9/18/1882 - No wheezy slow conclusion in a bed for the 36-year-old gunfighter from Alabama, boots on, the life of Dallas Stoudenmire comes to a sudden end in an El Paso, Texas saloon, with the lawman unsuccessfully taking on two enemies too many, the brothers Doc and James of the notorious Manning Family.
Stoudenmire
Born to Lewis and Elizabeth Stoudenmire in Aberfoil, Alabama, in 1845, Dallas is one of nine children in the family. Shortly after the Civil War begins the six-foot-tall youth enlists in the Confederate Army despite being only 15-years-old. Discovered, he is sent home twice, but comes back and is eventually allowed to serve as a private in Company F, 45th Alabama Infantry Regiment. Now a 6' 4" brute, Dallas participates in many battles with the regiment and is wounded numerous times, carrying two souvenirs of the conflict in his body for the rest of his life. War over, he drifts south and for three years serves as a Texas Ranger (in Company B of the organization) and is soon well known as a man who can shoot equally well with both hands (he carries two pistols in the leather-lined hip pockets of his pants, and carries a snub-nose revolver as a third, just-in-case weapon), likes to dress up in fine clothing and flirt with the ladies, and who when in his cups (and as an alcoholic, he is in his cups a lot!), possesses a swift and savage temper For a time he lives in Mexico and before he turns to being a full-time lawman, he learns to speak Spanish fairly well and puts food on his table and money in his pockets as a sheep farmer, wheelwright, proprietor, merchandiser, and carpenter (he is said to have made his first gunfight kill in 1876). In 1878, Stoudenmire finds his calling and becomes the town marshal of Socorro, New Mexico. Surviving the job (there are shooting scraps in the area for Dallas in 1877 and 1878), Stoudenmire's brother-in-law, Stanley "Doc" Cummings (and El Paso resident), convinces the lawman to take the boomtown job of bringing peace to El Paso and the man's quick-draw adventures begin. He will be the sixth town marshal the town has had in eight months ... and there are troubles from the very start
Stoudenmire
Told to take possession of the town's jail keys on his first day, Dallas shows off his temper when the town drunk, and the city's deputy marshal, Bill Johnson, can't find the right keys on his key ring and says he'll go home to figure it out and have the jail keys in the morning for the new marshal ... a response that causes Dallas to turn Johnson upside down, shake the keys out of his pocket, and then throw the lawman out of the jail. Then, only three days into his new job, Stoudenmire becomes involved in a feud between Mexican cowboys (searching for the men that killed two herders seeking rustled cattle) and local ranchers. Known as the infamous "Four Dead In Five Seconds" gunfight, eating a late lunch at the Globe Restaurant, Stoudenmire responds to shots in the street by stepping outside and blazing away at anything that appears to be a threat to public safety ... a Mexican bystander dies from a shot in the back as he runs from the street, a trouble maker named John Hale (the man who starts the tragedy rolling by firing on Town Constable Gus Krempkau and mortally wounding the lawman) is plugged in the head as he looks around an adobe pillar, and Hale's drunken friend, George Campbell, takes a fatal round to his stomach.
El Paso
Three days later, encouraged by Jim Manning (a friend of both Campbell and Hale), hating the way he was treated during the "keys" incident, Bill Johnson attempts to assassinate cummings and Stoudenmire. A bad decision, the two friends prove to be much better gunfighters than Johnson, who goes to Boot Hill wearing his boots and with eight slugs in his body, missing his testicles. Now Stoudenmire is in a blood feud with the Mannings. Bringing the town's crime rapidly under control, the marshal will kill six more men while making arrests over the course of the next year. The feud rears its ugly head again and increases in intensity when a drunken argument at the Coliseum Variety Theater between Cummings and Jim Manning escalates into a gunfight in which Cummings is killed (at trial, the killing will be deemed a "justifiable" homicide for both Manning, and bartender David Kling, who also fires a bullet into Cumming's body). Happy with the drop in crime, but not the number of corpses that seem to be piling up out on the streets of El Paso or with the lawman screaming at people that testified against Cummings (most of the jury are Manning Friends and Stoudenmire is also not amused by the editorials of El Paso Times writer, George Washington Carrico, berating the lawman for his incessant drinking), the town council fires Stoudenmire on May 27, 1882 (they are also not amused with Stoudenmire using the St. Clement's Church bell for target practice) ... a decision Dallas reacts to by showing up at the council hall drunk, pulling his pistols, and threatening to plug each member of the town's governing panel, which the council responds to by claiming it was all a big mistake and the lawman can keep his job. Disgusted and sober, two days later Stoudenmire resigns as the town's marshal. But he doesn't leave El Paso and spends his time running down lawbreakers as a newly appointed Deputy U.S. Marshal for western Texas and the New Mexico Territory (working for U.S. Marshal Harrington Lee "Hal" Gosling), managing his brother-in-law's business, the town's Globe Restaurant, and hurling insults at the Manning Brothers (mostly while not sober), who make sure to never be alone with the pistolero.
El Paso
A wise decision, the feud finally boils over on the evening of September 18, 1882 when friends bring the men together to arrange a truce between the combatants ... at a local saloon. Things begin amicably, with Jim and Frank leaving once they think the differences of the men have been sorted out, but sure enough, a few more drinks downed, and Doc Manning and Stoudenmire begin arguing about whom has lied to who. At the words "damn lie" from Stoudenmire, J. W. Jones, a co-owner of the saloon, steps between the two enemies and pushes the men apart just as both pull their revolvers, with Manning firing first over the peacemaker's shoulder. The slug tears through Stoudenmire's left arm, causing him to drop his pistol, and a second bullet hits Dallas in the chest, knocking him down but doing little harm to the gunman because it hits a bunch of papers in the gunman's shirt pocket. Charging his opponent, the two men grapple outside as Stoudenmire produces another weapon and puts a slug into Doc Manning's arm. Fighting and cursing each other as they wrestle along the boardwalk, Stoudenmire is just about the line up Manning for a kill shot when Jim Manning arrives on the scene with a .45 in his hand. Protecting his brother, from behind, he fires two bullets at Stoudenmire. One thuds harmlessly into a nearby barber's pole, while the other becomes a man killer ... hitting Stoudenmire in the head behind his left ear, the lawman groans and then collapses in death. Not good enough though when hatred is involved, Doc Manning disarms the corpse he was just fighting with, and using Stoudenmire's own weapon, wildly pistol-whips the lawman's body until he is pulled off by local lawman, Jim Gillett. In the aftermath of the affair, both Manning boys are acquitted of murder, and after funeral ceremony for Dallas held at the El Paso Lodge #130 A.F. & A.M, Stoudenmire's wife has his body shipped to Columbus, Texas, where at the expense of the local Masonic Lodge, the lawman is buried in the Alleyton Cemetery of Colorado County, Texas.
One Of Stoudenmire's Weapons
Stoudenmire At Center
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