Did Pat Garrett Receive a Reward for Killing Billy the Kid?

A few days after the killing of Billy the Kid at Pete Maxwell’s house in Fort Sumner, New Mexico on July 11, 1881, Pat Garrett traveled by train to Santa Fe to collect the $500 reward offered several months earlier by Governor Lew Wallace. The current governor, Lionel Sheldon, was in Washington attending the funeral of President James Garfield.

Unfortunately, Garrett had to deal with secretary of the Territory, and acting governor William Ritch, who was dragging his feet, making it difficult for Garret to collect the reward. When Garrett met Ritch, he presented him with a bill for $500 for the capture of the outlaw at Stinking Springs on December 23,1880. Obviously stalling for time, as Garrett had a copy of the offer and proof that Billy was dead, Ritch made the outlandish claim that the reward was a personal offer from Governor Wallace and was not intended to “bind the territory.” He even swore that “there is no record whatever, either in his office or at the Secretary’s or there having been a reward offered.”

No doubt fearing the wrath of the citizens, he assured him the territory would honor the territory’s offer, but he needed some time to study the records and confirm the reward offer. Keep in mind the notorious corruption of the Santa Fe Ring at the time, the attorney general advised Ritch the reward money had to be paid with territorial funds and action on the claim would have to wait until the legislature met.

When the word got out the citizens ranging from Santa Fe and Las Vegas to Socorro and Las Cruces raised over $7,000 in reward money to Garrett. A year later the New Mexico territorial legislature passed a special A year later the New Mexico territorial legislature passed a special act to grant him another $500 to honor Lew Wallace’s reward offer.

Was the reward for the killing the Kid? No, the New Mexico territorial legislature passed a special act to grant him another $500 to honor Lew Wallace’s reward offer. The reward was for the capture of BTK. And on December 23, 1880, that’s what he did.

Lew Wallace left the governor’s office on March 9, 1881, several months before Garrett killed the Kid. That means Wallace was long gone.