Cherokee County, from The Advocate, 2/06/1895
Cherokee Co. OK Archives 
Copyright c 2003 by: Mollie Stehno, e-mail: shoop@orcacom.net
This copy contributed for use in the USGenWeb Cherokee Co. OK Archives. 
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OLD-TIME OUTLAWS
Bill Cook's Exploits Appear Childish When Compare with Henry Starr's

February 6, 1895-The Cherokee Advocate-Special Correspondence of the Globe 
Democrat-Guthrie, Okla. January 20-Just now, while the attention of the whole 
country seems to be centered on the Cook Gang of outlaws and their depredations 
in the Indian Territory, a few reminiscences of the old-time outlaws of that 
section will be interesting to everybody.
	   These outlaws, like the present marauders, were nearly all of mixed 
Indian and white blood, but so much more daring were their exploits, so much 
more desperate their character, that the exploits of the Cook Gang appear as 
mere boys' play when compared to their deeds of outlawry.
	The most notorious of these old-time outlaws was Henry Starr, long since 
dead.  Much of the story of his life is shrouded in obscurity and other parts 
greatly magnified by tradition, but it is know positively that he alone killed 
over seventy men, fully a dozen of his victims having been felled with a single 
blow of his might fist.  He was a Cherokee, with a tinge of Seminole blood, 
nearly 7 feet tall, massively built, and with an arm and fist like a 
sledgehammer.
	   He terrorized the whole Cherokee Nation for years, and so great became 
his power that the Cherokee Council finally entered into a regular treaty of 
peace with him, granting him amnesty from all past deeds if he would cease his 
outlawry-the only instance on record of a nation entering into a treat of peace 
with a single individual.  
	   At one time $10,000 reward was offered for Starr's head and $5,000 for 
the head of one of his lieutenants.  One day the lieutenant was killed by the 
accidental discharge of a gun at the outlaw camp, and Starr cut of his head, 
and, putting it in a sack, went to Tahlequah, the Cherokee Capital and walking 
boldly into the officer of the National Treasurer, covered the officer with a 
revolver, took the gory head from the sack, and laying it on the table compelled 
the officer to pay the $5000 offered for the head, then walked out, mounted his 
horse and escaped.
	   After the treaty of peace the old man lived quietly for a number of 
years and died a natural death.
A Chief Of The Old Block
	   In later years one of the most cunning of outlaws was Bill Starr, a 
grandnephew of Henry and father of the notorious Belle Starr.  He did not turn 
outlaw until well along in years, but in a short time became the leader of one 
of the most adroit gangs of thieves that has ever infested the Indian country.  
He was not a common thief, and in one sense was not actively in the business, 
being rather a superintendent of general manager.  His gang was large in 
numbers, and he had spies in every town, trading post, and community in the 
Territory and adjoining States.  He did not make a practice of stealing for fun 
or excitement, but was in it for business, and would take only the best and when 
he was sure of a large return for the work, but once making up his mind to steal 
a thing, there was nothing at which he would hesitate.  There was not much ready 
cash in the Territory to steal in those days, and they confined their work 
mostly to stealing horses.  A member of the gang in a neighborhood would take a 
fine horse, ride it a few miles and turn it over to a confederate, who would do 
the same, which procedure would be repeated in turn by a dozen different men, 
and as each one would be at home the next morning detection was almost 
impossible.
	   The gang had a cipher language whereby they could converse 
intelligently among themselves about their work, and an outsider listening would 
think them conversing about some ordinary topic.
	   Occasionally, when there was some particularly valuable horse to be 
stolen Starr himself would do the work.  He was an expert blacksmith, would 
carry shoeing tools along with him, and after riding the horse a half day, would 
take the shoes off and put them on backwards.  Thus those in pursuit were 
fooled, and it was a long time before the discovered hi strategy.  They would be 
on the trail all right, following the horses' tracks, when suddenly the 
footprints would be reversed indicating that the animal had been traveling in 
the very opposite direction.  Had they followed the trail sufficiently long they 
would have come to a place where the tracks again changed, but they seldom went 
far enough and gave up the chase in disgust.
The Notorious Belle Starr
	   Belle Starr was a fit successor to her father and led a gang equally as 
daring.  The narration of a single one of their exploits will serve to show the 
character of the work they did.  One day about eight years ago, while Maj. Neal 
was agent of the Sac and Fox Indians, Belle Starr and her brother Frank and Bill 
and John Wade drove up to the agency with a barrel of whiskey, and in plain view 
of the agent's quarters, and the officers of the Indian police, began selling 
the fiery liquid to the Indians, two of the gang keeping up a constant firing 
into the agency buildings with Winchesters.  They sold as long as any of the 
Indians had money to buy and then drove leisurely away.  The Wades were captured 
soon after and bought their freedom by turning traitor and delivering Frank 
Starr to the officers, who turned him over to the Texas authorities, where he 
was given a life sentence for murder.
	   The last of the old school of outlaws was Ned Christie and Bill Pigeon, 
both Cherokees.  Christie led many a daring raid years ago, but for nearly a 
decade has been wholly on the defensive, living in a stone fort in the mountains 
of the Creek country, defying the deputies and repulsing attack after attack, 
only to at least fall a victim of treachery.  It was less than a year ago when 
he was shot down by a traitorous member of his gang who, Judas like agreed to 
deliver him to the officers for a monetary consideration.
	      In the mountain fastnesses, forty miles from Muldrow, in the 
Cherokee Nation, still live Bill Pigeon, over 80 years of age, and the only 
surviving member of the old-time outlaw bands.
	      The story of his life and adventures reads like a sensational 
romance rather than the account of every day life.  For nearly half a century a 
fugitive from justice a man after whom the officers sought vigilantly for years 
and for whose arrest large rewards were offered, a man whose hands in the past 
were often steeped in crime-he now lives in quiet, obscurity, asking only to be 
let alone to live his few remaining day and in peace.
Not A Voluntary Outlaw
	   It appears he did not as first become an outlaw from choice.  For a 
long time he was engaged in bringing whiskey into the Territory in large 
quantities, and was very successful in eluding the officers.  After a long chase 
the deputies cornered him once, and he was in such close quarters that he was 
compelled to kill a deputy to escape.  A price was then put upon his head, and 
from that day he plunged into the wildest of crimes and became an outlaw whose 
acts terrorized the whole southwest.  Along he committed many deeds, at which 
the whole Cook or Dalton gangs would quail, and many a wild chase he led the 
deputy marshals and the Indian police over the Territory.  Finally, wearying of 
this carnival of crime, he retired to the mountains and settled down to live a 
quiet life with a wife whose influence and a promise to marry him were 
undoubtedly the grates motive leading him to give up his wild life.
	   Entrenched among the wild hills and passes, surrounded on all sides by 
friends and neighbors who admire him for his bravery and loyalty, he feels 
secure and altogether at home.  If any stranger appears in the neighborhood he 
is always warned and should they come to his abode he is always prepared to 
receive them-sometimes in a very unlooked for manner.  It is said that several 
marshals and detectives who have gone to his home in disguise have never 
returned to tell the tale of their adventures, and other officers who scouted in 
the vicinity have received such effective warnings that nothing could ever 
induce them to return.
	   He has an interesting family, among them a handsome and well-educated 
grown daughter.  He spends a good portion of his time in farming pursuits, and 
has the reputation of being a good neighbor.
	   Of late the deputy marshals and other officers have given him a wide 
berth, and to the outside world the name of Bill Pigeon, the Cherokee outlaw, is 
almost forgotten, but very few people knowing that he is still alive.
	  We publish the above in order to show what wonderful liars some 
correspondents are.  The only Henry Starr (outlaw) we know of is now in the Fort 
Smith jail, whose age is about 22 years.  Ned Christie was wanted for murder, 
but never led any raids.  He was by himself when he murdered George Maple, a 
deputy marshal, and remained to himself until his death, and was in no way 
connected with any gang of outlaws.  Belle Reed, or Starr, which ever you please 
was a white woman who came to this country from Clay County, Mo., with the James 
and Younger Brothers along in 1868.