An intriguing clue comes from Clark Hust, a cowboy who had worked as a boy for Pat Coghlan, an Irish immigrant rancher in Tularosa, New Mexico. Coghlan was born in Ireland in 1822 and moved to New York City when he was 26; he drove his first cattle to New Mexico in 1872.
Hust recalled in a 1954 interview that the childless Coghlans had a surrogate daughter, their niece Mary, from Ireland. She did not speak English, and thus she could communicate only with the Coghlans…and Billy the Kid. Th

May 2015
In This Issue:
More In This Issue
- Buck Taylor: King of the Cowboys
- Daredevil, Reporter, Feminist
- The Legend of Sam and Major Dundee
- “One Riot, One Ranger”
- Hell Paso
- Hygiene in the Old West
- Dan Tipton’s Grave
- The Most Detested Day on the Frontier
- When Johnny Came Marching Home Again
- Hanging Windmill
- Arbuckle’s Coffee
- Dancing at the Sheridan Inn
- The First Ronstadt Superstar
- The Birth of an Outlaw
- The Real Bonanza: Water in the Desert
- Bat Masterson Meets his Maker
- Flying Pesos
- Victor Hall
- Gunfighters Didn’t Always Shoot Straight
- Play Ball! Indian Chief Trading Cards
- Mother’s Day Revisited
- Pancho Villa’s Guns
- The North Bend Robbery
- Erwin E. Smith
- Power’s War: New Film Investigates Arizona’s Deadliest Gunfight
- The Sundance Kid
- Show Low vs a Straight Flush
- New Mexico to Honor Author Max Evans
- Gunfighter Marksmanship
- What a Teenager
- Hanging Judge Isaac Parker
- Dust-Up in Delta
- Jack Swilling
- Opulence, Your Name is Cheyenne
- The War’s not Over ’Til It’s Over
- Russian Bill
- Western Star James Coburn Posthumous Honors
- Bill Carver and the Skunk
- Texas Rangers Epic Event
- Oh, The Homestead
- John Escapule
- She Rests in Arizona
- King of the Counterfeiters
- America’s Titanic Tragedy on the Mississippi River
- Andy Cooper
- Saddle Rifle Extraordinaire
- What an Idea
- Matt Warner’s Speakeasy
- True West Contributor Honored with Western Heritage Award
- John “Pie” Allen
- Pioneer Women
- No Spin: Real West, Real History from True West’s Marshall Trimble
- Idaho Celebrates 125 Years of Statehood
- A Boomer Sooner Goes South
- Snowshoeing with the Donner Party
- Buffalo Bill’s Disputed Dagger
- Billy Bonney’s Bad Bucks
- Billy the Irish
- “Hello, Bob.”
- Seeking the Creation of the Kid’s Death Record
- Is This a Photograph of Billy Playing Croquet?
- How Did Henry Get His Alias?
- How Did the Kid Get the Gun?
- May 2015 Events
- On The Trail Of Custer
- Two-Fisted Texas Ranger Action
- A Russian Duke Out West
- Wister’s Trails West
- Get a Room! Historic Western Hotels and Saloons Recall the Golden Era of the West
- Were there brothel inspectors in the Old West?
- Dan Piraro
- Wild Times on the Alaska Frontier
- Buffalo Bill And The Indians
- After the Homestead Act, how did early settlers stake out their land?
- Armed to Survive
- A Campaign from Hell
- What kind of restaurants existed in the Old West?
- What’s the story behind Wild Bill Hickok’s gunfight with a couple of soldiers in Hays City, Kansas?
- Did naturally burning coal mines exist in the Old West?
- The Prince of Hangmen?
- Cement Cowboy Nearly Dies
- A Smatter of Smearcase
- The End of the West
- “What if everything we know about Billy the Kid is wrong?”
- Raphael “Red” Lopez
- That Would be Mrs. Jerome, Thank You
- Rough Drafts 5/15