A Shootist is Shot

Wes Hardin goes the way he lived…

August 19, 1895. Famed gunfighter John Wesley Hardin is throwing dice in El Paso’s Acme Saloon. John Selman walks in, pulls his pistol and puts four bullets into Hardin, including one to the head. Wes dies on the spot.

The reasons are a bit complicated. Selman’s son, a constable, had rousted Hardin’s lady friend for “brandishing a gun in public.” An angry Hardin threatened the younger Selman–and then got into a heated argument (and threatened) Old John, who decided to end things in his own way.