Billy the Kid's Grave
Is the Kid really buried under the marker bearing his name?
We’ve all heard about the Kid’s grave being washed away during a flood. But is that true?
How can we be certain that Billy is buried under the current gravestone?
So here’s the thing. Fort Sumner was first established as a military post in 1862. For the next six years, its cemetery would welcome 22 soldiers. Well, one of them was a civilian who was killed by soldiers, but that’s neither here nor there.
Lucien Maxwell purchased the fort in 1870, and the cemetery became the final resting place for civilians living there. The most famous of whom was Billy the Kid.
On July 15th, the Kid was interred beside his old pals Charlie Bowdre and Tom Folliard. A wooden maker was placed over the grave, but it was soon riddled with bullet holes thanks to drunken soldiers. A few years later, the marker was stolen altogether, and the grave would remain unmarked for around the next thirty-five years.
Skip ahead to October 8th, 1904. That’s when the great flood occurred, and the Pecos River covered the cemetery with around four feet of water.
A year later, Pat Garrett paid the cemetery a visit with author Emerson Hough.
“Twenty-five years of time had done their work in all that country, as we learned when we entered the little barbed wire enclosure of the cemetery where the Kid and his fellows were buried. There are no headstones in this cemetery, and no sacristan holds its records. Again, Garrett had to search the salt grass and greasewood. ‘Here is the place,’ said he at length. ‘We buried them all in a row. The first grave is the Kid’s, and next to him is Bowdre and then O’Folliard. There’s nothing left to mark them.”
Later that same year, it was announced that the Fort Sumner Cemetery would be closed. Per historian David G. Thomas, “The decision was motivated by a desire to consolidate all state military burials, plus a concern that further Pecos River flooding would entirely wash away the old cemetery.”
Originally, the plan was to relocate all of the bodies, but it was soon decided that only the soldiers would be reinterred.
The job fell to Charles W. Dudrow. He was responsible for ensuring that the soldiers were dug up, identified, reboxed, and shipped to the national cemetery at Santa Fe.
This was not an easy job, to say the least. It’s worth noting that these soldiers had been in the ground for nearly forty years. Most of their graves were unmarked, and for those that were marked, the writing was completely illegible.
Nevertheless, Mr. Dudrow got it done
He first interviewed all the old timers he could find, gathering intel. Keep in mind that in 1906, quite a few people who not only knew Billy the Kid but were present for the funeral were still alive, including Paulita and Deluvina Maxwell.
Indeed, Deluvina served as a defacto guide for years following the Kid’s death. When author Fred E. Sutton came to pay his respects in the mid-1920s, it was Deluvina who led him straight to Billy’s grave.
“We walked to the rude gate or entrance to the yard, from there was a path running among the graves, and she said: ‘Billy was buried three feet west of this path and thirty-one steps from the gate.’ We stepped the distance and she pointed to a sunbaked, cracked and desolate spot of ground about six feet by three, as bare as it could be made, with grass and weeds growing to it’s very edge and then utterly refusing to go further. ‘It has been this way always,’ she said, ‘and I don’t see why things won’t grow over Billy, for he was a good boy.”
Thanks to Old Timers like Deluvina, Charles Dudrow soon had a hand-drawn map, marking not only where the soldiers were buried but also Billy the Kid and his “gang members”—Charlie Bowdre and Tom Folliard.
According to historian David G. Thomas, “Dudrow successfully located the known military burials and made strenuous efforts to ascribe an identity to each set of remains, although he ultimately was unable to do so. He obviously was a meticulous worker. This gives his identification of Billy’s, Bowdre’s, and O’Folliard’s graves formidable credibility.”
The Dudrow map “provides the best historical documentation of the location of Billy, Bowdre, and O’Folliard’s graves that exists.”
Now, we’ll check back in with Billy in just a moment, but what Dudrow found when he began to open the soldiers' caskets is very interesting.
“The remains of each and every one were in a fine state of preservation and the entire skeleton of every one secured. The bones were dry and clean and no odor noticed except in one instance and then only very slightly.”
Hmmm, imagine that. Despite the cemetery flooding the year prior, the bodies of the soldiers were left remarkably intact.
Per the Albuquerque Citizen:
“The bodies were disinterred, put into coffins, and sent by teams to Santa Rosa. From there they were shipped over the El Paso and Southwestern to Santa Fe and will arrie Saturday, next, it is expected. There were twenty-two of them and they will be placed in the National cemetery west of the city of Santa Fe. The names, companies and regiments to which the soldiers belonged have been preserved, and will be placed on the headstones of their graves. Records of these are kept in the quartermaster’s department in Washington and by superintendent of the National cemetery in Santa Fe.”
Following the 1926 publication of Walter Noble Burns’ widely popular book, The Saga of Billy the Kid, people began flocking to the cemetery. But remember, there was still no headstone as the Kid’s original bullet-ridden marker had been stolen in the late 1880s.
I won’t bore you with the entire history of the cemetery, but the Kid got a new marker in 1927. The only problem was that it was placed in the wrong spot. This error was rectified three years later when four men—three of whom actually knew Billy the Kid—set out to locate the grave’s exact location.
These men were Paco Anaya, Jesus Silva, Vicente Otero, and Charles Foor
Of the four, Charles was the only one who didn’t personally know Billy the Kid. Be that as it may, he did arrive at Fort Sumner just a few months following the Kid’s death when the grave was still fresh. Mr. Foor may not have helped bury Billy Bonney, but he would have likely noted the location of his grave when others at Fort Sumner pointed it out. As for Anaya, Silva, and Otereo, they were all present that July night in 1881 when Garrett killed the Kid, and they helped prepare Billy for burial and even served as pallbearers. There’s no doubt that they had once known where Billy was buried. The only question was, could they still remember nearly 50 years later?
The location that these four decided upon is the current location of the gravesite. In October of that same year, King Vidor’s Billy the Kid was released on the big screen, and Billy was once more cast into the limelight. Once again, there was renewed interest, hence the large granite marker that still covers Billy’s grave to this day. This marker was placed exactly where Paco Anaya, Jesus Silva, Vicente Otero, and Charles Foor said the Kid was buried.
Now, here’s where things get really interesting…
When Silva and the others located Billy’s gravesite in 1930, they were unaware of the 1906 Dudrow map. In fact, historians wouldn’t even learn about the map until the 1990s.
If you’ll recall, Dudrow marked the location of Billy’s grave based on information from Old Timers who knew the Kid. And when you compare the location on Dudrow’s map to the spot where the granite marker currently stands (the same location that Anaya, Silva, Otero, and Foor all agreed upon), they damn near line up perfectly, give or take a few feet.
In other words, we can be relatively confident that the current memorial marks Billy the Kid's grave.
The only question remaining is whether or not Billy’s casket was physically washed away during the great flood of 1904
When Dudrow was reinterring the soldiers, he noted how well they were preserved. Not a single one had been washed away in the flood, and the burial mounds were still visible.
If the soldiers’ remains weren’t disturbed or damaged during the flood, then there’s a very good chance that Billy’s body wasn’t disturbed, either.
What’s the TLDR?
The idea that Billy the Kid’s casket or body was washed away in a flood is not backed up by any actual evidence. Yes, there was a large flood in October of 1904, but there’s no indication that the Kid’s grave was disturbed.
Based on the information we now have at our disposal—the excellent condition of the soldiers’ remains coupled with the Dudrow map—there’s a likely chance that Billy the Kid is still resting underneath that large granite marker. Give or take a few feet.
If you’d like to learn more, I’d strongly suggest picking up a copy of David G. Thomas’s book, Billy the Kid’s Grave. There’s a ton of info in the book on the history of Fort Sumner, as well as a breakdown of events following the Kid’s death. You’d be amazed how often Billy’s grave markers have been stolen!
I own a few of Mr. Thomas’ books, and they’re all very well-researched. You won’t be disappointed.
I’d also suggest that you read this article by Ben Doss and the Billy the Kid Coalition. It contains additional information regarding the Kid’s final resting place.
UPDATES!
Due to unforeseen circumstances, there was no new episode of The Wild West Extravaganza this week. Don’t worry; we’re coming back next Wednesday with brand-new content! Here are a few topics you can for in the upcoming weeks: Dangerous Dan Tucker, John Joel Glanton, Black Jack Ketchum, & an entire series on Kit Carson!
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