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Show Genealogy Research of the West Wos lom Horn framed? By Kerry Ross Boren Several years ago I had the opportunity oppor-tunity to do some in depth research into the life of Tom Horn, notorious "rustler exterminator," when actor Robert Red-ford Red-ford wanted to do a movie of this controversial con-troversial character's life. However, Steve McQueen was doing a similar film at the time and so my research never saw the screen, but it left me with a considerable amount of material and a burning question in my mind-was Tom Horn framed for the crime for which he was hanged? In the early morning hours of July 8, 1900, Tom Horn shot the horse of Matt Rash in Brown's Park, to lure him from his cabin, and when Rash came out, Horn put three 30-30 slugs into him; in the lung, the hip, and his back. Matt Rash, who was the nephew of the famous Davy Crockett, was also the finance of Queen Ann Bassett of Brown's Park, and Queen Ann readily accused Horn (who was using the alias of Jim Hicks) of the crime, but Horn laughed it off. Ann later confronted Horn alone in a cabin on Cold Springs Mountain and attempted to shoot him, but Horn dodged behind an upturned table and escaped. Ann soon after barely bare-ly missed being killed when a 30-30 slug came through the window of her house and passed near her head. On October 11, 1900, Horn ambushed and killed the Negro rustler, Isom Dart, a close personal friend of Ann Bassett. Shortly thereafter, George Bassett (Ann's brother) discovered a note pinned pinn-ed to his front door which read: LEAVE THE PARK WITHIN TEN DAYS OR SUFFER THE CONSEQUENCES. TOM HORN. George "left between days" and went to Alaska and did not return until he learned that Horn was dead, several years later. On November 20, 1903, Tom Horn was hanged at Cheyenne, Wyoming for the alledged killing of 14 year old Willie Nickell. Young Willie had been shot at . the gate of his father's ranch as he stopped stop-ped and dismounted to open it. A rock had been placed beneath his head where he lay - a "calling card" employed by Horn to collect his $500 bounty on rustlers. But young Willie Nickell was not a rustler. TOM HORN Subsequent events proved interesting. in-teresting. Queen Ann Bassett married one Hi Bernard, foreman of the Two-Bar Two-Bar Cattle Company, but divorced him when she learned that Bernard had been the man who paid Tom Horn the $1,000 for the killing of Rash and Dart. This writer had the privilege of knowing know-ing two of the participants in these events - Josie Bassett and James E. Harvey. Harvey had told me earlier that a man named Joe Good had killed Willie Nickell and not Horn. Josie Bassett confirmed it. "His name was Jose Bueno, but we just called him Joe Good. He was a friend of mine and of Ann's for many years. He was the man who drove the wagon which hauled the body of my dead husband, Emerson Wells, from Linwood to Brown's Park for burial back in 1914. Josie also related the circumstances under which Willie Nickell was killed and Tom Horn framed. She stated that Ann Bassett herself had hired Joe Good to go to Wyoming and kill Tom Horn, "by any method he could." Failing in this, whether through lack of opportunity opportuni-ty or courage, Joe Good killed Willie Nickell and placed Horn's calling card under his head Is the story true? Josie swore it was, and James E. Harvey informed me that Good used a rare caliber rifle not found in this region, an antique caliber. But it was a well known fact that Horn used only a 30-30 Winchester. Wouldn't the inquest prove that Horn was innocent? Through rare good fortune, I obtained a copy of Horn's trial appeal transcript which had been handled by Douglas Preston, one time attorney general of Wyoming (and mouthpiece of Butch Cassidy), and left among his possessions posses-sions in boxes in his garage after his death. The copy is extremely rare. The appeal was based on the fact that a weapon "other than a 30-30 caliber" had been used to kill Willie Nickell. Therefore, Tom Horn was certainly framed for the crime for which he was hanged. Finally, however, the questions can also be asked, "Was Tom Horn really hanged?" Certainly there were witnesses to the hanging, but Queen Ann Bassett swore until her death that Horn was not the man who was hanged, and that he lived out his life in South America. Ada Piper, the sister-in-law of the outlaw Elza Lay, wrote in a letter dated 1963: "I knew that old murder . (er) & dog of a man Tom Horn. ...Horn i buried in Lander (Wyo.) and he was never hung, died from booze about four years ago...." Did Tom Horn die on the gallows, or did he somehow survive to die an alcoholic in Lander, Wyoming in 1959? Maybe we will never be certain, but the thing of which we are now certain is that Tom Horn was framed for the killing kill-ing of Willie Nickell. It's another little bit of history that should be corrected, so that the devil may get his dues. Horn's cousin, Eva Horn Whitehead of Missouri, wrote to this writer a few years ago, stating: "Cousin Tom was guilty of many of the killings which were attributed to him, but one thing which I and my family fami-ly all knew for certain, because Tom told his brother before he died, he did not kill Willie Nickell!" At Horn's hanging, he requested that the song "Life's Railway to Heaven" be sung. Perhaps it was appropriate, because he was indeed railroaded to the gallows. |
