THE END OF NED KELLY

11/11/1880 - Caught after an epic gunbattle with authorities in which he wears a homemade armor suit, Australia's version of Robin Hood and Jesse James, 25-year-old bushranger Ned Kelly is executed for murder at the Melbourne Jail.

Kelly

The third of eight children born to transported Irish convict, John "Red" Kelly (sent from Ireland to Australia for stealing two pigs) and his wife, Ellen Quinn, Ned begins life in the small community of Beveridge in December of 1854, baptized by Augustinian priest Charles O'hea, who will also give him his last rites before his execution.  Experiencing a normal childhood for the area that sees the youth receiving a basic education while also learning wilderness skills, 11-year-old Kelly risks his life and saves a fellow youngster from drowning in Hughes Creek in 1864 (delighted, the boy's family awards Kelly with a green sash that the outlaw will wear under his armor during his final gunbattle).  In 1865 however, things go wrong for the Kelly Family when "Red" is arrested for having meat he can not prove is his, and unable to pay the fine of twenty-five pounds, is sent away for six months.  Heavily drinking upon his release, Ned's father dies at the end of 1866, and a bitter Ned and family are forced to move to a 88-acre homestead of uncultivated and untitled farmland at Eleven Mile Creek near the Greta region of Victoria.  There, they run afoul of some of the neighbors and authorities, who accuse the family of cattle and horse rustling.  Giving in to the calling of his genes, previous experiences with the local colonial police, and bad associates (he is mentored on the ways of a bushranger by transplanted Irish convict, Harry Power), Kelly becomes a full fledged outlaw at the age of fourteen in 1869.

Kelly

Power - 1870

Avoiding jail time for an altercation with a traveling Chinese pig and fowl dealer named Ah Fook (who claims Kelly beats him with a stick and steals ten shillings, while Kelly claims he was the one beaten by a stick for coming to the defense of his sister when she is verbally abused for giving Fook creek water instead of well water when the traveler requests a drink at the family's farm), and the series of robberies he participates in with Power, Kelly is finally sentenced to three months of hard labor for each of the three charges against him for his role in passing on a vile note wrapped around calf testicle's for a jailed friend to the wife of the man's accuser (for horse theft), Jeremiah McCormack,  Released in 1871, in a dispute over a missing horse Kelly finds on his property and is in the process of returning, Ned is arrested by Constable Edward Hall.  Resisting the arrest for a crime he didn't commit (Kelly is still behind bars when the horse goes missing), Hall draws his weapon and fires three times at Kelly, misfires all that incense the outlaw, who overpowers the lawman, only to be beaten to a pulp by Hall and his pistol when seven bystanders come to the aid of the constable.  Sentenced to three years of hard labor, the youth serves his time and is out again in 1874, six months ahead of time for good behavior.  Not done yet though with the horse "theft," to settle the score with the man who originally lost the horse, Kelly takes on his opponent, horse-breaker Isaiah "Wild" Wright in a bare-knuckle boxing match at the town of Beechworth's Imperial Hotel, which Ned wins in twenty rounds (Wright will consequently become a firm supporter of the outlaw).

Mugshot At 15

The Boxer

Troubles accelerating, in 1877 in the town of Benalla, Kelly is arrested by four policemen for public drunkenness, flees, and is caught again hiding in a shoemaker's shop after a brawl that has Ned finally subdued when his pants are torn off and Constable Thomas Lonigan puts a lock grip on his testicles (Kelly will tell the constable, "Well Lonigan, I never shot a man yet, but if I ever do, so help me God, you'll be my first."  And sure enough, Lonigan will be killed by Kelly in 1878).  Fine paid for being drunk and then destroying the officers' uniforms in the fight, Kelly next problem with the law arises in April of 1878.  Attempting to arrest Ned's brother Dan for horse theft (after spending time drinking in a Winton public house) without backup, Constable Alexander Fitzpatrick will get into a brawl at the Kelly farm that involves Ned's mother, neighbor William Williamson (in trouble for not having a license to chop wood on Crown land, Kelly brother-in-law Bill Skillian, Dan Kelly, and Ned Kelly, who the lawman will claim shoots him in the arm before beating Fitzpatrick insensible (waking from his slumber, the constable will state that Kelly forces him to cut the bullet out of his arm with a knife to prevent the slug from being used as evidence against the outlaw, while Kelly will claim he is miles away and that the fight is brought on by Fitzpatrick making a pass at Ellen Kelly).  On Fitzpatrick's testimony (he will later be dismissed from the force for drunkenness and perjury) before a jury of former police and enemies of the family, the brawlers will be found guilty of attempted murder and sentenced to hard labor (his mother will still be serving her sentence when her son is executed), and arrest warrants for Dan and Ned are issued.

Fitzpatrick

Hiding from the authorities in the wilds at the head of the King River, the Kellys are soon joined by two friends, Joe Byrne and Steve Hart, and the Kelly Gang is created.  Tip received as to the gang's location, in October of 1878 two groups of officers (a group of five men from Greta and four men from Mansfield) from different directions close in on the area, using an abandoned mining camp on Stringybark Creek as a base camp.  Hunting for dinner in the area (a repast of parrot meat when kangaroos had been wanted), on 10/26 the sound of gunfire draws the outlaws to the lawmen, whom they surprise while the lawmen are brewing tea.  Trying to hide behind a tree while drawing his gun, Constable Lonigran does indeed become Ned's first murder, dead from a slug that hits the lawman in the temple (later, seven bullets will be found in his body).  Constable McIntyre captured, aware that more men are using the camp, the outlaws wait for the other lawmen to appear ... when they do, and Kennedy seemingly makes a move to draw his gun, the outlaws open fire and kill Sergeant Kennedy and Constable Scanion, while McIntyre jumps on a horse and gallops away (after a twenty mile journey on foot, part without one of his boots, through the bush to reach civilization) to spread the word of the killings.  There is no going back for the gang from the killings (or the increase in reward monies offered for the men's capture).
  
Dan Kelly, Steve Hart, And Joe Byrne

Ambush 

Clockwise From Left - Lonigan,
Kennedy, McIntyre, Scanion

Officer Memorial In Mansfield

Outlaws acting like outlaws, now with murder charges on their heads, closing out the year, in December, Ned and his gang rob the bank at Younghusband's Station, near the town of Euroa, getting away with cash, gold ingots, gold dust, and silver.  The authorities respond to the robbery by arresting all known friends and sympathizers in the region, 23 people in all, and hold them without trial for three months.  Outlaws turn, in February of 1879, the Kelly Gang pulls off a three day raid on the town of Jerilderie in which they capture the police, help set up the chapel in the courthouse for Sunday services, enjoy resting at the town's Royal Hotel, rob the local bank of its cash, burn mortgage documents, share drinks with the locals, give a personal letter Ned has written about why he fell into a life of crime to a bank accountant for later publication (it is 56 pages and 7,391 words long and is now on display at the State Library of Victoria) and steal a saddle and two police horses.  Then, though sought by thousands, the gang seemingly vanishes.  They resurface in June of 1880 after precipitating another murder.

Taking The Police Barracks

Bounty Notice

Convinced that a former Greta friend has turned traitor and is providing information on the gang to the authorities, on 6/26, Dan Kelly and Joe Byrne show up at the Woolshed Valley home of Aaron Sherritt, force a kidnapped neighbor to knock on the door, and in front of the man's mother and wife, gun him down with bullets in his neck and chest before fleeing the area (there are four policemen staying at Sherritt's home that soon spread the news of the gang's reappearance).  Expecting the reaction of the authorities will be swift and violent (it is), featuring officers flooding the area via a special police train, Kelly concocts a plan to take a large number of his tormentors out ... the gang will wreck the train at the small town of Glenrowan in the Warby Ranges, kill any survivors, then ride to the town of Benalla, which they believe will be stripped of police from supplying men for the train, and there, they will rob the bank, burn down the courthouse, blow up the town's police barracks, release anyone in the town's jail, and generally raise chaos in the region.  It is a plan that will instead see to the gang's undoing. 

Sherritt

The Death Of Sherritt

At first, things go well for the Kelly bandits; a sharp curve in the railroad line that runs over a deep ravine is selected for the train's derailment, the selected tracks are damaged, the town of Glenrowan is taken over (in all, the gang will take 62 citizens hostage and confine them in the town's Glenrowan Inn), supplies are readied (including homemade suits of bullet-repelling armor), and while waiting for the train to show up, the bushrangers relax with the locals by dancing, singing, playing cards, and drinking.  The problem is that the police find out about the gang's plans thanks to the efforts of a man the outlaws believe is a sympathizer of the outfit's activities, Thomas Curnow, the local schoolmaster.  Not confined to the inn like the rest of the town, Curnow uses his freedom to warn the train before it reaches the kill curve, and with the knowledge provided, the gang (all in their armor) is soon confronted at McDonnell's Railway Hotel by an advanced party of police that includes a commanding superintendent, six constables, and five native trackers.  Battle on, the warring parties exchange gunfire for fifteen minutes, a time period during which Superintendent Hare has his left wrist shattered, and Ned is wounded in the left elbow and right foot, before slipping away from the  the hotel undetected.  Hotel soon surrounded by police, trackers, and civilian volunteers, Byrne is the first bandit to go, bleeding to death after a bullet enters a weak spot in his armor and severs his femoral artery (just after he drinks a whiskey toast at the hotel's bar, "Many more years in the bush for the Kelly Gang!").

Messing With The Tracks

Battle 

At daybreak, in his armor, and armed with three handguns, rises out of his nearby hiding place in the bush and attacks the police from their rear, stalking slowly through the morning mists towards the hotel.  The sight causes fright and wonder as bullets bounce off the apparition (later the armor will show eighteen bullet hits).  Laughing and taunting the police, as the gang opens fire from the hotel on their adversaries once more, in ten minutes of madness, Kelly advances about fifty yards before Sergeant Steele of Wangaratta realizes the outlaw's legs are unprotected and sends twin shotgun blasts Ned's way, savaging the bushranger's hip and thigh.  Collapsing against a fallen tree, Kelly exclaims, "I'm done!  I'm done!"  But not quite, when Steele moves forward to take Kelly into custody, the outlaw sends a slug at the sergeant that knocks his hat off and burns the lawman's face.  Too weak from blood lose for more action, when Kelly's armor is taken off officers discover the bandit has wounds to his left foot, left leg, left arm, right hand, and groin, all of which are treated when he is moved to the local stationmaster's office.  Two bushrangers down, two yet to go.

Kelly

The Capture Of Kelly

Monument At The Site Of The Capture

Kelly's Armor 

Hostages released by Dan Kelly and Hart (whether by police fire or from the outlaws, three members of the Glenrowan community will die during the siege, an old man named Martin Cherry, shot in the groin, George Metcalf, shot in the face, and 13-year-old John Jones, the son of the hotel's landlady, from a hip wound, additionally, three other civilians are wounded, but survive) the remaining members of the gang continue to fire on the police from the hotel.  Unwilling to storm the hotel and risk the lives of his men, Superintendent Sadleir requests a 12-pound Armstrong cannon by trained to Glenrowan from Melbourne, but before it can arrive, changes his mind and decides to burn the pair out.  Gunfire keeping the outlaws busy, Senior Constable Charles Johnson places a burning bundle of straw against the hotel's west side and the structure is soon ablaze.  Watching the hotel burn, Matthew Gibney, a priest out of Western Australia, decides to enter the structure to rescue anyone still left inside.  Smoke and fire all around, he instead finds that the battle is over, both Dan Kelly and Hart are dead (it is never established if they mutually commit suicide, or have fallen victim to police bullets).

The Hotel After

Brought to trial before Sir Redmond Berry on a host of charges, Ned Kelly is of course sentenced to death, and when the judge states, "May God have mercy on your soul," the outlaw responds, "I will go a little further than that, and say I will see you there where I go."  In Melbourne, thousands march in the streets seeking clemency for Kelly, and 32,000 sign a petition asking for the same ... to no avail.  On the morning of 11/11/1880, Kelly's leg irons are removed and he is marched to the jail's scaffold and hung.  His last words are purported to be either, "Such is life," or, "Ah, well, I suppose it had to come to this."

Execution

Death Mask

Outlaw removed, Kelly somehow manages in death to become a Robin Hood to Australia.  A cottage industry in death, there will be magazine articles, books (the Ned Kelly Awards are now given annually for the best fictional and true crime writing in Australia), movies about the bushranger, songs from a host of musicians that includes Johnny Cash, Waylon Jennings and the band, Midnight Oil (along with a country band being named Reckless Kelly after the outlaw), hundreds of performers at the opening ceremonies of 2000 Olympic Summer Games will dance before an international audience of millions wearing stylist Kelly helmets designed by visual artist Sidney Nolan, and even tourist tours of the areas where Kelly once reigned (rural districts in northeastern Victoria are called "Kelly Country").  By the way in which his brief life is played out ("As game as Ned Kelly" is now an Australian term for bravery), in hanging Kelly, the authorities actually insure that Kelly will never leave the consciousness of Australia, a dubious kind of immortality to be sure.

1906 - The Story Of The Kelly Gang

1950 - The Glenrowan Affair

Mick Jagger As Kelly - 1970
 
Heath Ledger As Kelly - 2003

Opening Ceremonies

The Real Ned Kelly

DYNAMITE DICK IS DONE IN

11/7/1897 - Picked off one by one by law enforcement after shooting up the streets of Ingalls, Oklahoma in 1893, another member of the Doolin-Dalton Gang (also known as the Wild Bunch and the Oklahombres) is blasted into eternity near Checotah, Oklahoma ... this time the Swiss-cheesed desperado is Charles Daniel "Dynamite Dick" Clifton.

Clifton

Left without a gang to be a part of after the Daltons are wiped out trying to rob two Coffeyville, Kansas banks on 10/5/1892, Bill Doolin puts together a new band of killer cowboys that will include Clifton (the band's co-leader is Bill Dalton).  His early years mostly a mystery (it is believed he is born in Texas around 1865), by 1892 Clifton has a criminal resume that includes cattle rustling around Pauls Valley in the Chickasaw Nation, the town of Ardmore, and along Oklahoma's border with Texas, safe cracking, and whiskey peddling, and surviving an Osage gunfight with U.S. Deputy Marshal Lafayette "Lafe" Shadley that leaves the outlaw with a permanent scar the size of a silver half-dollar where one of the lawman's wounding bullets needs to be cut out of his neck.  His moniker of "Dynamite Dick" is said to come from his explosive temper, or from blowing himself out of a train trying to break into a safe, or his younger days as a miner, or from his penchant for modifying his bullets into explosive rounds.  And or is also attached to the identifying characteristic of having three fingers blown off his right hand, or is it his left, and do the digits leave in a childhood accident, or leave thanks to a safe cracking error, or do lawmen blow them off during the 1893 Battle of Ingalls in which U.S. Deputy Marshals Thomas Hueston, Richard Speed, and Lafayette Shadley are all killed.

Dead Outlaws - L-to-R - Bill Powers, Bob
Dalton, Grat Dalton, Dick Broadwell

Doolin
   
Shadley

Quite the coming-out party, Clifton's first gun moment with the Doolin-Dalton Gang is the Battle of Ingalls (about fifty-four miles west of Tulsa, Oklahoma).  Drinking and playing poker with other members of the gang in Ransom's Saloon, Clifton is as surprised as any of the other outlaws when the quiet of the morning is broken by lawman bullets being fired at Bittercreek Newcomb.  Gun out and firing back at the lawmen positioned about the town (there are thirteen before the deaths begin), Saloon beginning to be shot to pieces, Clifton, along with Tulsa Jack Blake, provides cover fire for Doolin, Bill Dalton, and Red Buck Waightman as the outlaws run to the nearby barn where their horses are stabled, then with their covering fire, moves there himself with Tulsa Jack.  Horse bridled, though wounded in the hand, with Doolin, Clifton mounts up and spurs his horse out of the barn's back door (the three remaining bandits charge out the front door), dashes down a draw to the southwest, and quickly vacates the town, eventually arriving at the town of Alfred.  Wanted for murder like the rest of the boys, Dynamite Dick is now a full fledged member of the outlaw gang.

Barn Dash

Wounds somewhat healed, and in need of cash, Doolin and Clifton next rob a businessman named Mr. Higginbotham in the town Blackwell on November 16, 1893 ... the robbery is problematic though as the man has only two dollars on him, and not wanting to clean him out, Doolin gives him one of his dollars back.  Attempting a much more respectable haul, on May 20, 1895, at 3:00 in the afternoon, the gang robs the Southwest City Bank of Southwest City, relieving the financial institution  of $3,700, but the ill gotten proceeds are not won easily.  Slugs flying about as the bandits leave the bank, Oscar Seaborn is wounded, while the same bullet kills his brother, former Missouri State Senator J. C. Seaborn, standing in Baker's saloon, M. V. Hembre is struck in the ankle by a bullet and loses his foot, U.S. Deputy Marshal Simpson Melton is shot in the leg, Doolin is bloodily wounded in the left temple, and three outlaw horses are hit (about a hundred shots are fired during the holdup).  Hiding out in a dugout at the "Rock Fort" of the Dunn Brothers, Clifton is one of eight gunmen that don't kill U.S. Deputy Marshal William Tilghman when the lawman shows up at the hideout alone (Doolin is suppose to have said, "Bill Tilghman is too good a man to shoot in the back.").

Dynamite Dick

Next on the gang's dance card is the robbery of the Rock Island Railroad at the town of Dover.  Engineer and fireman covered by Clifton and Little Dick West, a robbery that is said to net the Doolin Gang (by 1895, Bill Dalton has been killed by a posse) $35,000, but puts U.S. Deputy Marshal Chris Madsen on their trail, an eventuality that will result in the death of Texas Jack when the fleeing outlaws are found by the lawman's posse (after a pitched battle of almost an hour in which over 200 rounds are exchanged, the gang is able to escape without further damage).  Using Texas Jack's sacrifice, Doolin, Little Dick West, and Clifton take up cowboying for awhile at the Rhodes Ranch in the San Andres Mountains of New Mexico, and Dynamite Dick also hides in the Arizona camp of a couple of Mexican sheepherders ... until they have a spat and the outlaw kills both men and heads back to Oklahoma.

Texas Jake Trophy Shot

Back in Oklahoma, Clifton is instantly once more a target of law enforcement, and he doesn't help matters by being arrested by two Federal marshals on bringing illegal whiskey into the territory as a crook named Dan Wiley.  Tip received Wiley is actually Clifton, U.S. Deputy Marshal Frank Canton rides to Paris, Texas, correctly identifies Wiley as Dynamite Dick, then takes charge of the prisoner and returns him to Guthrie, Oklahoma to stand charges for murder.  There is a problem though, in taking Clifton to Guthrie, Canton has reunited Dynamite Dick with Bill Doolin, also in the local jail after being arrested by U.S. Deputy Marshal Bill Tilghman in a Eureka Springs, Arkansas bathhouse.  Bad news to have the outlaws together, the men soon come up with a plan to escape which they launch on the evening of July 5, 1896.  Using the way water is distributed to the prisoners inside their cells and the gun of night guard J. W. Miller, Doolin, Clifton, and twelve other bad eggs take control of the jail (it is about 9:00 in the evening), slip down the structure's steel stairs, and vacate the premises, with Doolin and Clifton (for awhile they are accompanied by a hatchet holding counterfeiter named Bill Jones) highjacking a buggy from Alva W. Koontz (a county clerk) and Miss Winifred Warner (a local schoolteacher) as they make their way north and east out of town.  Despite the search for the fugitives being the biggest manhunt in the history of the territory, the desperadoes gain tobacco, whiskey, and $50 by robbing a bar in the town of Morrison (when the bartender at the establishment protests, Doolin shoots off the man's ear), before making their way to an old hideout about twelve miles west of Ingalls on the north side of the Cimarron River, where they once more hook up with Little Dick West.  Free, but not for long, returning from a night visit with his wife, Doolin is killed on August 24, 1896, by a posse led by U.S. Deputy Marshal Heck Thomas.

Canton

Doolin   

Leaderless, West and Clifton foolishly continue operating in Oklahoma, with Dynamite Dick almost cashing in his chips when he and two other outlaws are found camped in a ravine twenty miles west of Sapulpa, Oklahoma by a Heck Thomas posse but mange to shoot their way out of danger.  Use to being members of a gang (there is now a $3,500 reward, dead or alive, for Clifton), West and Clifton  hook up with the Jennings Gang, consisting of novice bandits Al and Frank Jennings, and Morris and Pat O'Malley.  Hoping for more major robberies, the Doolin alumnists are sadly disappointed at the chump change they lift from The Corner Saloon of Pottawatomie County, and their failed train robbery outside of Edmond in which they are unable to blow open the Wells Fargo safe holding the cash they want ... twice.

Al Jennings

The end of the trail finally comes for Clifton on a Sunday in November.  Under the direction of Chris Madsen, U.S. Deputy Marshals George Lawson and W. H. Bussey locate the refuge of Dynamite Dick on the Sid Williams farm near Checotah.  Surprising the outlaw on the trail, the marshals call for Clifton's surrender, the outlaw refuses and goes for his guns, and the lawmen open fire, with a round from Lawson's rifle breaking the outlaw's arm and knocking him out of the saddle ... where he escapes on foot into the brush.  But not for long!  Tracking the outlaw, the lawmen discover Clifton in a remote, forest sheltered cabin.  Cornered, just as night is beginning to fall, Dynamite Dick bursts out of the door of the cabin, firing as best he can at his opponents with his one good arm ... which is not good enough.  Ready for the request surrender to be refused again, the officers gun down the bandit before he can make it back into the woods and Clifton dies a few minutes later.
The End Of Dynamite Dick Clifton

THE VIOLENT DEMISE OF NEDE WADE

11/3/1892 - Whether he was a hero to the Cherokee people, or a maniacal Indian outlaw, or some variation between the two positions, the life of NeDe WaDe, better known since to Wild West historians as Ned Christie, comes to a abrupt and violent end near Tahlequah, Oklahoma, when dynamite and fire chase him out of his fortified home and he confronts a posse of sixteen to twenty-five lawmen and enemies.

Christie

On December 14, 1852, Christie begins life in Wauhillau, Going Snake District of the Cherokee Nation in what will one day be the state of Oklahoma.  He is the son of Trail of Tears survivors (the government forced removal of Native Americans from ancestral homelands in Georgia and North Carolina ... in the movement out to Indian Territory of Oklahoma, over 4,000 Cherokees will lose their lives, among them, Christie's Irish grandmother), Watt (he will become a Civil war veteran, fighting for the Union) and Lydia Thrower Christie, members of the tribe's most traditional band, the Keetowah (which translates into English as "the real people").  Growing up in a family of loving parents and siblings, Christie learns the blacksmithing trade from his father, along with his dad's abilities with firearms, becoming a crack shot, many feel the best in the entire Cherokee Nation, by the time he is ten.  As a youth, he is also a marble champion, a popular local fiddle player, a well regarded stick ball player, and learns to speak English fluently.  Growing into a handsome man of 6'4", he is well regarded within his community, and in 1885, follows in the footsteps of his brothers and father, and is elected to represent the Going Snake District in the Cherokee National Council (he will serve as one of three advisers of Chief Dennis Wolf Bushyhead).  Only his hot temper, especially after drinking, gives anyone any qualms (he is brought to trial in 1884 for the liquor-related murder of William Palone, but declared not guilty of the killing).  Sadly, he has been drinking a lot on Easter of 1887, April 10th.

Christie And His Half-Brother, Jim

Bushyhead

Living in Rabbit Trap with his third wife, Nancy, and his son, 13-year-old James from a previous marriage, as a member of the Executive Council, on Sunday, Christie finds himself in Tahlequah, the Cherokee Nation's capital for an emergency session of the legislature to see what can be done to rebuild the recently fire destroyed Cherokee Female Seminary.  As usual when in town, he stays at the home of one of his wife's relatives, Senator Ned Grease, and also in habit. after completing the demands of his office, with a friend named John Parris (a half blood troublemaker known for selling illegal whiskey), goes out seeking liquid refreshments, booze the men find in the Dog Town northern end of town, at the home of Nancy Old Lady Shell, bought from whiskey runner, Thomas Bub Trainor, Jr.  Imbibing massive amounts of hooch (the pair meet up with friends, John Hogshooter, George Paris, and Charley Bobtail), Christie for the rest of his life will claim to spend the rest of the night passed out cold in a clump of bushes (a tale that will be verified years later, in 1918, by traumatized witness, Dick Humphreys).  Unfortunately though, someone is awake, and that person murders 41-year-old U.S. Deputy Marshal Daniel Maples when he goes into Dog Town that night looking for whiskey runners (he has arrest warrants for both Parris and Trainor), shot in the chest while crossing a log footbridge.  Waking the next morning, Christie is stunned to discover he is a suspect in the death of the lawman, and after attending to his duties with the National Council, he takes the advice of his father and Senator Grease, and flees back to his home in Rabbit Trap, very aware that it is a death sentence for an Indian to kill a white man (writing to the authority for the region, Jude Isaac C. Parker, the infamous "Hanging Judge" of Fort Smith, Arkansas, Christie offers to surrender if he will be granted bail to prove his innocence in the death of Maples, but his request is denied by the judge).  Warning system in place of friends and relatives, he hides from authorities, eventually losing his position on the National Council and his blacksmith business, and needing funds, begins bootlegging whiskey, transformed into the criminal he wasn't, warning all that will listen that he will not be taken into custody without a fight.  What follows will be known in Oklahoma's history as Ned Christie's War.     

Daniel Maples

Parker

The first attempt to arrest Christie takes place in 1885 when Deputy Joe Bowers is sent on his way with a bullet in his leg, the next try is by Deputy John Fields, who leaves the property with a Winchester slug (Christie's weapon of choice is an always chambered 1873 Winchester rifle that firs .44/40 bullets) in his neck (he survives), and then, in 1886, a group of lawmen attack and are chased away when three of them are wounded approaching the Cherokee's cabin.  Tired of the situation, in 1889, newly appointed U.S. Marshal Jacob "Blake Jake" Yoes orders U.S. Deputy Marshal Henry Andrew "Heck" Thomas (in his storied career as a lawman, Thomas will engage in an 1878 shootout with the Sam Bass Gang as they try to rob a train in Texas, death best killers Pink and Jim Lee with his Winchester, get shot bringing moonshiner Aaron Purdy to justice (\<knocked off his horse, the crook is killed by the rest of Heck's posse>, quick-draw robber Jim July to death in 1890, dog the Dalton Gang into their disastrous Coffeyville retirement try, be part of the team that kills Doolin Gang member Ol Yantis on the farm of the bandit's sister <he is accompanied by U.S. deputy Marshals Chris Madsen and Tom Houston>, with his Winchester, shatters the hand of Doolin Gang member Little Bill Raidler <brought in later by U.S. Deputy Marshal Bill Tilghman>, gets into a gun battle with Doolin Gang member, Dynamite Dan Clifton, that forces the outlaw out of Oklahoma, and leads the group of men that turn Bill Doolin into a bleeding piece of Swiss Cheese as the outlaw is leaving the home of his father-in-law outside of Lawson, Oklahoma in 1896) to bring in Christie (by this time, there is a $500 reward for the Indian's arrest).  On a late September morning, led to Christie's home by Bub Trainor himself, Thomas, U.S. Deputy Marshals L. P. Isbel and David Rusk, along with an officer named Salmon, creep up on the location, but are noticed by the sleeping man's watchdogs.  Alerted by the howling the dogs produce, Christie opens fire on the posse (after uttering the turkey gobble he has stated he will use before aiming in earnest at his opponents), who respond in kind, while also setting the out building where the Indian plies his trade as a blacksmith on fire, a fire that eventually jumps to the main cabin.  Gun fire and smoke, Christie's wife is allowed to vacate her home, but James is shot in the back climbing a fence to escape the conflagration (he will survive his wound), lawman Isbel takes a round in his shoulder, and Christie is hit with a round that smashes his nose and blinds him in the left eye.  Thought dead when gunfire from the house ceases, the posse rides away, seeking help for Isbel, and unknowingly allows the Cherokee renegade to escape when Nancy Christie and other friends pull Ned out of the burning building.

Yoes

Thomas

Hidden in the woods by friends, recovered from his wounds, seeing his son shot and his home burnt to the ground, Christie moves into a virtually impregnable rock fortress on a hilltop (it will soon be known in the region as Ned's Fort Mountain) about a mile to the west ... a cliff structure with two-log thick walls, augmented with cushioning sand and lined by Oak two-by-fours, with a loft for improved shooting at enemies (along with fields of fire denuded of trees), that is fully stocked with food, water, and plenty of ammunition.  Weeks later, when another Thomas posse returns, the lawman sees what he is up against and decides it might be more conducive to his health if he withdraws from the area and concentrates on bringing down the Dalton Gang (returned to civilization, the lawman will state that it would take a fully armed regiment to remove Christie from his new home).  Other lawmen however are not as wise as Thomas (emboldened perhaps by the reward on Christie's head being raised to $1,000).  Blamed for almost every crime that takes place in the region (there are rumors he has murder eleven men), in November of 1890, Christie is next confronted by legendary African-American lawman, Bass Reeves and his posse ... another failure that leaves two more men wounded.

Reeves.

Christie

Next up to have a go at Christie is U.S. Deputy Marshal David Rusk, a member of the Heck Thomas attempt to bring in the Cherokee warrior.  In 1892, with Yoes emphatic about not letting Christie get away, Rusk, five other deputies, and a small group of Indians attack the fort, with the same kind of results that previous posses have had ... no Christie and four more wounded men.  Not dissuaded despite the setback, one at least two more occasions, Rusk sneaks back into the area alone and tries to ambush Christie, with each attempt ending with rifle fire from the Indian marksman sending him on his war.  Any thought about a third attempt on Rusk's part is only increased when Christie, knowing the name of his antagonist, slips away from the stronghold, slips in to the town of Oaks, to the north of Tahlequah, and burns Rusk's general store to the ground (though not in charge, Rusk will be in on the final assault on Christie's fort).  Undaunted, another group of lawmen go after Christie in October, a group that includes Charley Copeland, Milo Creekmore, and D. C. Dye ... their try ends with two officers wounded, a wagon filled with flaming brush meant for the cabin instead setting fire to an outhouse on the property, and lit sticks of dynamite bouncing off the walls of the fort and detonating harmlessly causes the posse to leave in disgust.

Winchester 1873 

Like Lincoln looking for the right Northern general to win the American Civil War, Yoes next puts together a battle plan that will include his marshals, led by U.S. Deputy Marshals Gideon "Cap" White and Paden Tolbert, and a group of local lawmen, including Dan Maples' son, Sam, all under the direction of bounty hunter Gus York.  Plan simple for the twenty-five men involved, one group of men will establish a perimeter around the fort to keep Christie's friends away, while the other group will attack the fort using pistols, rifles, dynamite, and a borrowed cannon that fires three pound bullet shaped balls.  The posse pierces the Cherokee Nation in darkness, and by 4:00 in the morning of the next day, has taken up positions around the fort; sleeping inside, unaware of what awaits them at first light (the dogs that warn Ned of previous posses are off hunting with Christie's son) are Christie, his wife Nancy, his daughter Mary, his granddaughter Charlotte, Charles Hare, a young full-blood Cherokee new to the area, 7-year-old Charles Grease, Nancy's nephew, and an Indian fugitive named Little Arch Wolf. 

Some Of The Posse - After

Players in place, the battle of Christie's fort begins in the early dawn of 11/2 when Wolf ventures outside for some water and is immediately called on to surrender.  Refusing the order, Wolf fires at the voices in the brush as he runs back to the cabin, making it despite being wounded in the leg, arm, and head.  After Christie's notorious gobbling, the battle is on.  Bullets exchanged, in a pause in the action, Nancy, Mary, and Charlotte are all allowed to leave, but for some reason Grease stays behind in the root cellar.  Frustrated by the bullet battle (Christie is asked again to surrender, in Cherokee, by full-blood local, Sheriff Benjamin Knight ... in response, the renegade laughs at the lawmen), at about 1:00 in the afternoon the cannon is brought into play.  Set up on an oak stump across a creek and out of range of Christe's rifle, thirty-eight balls are sent at the fort with little effect (the balls bounce off the structure's stout walls), so it is decided to increase the weapon's powder charge ... a mistake that blows the cannon apart with its next firing.  Last chance improvising, the lawmen discover the remains of the wagon that burnt the outhouse down and jury-rig the remains into a barricade that allows Charley Copeland, when the moon goes down in the evening to place a grouping of six dynamite sticks against the south wall of the fort (by this time, family and friends of Christie have gathered in a hollow below the fort, watched the entire time by armed and ready members of the posse ... there are no disturbances from the group other than a couple of half-hearted attempts to get more ammunition up to the fort). 

More Posse - Back Row L-to-R - Tom Johnson, Bill Smith, John Tolbit, Abe Allen, and Wes Bowman - Front Row L-to-R - Gideon White, Charley Copeland, Paden Tolbert, Heck Bruner, and David Rusk

Surrender requested and refused once more, in the morning of 11/3 the charge is lit.  Big boom created as hoped (it is said it can be heard in Tahlequah), the consequent explosion takes out a wall and corner of the fort, and sets the entire structure on fire.  Retreating to the root cellar, Wolf's hair catches on fire (he will lose all of it) and burning timbers strike Hare as the place comes apart ... and both men flee the structure (arrested, they will both spend time in jail for resisting arrest and attempted murder, with Wolf eventually ending up in an insane asylum).  Grease already dead in the root cellar, Christie is the last to leave, trying to slip away in the chaos and smoke ... and he almost makes it.  Running through the thick smoke, he suddenly comes face-to-face with Wes Bowman ... snapping off a shot, Christie barely misses the lawman (he does succeed in giving Bowman a powder burn on his face that he will wear the rest of his life).  Spinning, Bowman gets off a shot of his own that hits the tall 39-year-old Indian behind the ear, killing him instantly ... the war is over, but the victors have some final indignities to put the Cherokee to anyway.  Running up to where Christie lays, young Sam Maples empties his pistol into the corpse, then, the posse lashes Ned to his own front door and takes their trophy to Fayetteville, Arkansas (where his killers are photographed with their prize and postcards for sale are created), then on to Fort Smith (Judge Parker will personally congratulate each member of the posse) for the reward money (the $1,000 is given to bounty hunter Gus York, but after paying for expenses and divvying up the bounty, he makes only $74 for the kill).

Posing With Ned

Body eventually returned to his family, Christie is interred at the Watt Christie Cemetery in Wauhillau, Oklahoma.  And as these things go, his life and death soon turn him into a Wild West legend, suitable for magazines, books (Lonesome Dove author Larry McMurty will tell his tale in his novel, Zeke and Ned), television, and movies ... and in Tahlequah, Oklahoma, at the Cherokee Court House, the oldest public building in the state, a memorial plaque on the wall of the structure simply notes, "... assassinated by U.S. Marshals in 1892."  A hero to the Cherokee people now, rest in peace Ned!

Final Resting Place