coal Company. Butch and Elsie stole nearly $10,000 that day, but the getaway was not their finest moment. Butch had a devil of a time getting his horse to cooperate. But when he was finally in the saddle, he and Elsie galloped out of Castlegate, Utah. Butch gained great respect among his fellow outlaws and became the bane of railroad barons, bank presidents, and the kings of coal.

And as tales of his exploits grew, they became greatly embellished. By some newspaper accounts, the thieves and murderers who made up the Wild Bunch numbered in the hundreds. Butch Cassidy loved that exaggeration. The more the public feared them, the better. The Wild Bunch led by Butch Cassidy counted only ten or so seasoned outlaws, with four or five his closest compadres. While Butch was not a killer, a couple of them were cold-blooded murderers,

and they would come and go by their own whims. One thing they all had in common, especially after his famously successful heist in Castlegate, was their commitment and respect for Butch Cassidy. It was said that Harvey Logan, alias Kid Curry, had killed at least 15 men. He generally treated people with respect, but if he was crossed, he was a deadly shot. But he didn't kill anyone during robberies with the Wild Bunch, which wouldn't stand for it. George Curry, alias Flat Nose Curry, was said to have had a nose that was so flat, his eyelids stood farthest out from his face. He was a brutal man from Canada who ran with Logan for years.

He killed 10 lawmen before he was finally brought down. William News Carver was from Texas and was a former member of Black Jack Ketchum's gang. His nickname came from his love of seeing his name in newspaper articles. Ben the Tall Texan Kilpatrick, was the ladies' man of the bunch. And LZ Lay, when he wasn't in jail, was part of the gang and a true friend to Butch Cassidy. Then there was the Sundance Kid. Though each previous robbery he had been involved in was a failure, he was accepted into the gang. He brought a calm strength. He was probably the best shot of all of them, but refused to use his gun unless it was absolutely necessary.

Butch was more outgoing than Sundance, but they both loved a good drink and a good laugh. They were well-read. They shared childhoods of hard work and discipline. Most important, they both hated violence. So it didn't take long before Sundance became one of Butch's trusted friends and chief partner in crime. By 1898, the Wild West was coming to an end. There was little free range left from which to

rustle cattle and horses. Homesteaders and large sheep farms were quickly taking over the land once claimed by rich cattle barons. Along with the telegraph wires strung beside the railroad tracks, telephone lines began to appear. Towns were growing with a much greater need for protection and justice from the lawlessness of the West. No longer could a gang of three or four armed men rob a train and ride off into the wilderness scot-free. Soon, even the wild bunch would not be safe in its hideouts. All types of lawmen, from U.S. Marshals to Deputy Sheriffs, searched for ways to bring the outlaws to justice. Early in the year, the governors of Colorado, Utah, and Wyoming secretly decided to send posses of armed men into Robber's Roost, the Hole in the Wall, and especially Brown's Hole.

They wanted to flush out the thieves once and for all. Butch and Sundance must have gotten wind of the governor's plans and stayed out of sight during the winter. But throughout the West, bank robberies and train robberies continued, and newspapers blamed them all on the Wild Bunch. Then, on February 15th, everything changed in America. The USS Maine, a battleship anchored in the harbor off Havana, Cuba, exploded and sank. The ship was said to have been sent to protect the Cubans who had declared their independence from Spain.

The real reason was to protect the vast American interests on the island. On April 24th, 1898, the United States declared war on Spain. The Cheyenne Sun Ledger newspaper strongly urged cowboys to volunteer. Butch, Sundance, and El Zile, among other members of the Wild Bunch, proudly declared their commitment to their country. They held serious discussions about running off to fight the Spanish. Some members of the Wild Bunch did join the fight. Butch seemed to genuinely consider enlisting. He hoped his efforts might earn him a pardon from the governors who had banded together to bring him down. Then he realized he'd be enlisting with many of the sheriffs and deputies

who were trying to arrest him, and he changed his mind. He did offer his services as a guard for valuable railroad shipments, but they were no takers. Even though many lawmen rushed off to war, the heat on Butch and Sundance did not decrease. Governors and railroad barons continued to hire professional posses to track down the outlaws. railroad barons continued to hire professional posses to track down the outlaws. So Butch, Sundance, and Elzey Lay rode south to New Mexico and Arizona. They hired on to the W.S. Ranch to lay low. William French owned the large spread along the San Francisco River, not far from Alma, New Mexico.

He liked his new ranch hands and didn't ask questions about their histories or their comings and goings. And it wasn't long before Butch became trail boss. But Sundance wasn't as compelled as his friends to stick around. While Butch and Elsie stayed put in New Mexico, Sundance headed north to Humboldt, Nevada. He joined up with Harvey Logan and Flat Nose Curry to rob a train. On July 14, 1898, they stole $26,000 from the Southern Pacific Railroad. After blowing open the express car and shaking hands with the railroad workers, they made a clean getaway. Though others were accused of the deed, the Pinkertons knew Sundance and his friends were responsible.

A $1,000 reward was placed on the head of each man. For the next year, Butch laid low in southwestern New Mexico. He might have helped plan the robberies that caught the nation's attention in the spring and summer of 1899, but he wasn't directly involved in any of them. A little after two o'clock in the morning on June 2nd, 1899, two outlaws stood at one end of a railroad bridge near Wilcox, Wyoming. They held swinging lanterns that caused the oncoming train to screech to a halt. The two robbers hurried onto the train, and one of them put a gun to the head of the engineer. They told him to drive the train over the bridge and then

stop. The engineer did as instructed. The train barely made it across the bridge before an explosion crippled the wooden structure behind it. The bridge had been rigged with dynamite. behind it. The bridge had been rigged with dynamite. The bandits forced the train crew to disconnect the express cars from the passenger cars. Then they made the engineer haul the express cars a mile or two up the tracks and stop again. At the final stop, four more bandits joined the robbery. The outlaws ordered the man in the express messenger car to open up. The man refused, and the robbers placed dynamite at the door. When the dynamite exploded, the blast showered the countryside with wood and steel. The messenger, Charles Woodcock, was dazed but not injured. The robbers ordered him to open the safe. He refused again. The bandits

brought out the dynamite for a third time. They blew open the safe and found between $30,000 and $50,000 in cash, coins, and jewelry. The outlaws grabbed the loot and used their tried-and-true formula to get away. They'd set up relay stations with fresh horses along their route. The gang stopped at a cabin, divided the money, and then split up. Various posses chased them, and a deadly confrontation happened four days after the robbery. Three of the robbers, Harvey Logan, Flatnose Curry, and a third man who was probably Sundance, hid in a deep ravine in the area that is now called Teapot Dome. A posse stumbled right into them, and a gunfight broke out. Outlaw Harvey Logan shot and mortally wounded the leader of the posse,

County Sheriff Josiah Hazen. After that, the bandits were able to sneak away, but they had to leave their horses and part of their loot behind. The raid on the Union Pacific Overland Flyer No. 1 made headlines across the country in the weeks that followed. Six members of the Wild Bunch were involved, including Elze Lay, Flat Nose Curry, Harvey Logan, and the Sundance Kid. It's assumed that Butch Cassidy helped plan the robbery, but most believe he didn't participate. Some people speculate that Butch met up with his gang sometime after the robbery, but the possible evidence is too thin to know for sure.

Regardless of Butch's involvement, he was about to become a celebrity. On June 25, 1899, the New York Herald ran an article about the Hole-in-the-Wall Gang that featured Butch's prison photo. He was now officially the leader of the most famous gang in America. And with the publicity came the heat. The robbery was another major embarrassment for the owners of the Union Pacific, so they hired the Pinkerton Detective Agency.

They were determined to stop the thieves for good. The agency spent weeks tracking the outlaws and the stolen money. Detectives chased leads all over the western United States, including one that led them to Alma, New Mexico, where Butch was still the boss of the W.S. Ranch. Just two weeks after the Union Pacific robbery in Wyoming, three members of the Wild Bunch hit a train in the northeast corner of New Mexico. corner of New Mexico. On July 11, 1899, Elzey Lay, Harvey Logan, and News Carver held up a Colorado and Southern train near Folsom. They stole an unknown amount of money, but the getaway

had more serious consequences than the robbery. During their escape, they got into a blazing shootout with a posse, and El.Z. Lay killed a local sheriff. Lay was wounded in the process and captured by the posse. Three months later, in October 1899, he was put on trial for murder. He was convicted and sentenced to life in prison. And right about the time he began his sentence, a Pinkerton arrived at the W.S. Ranch in southern New Mexico, looking for Butch Cassidy. Detective Frank Murray showed a photo to William French, the owner of the W.S. Ranch. Mr. French stared at the picture. It looked exactly like his favorite

trail boss. When French found out that his trusted foreman was actually the notorious outlaw Butch Cassidy, French was stunned. And then a more frightening thought probably occurred to him. It was possible that his ranch had been taken over by outlaws. Some of Butch's friends had worked at the ranch off and on over the past year. It was certainly possible they were part of the gang. Later, French confronted Butch. Butch didn't deny his true identity, but he told his boss not to worry. The night before, Butch had actually met Detective Murray

in a saloon in town and saved his life. Butch stopped his outlaw friends from killing the Pinkerton. Butch probably realized that now, wherever he went, the Pinkertons would be on his trail. So he left the WS Ranch and rode to Salt Lake City. He convinced a friend, a former sheriff, to help him secure a pardon from the Utah governor. To their surprise, the governor considered their request, but ultimately refused it. Then a friend came up with another idea. The friend contacted Union Pacific officials and told them that if Butch gave up his outlaw ways, he would work for them. After all, no one knew how to stop a train robbery better than Butch Cassidy. The officials agreed to the meeting. Butch's old lawyer friend Douglas Preston was supposed to bring the railroad officials to Lost Soldier Pass.

Butch waited at the pass for hours. When he couldn't sit around any longer, he wrote an angry letter that said, damn you Preston, you have double-crossed me. I waited all day, but you didn't show up. Tell the UP to go to hell, and you can go with them. He placed the letter under a rock and rode away. Butch had no idea that Preston was trying to hold up his end of the deal. He and the officials had been delayed by a terrible rainstorm. No more deals were made, and Butch's hopes of going straight were shattered. In the early morning hours of August 29, 1900, the Union Pacific Passenger

Train No. 3 pulled out of Tipton, Wyoming. Soon, the engineer felt a pistol against his back and was told to stop the train before hitting the fire that was blazing on the tracks up ahead. The train stopped, and the bandits went to the express car. They shouted for the express messenger to open up, and when the man responded, the outlaws recognized a familiar voice. Sundance said, Is that you, Woodcock? voice. Sundance said, Is that you, Woodcock? It was, in fact, Charles Woodcock, the express messenger who'd been guarding the safe on the Union Pacific train that Sundance and the gang robbed almost exactly a year earlier. This time, it seemed, Woodcock learned a lesson from his

previous experience. When the robbers threatened to blow open the door of the car with dynamite, When the robbers threatened to blow open the door of the car with dynamite, Woodcock readily opened it. Butch and the Wild Bunch made off with nearly $55,000. They were followed for days through desolate lands, and again, they escaped. It was the final train robbery for Butch and Sundance. They knew their outlawed days were nearly finished. And it was around this time that Butch began dreaming up his latest scheme. They would leave the country and start fresh, and he knew just where to go. Argentina.

Next time on Legends of the Old West, five members of the Wild Bunch sit for a famous photo. Butch and Sundance begin new lives in South America, and one by one, the outlaw lifestyle finally catches up to each member of the gang. The end of the saga of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid is next week on Legends of the Old West. If you're a member of our Black Barrel Plus program, you already have access to the full season. If you're not a member, you can sign up now through the link in the show notes or on our website,

blackbarrelmedia.com. Members receive access to each new season in its entirety one week before the season begins for the general public. And members receive exclusive bonus episodes.

Sign up today for just $5 per month. This season was researched and written by Mark C. Jackson, the award-winning author of An Eye for an Eye and The Great Texas Dance from the series The Tales of Zebediah Creed. The closing music is A Theme for Butch and Sundance, written and produced by David R. Morgan and Mark C. Jackson. Audio editing and sound design by Dave Harrison. Original music by Rob Valliere. I'm your host and producer, Chris Wimmer. If you enjoyed the show, please leave us a rating and a review on Apple Podcasts or wherever you're listening. Check out our website, blackbarrelmedia.com for more

details and join us on social media. We're at Old West Podcast on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. Thanks for listening. Thank you.