A dead drunk Thomas Haldeman went to sleep under a tree near Nopal, Texas on December 17, 1872. He never woke up. Brown Bowen, brother-in-law of John Wesley Hardin, put a bullet in Haldeman’s head, supposedly because the victim was an informer for the state police.
Bowen was arrested but Hardin engineered a jail break. He was recaptured in Florida four years later and convicted in the Haldeman killing. Bowen accused Hardin of the murder, but an eyewitness said Bowen pulled the trigger.

True West May/June 2025
In This Issue:
Features
- Historic Hotels of the American West
- A Journey Through Wyoming’s Outlaw History
- A Journey Through Washington’s Wild Frontier
- Blazing The Oregon Trail
- Journey Through Time
- Did Brigham Young Order a Massacre?
- Mountain Meadows Scapegoat John D. Lee VS. A Firing Squad
- Mormons in the Movies
- An Indigenous Consultant Ensures Accuracy
- The Battle Axe And A Raw Deal
- Showdown: Bridger VS. Brigham
- The Mountain Man and the Mormon Moses
- The Ghosts of Mountain Meadows
- The War Before the War
- Mountain Meadows