Hell's Belle Starr
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A.,ril 10, 1938 HELL'S BELLE STARR over before Jim Reed became In- smirched her reputation, per- volved in a feud; a band of simi- haps unjustly, more seriously Never Forgot Deadly and (Photos from than her dealings in stolen lar graduates of the frontier N. H.R_ school of anarchy called the collection.) horses. Dainty Girl Shannon boys killed his brother, She and a tomboy named She Was a Scott Reed, by mistake; and Jim B.ll. Starr. a Emma Jones, caught in the cold felt impelled to slay a Shannon lady and a Bandit to even matters up. Then an bandit. on her Lady Indian Territory warant for famous black horae. a library of about 100 books and murder was issued against him, itably the queen of the gang- was supposed to have read them and he and Belle decided to leave strong in council and tyrannical all. The Shirley tavern was a the country for a while. They in enforcing her own code of high-grade resort according to got as far as Los Angeles, manners. Once the Blue Duck frontier standards. where they lived for a forgot that she was a lady, when The social and entertainment few years without doing her hat blew off, and failed to life of the town centered there, anything t hat got into make the proper gesture of and Belle, who grew up .as a courtesy. She pulled a gun on Henry Starr, last of Belle's ••in·law •• typical hotel child, always ready him and compelled him to do his William Clarke Quantrill infamoua Civil war guerrilla. ldnamen. to show of! before strangers, tre- duty as a gentleman and pick quently recited and played the up her hat. By CHARLES COLLINS piano to amuse the guests. This same Blue Duck bor- Sam will have to attend school and I think it will be the best ~E LIFE of Belle Starr, Belle was 15 years old when rowed $2,000 from the gang's the Civil war began. Sympathy treasury and lost it all in a thing that ever happened to ~ ~L dangerous woman of him." for the Confederate cause ran night's sitting in a gambling the southwestern frontier blast of a ••norther" After this prison experience from the Civil war until 1889, high in that region, and her near a small settle- house at Fort Dodge. Belle rode e Ide r brother Ed became a to that town the next day, Sam Starr returned to outlawry deserves a place in American ment, b u 11t a fire on ae larger scale than stolen folklore. Among the various leader in Quantrill's guerrillas. against the wall of the walked into the resort with a She could ride as well as any gun in each hand, and lifted the colts. He was compelled to females who took to hard riding, village store to boil spend most of the year 1885 in straight shooting, and, in some man, although she always used coffee. The building entire bank roll, amounting to a sidesaddle, and her hoydenish $7,000. New Mexico, evading warants cases, outlawry, during the de- caught fire and was for a postoffice robbery. On his velopment of the ••wild west" •spirit and taste for adventure destroyed, and Belle was When the law began to close made her a valuable auxiliary in in on Messrs. French, Spaniard, return he was wounded by a tradition she was the most at- promptly jailed in Dallas posse, placed under arrest, and tractive character. The others the partisan warfare that Quan· under charge of arson and and Blue Duck, Belle withdrew . trill conducted. She was under to the Starr ranch in the Chero- released on bail. The next day were mainly uncouth and un- malicious mischief. When he was k1lled-in a drinking loyalist suspicion as a spy, of kee reservation, where she and kempt halt-men, like the rabu- she appeared in court for bout with a sherif's officer, say lous ••Calamity Jane," but Belle course, but she was too smart first hearing of the case an Jim Reed had spent many happy to be caught carrying mcrlmt- days. There she found her some; in a dance hall quarrel Starr throughout her career as old and we a 1thy stockman over the ownership of his horse, nating messages. you n g admirer and former a ••bandit queen" never forgot named Patterson saw her and say others. guide, Sam Starr, a half-breed, that she was a lady of the Vtc- began to glow with chivalry. Later that year, after being torian period. • • • He asked her how much it who could neither read nor write. In the winter of 1862 she was They wen t off on a cattle- acquitted on a horse- stealing She had an education that would cost to get the charges dis- charge, Belle Starr helped to or- g a v e her intellectual rating arrested by federal cavalry at missed, and Belle, without mak- rustling expedition around Ogal- Newtonia, a village thlrty- five lala, Neb., and when they reo ganize and direct a wild west among the virtuous wiW!sof the his field of horse-steal- ing a promise, said that $2,500 show at Fort Smith, Ark. This miles from Carthage, and taken turned to the Starr ranch a year border states; she had literary ing operations in the would be abo u t right. He exhibition included ami m i c tastes and a collection of books; to the home of a certain Judge Indian Territory with a promptly sold some cattle and a half later, driving a large Ritchey for questioning by a herd of kine, they announced stagecoach holdup by Belle and she liked to dress in the prevail- companion named John and gave her this sum in others in which the local judge Major Enos. He got nothing they were husband and wife. ing fashions. Occasionally she Morris. They stopped cash. A few days later and prosecuting attorney were traveled east to visit fashionable out of her but a concert of Con- This marriage to a ward of the criminal records. They reo at a farmhouse near the arson charge was dis- cast as passengers. The attorney watering places, where no fault federate songs, defiantly ham- the government gave Belle a turned to Texas in 1872with two McKinney, Tex., .for dinner, missed, without bribery, and was kept at home by illness in was found with her table man- mered out on the piano in Judge right to claim a land grant. She infant children, a son and a and Morris to I d Reed that Belle was sentenced to pay a the family. Belle told him aft- ners. She had two outlaw hus- Ritchey's parlor. After she had and Sam settled on a 1,000·acre daughter, to call ••Judge" Shiro the 0 w n e r of the premises nominal fine for malicious rnis- erward that she intended to slip bands who died with their boots been held for several hours she claim on the Canadian river ley ••grand pappy." was an eccentric old puritan chief. This left her with a net a loaded cartridge into her gun on, and 'Shewas an associate of was released by Major Enos profit of $2,490. Belle's father forgave her and who would object if they en- and k1ll him during the m~lee,. horse and cattle thieves, stage- with the remark: helped the young couple to estab- tered the house carrying Wln- The ardent rancher bought because of an old grudge against coach holdup men, and bank ••You'll meet your brother Ed lish themselves on a small ranch chester rifles and side arms. her a dinner or two in the him. robbers. She enjoyed the friend· on the road home, coming here nine miles from the Shirley Reed accordingly left his shoot- hotel, but found that his suit She continued to live on her ship of Frank and Jesse James; under arrest and due for a hang- place. There Belle settled down ing irons on the porch; Morris for her favors was making no ranch, mourning for Sam and she also found pleasure in the ing." to rear and educate her children, did likewise. When they were headway. He asked for are· watching over her daughter, printed works of Alfred Lord Belle rode back to Carthage but Jim was .often absent on at table Morris excused himself fund on the money advanced, until 1889. A stranger named Tennyson. at a furious pace, taking side but Belle alleged enormous legal journeys into northern Texas to go to the pump in the yard Watson settled near by, and It must be granted that much roads and cross-cuts that were and fill a pitcher. He returned expenses and would not return and the Indian Territory, buying Belle's contacts with the If grape- nonsense has been written about unknown to the Union soldiers. and selling stolen horses. Belle carrying his own revolver and a dime. His friends then urged vine" communication system of the alleged romance In criminal She arrived before the troop of sometimes rode with him into emptied it into the unsuspecting him to sue her for fraud, but he criminal life informed her that exploits of the western plains cavalry which had been sent to refused with the noble remark: the Cherokee Strip, and there Jim Reed. he was wanted for murder in such as Belle's, but the facts in arrest her brother, and greeted ••Hell, let her keep it! I reck- she met a halt-breed named Tom This assassination failed to Florida.