Bloody Bill Longley: The Mythology of a Gunfighter, Second Edition

Chapter 18 Same Old Rattling Bill

234 Long­ ley now languished in the well-guarded Galveston County jail until Judge Turner returned to Giddings in August to open the term of the district court. Although constrained by an iron bar connecting his ankles and affixed to chains,1 he kept himself occupied with a prolific frenzy of interviews, as well as writing letters when he could obtain writing materials and postage. Much of what he was reported as saying and wrote during this period gives insight into Long­ ley’s mindset as he sought to both justify himself and rationalize his selfcreated reputation, at the same time beginning to reconcile himself to his pending fate. But throughout his writings can be detected a continuing glimmer of hope that he might yet avoid the hangman. In one interview with a Chicago reporter, Long­ ley boasted of yet another killing that he had not previously mentioned. This involved an alleged duel with a man named Grady in Mexico, supposedly in revenge for the killing of a friend of Long­ ley in Texas. Long­ ley also claimed that he was at this time invited, but declined, to participate with Mexican bandits on a raid into Texas.2 As with his other claims, Same Old Rattling Bill Chapter 18 Same Old Rattling Bill 235 this one also appears to be another idle boast. Although it is possible, there was never any evidence that Long­ ley went to Mexico. On March 25, he mailed an extensive letter to the Illustrated Police News complaining about the description written of him in a previous issue as a “cold-blooded, wilful murderer,” claiming he always acted in self-defense. In this article, Long­ ley sought to rewrite the sordid events in his life, vigorously denying the killings he had so fervently boasted about only months before, insisting that the stories were the product of a vivid imagination on the part of the Giddings editor and the Galveston Daily News. “I had no showing for my life and I have so many enemies, that it is no use for me to say anything.” He proclaimed: “All those reports about my killing a soldier in Gonzales county, and the cattle drover, Rector, and the Osage Indians and then the soldier at Leavenworth, Kansas, and the quarter-master, in Wyoming, is all a conglomerated, damned lie.”3 In early April 1878, he wrote his captor, Milt Mast, his language an attempt at eloquence, expressing some sense of remorse, but nevertheless still self-pitying. His “unknown future” had become a source of increasing concern, and he sought to rationalize the extent of his crimes: I take my pen in hand to let you know that I still float through the greater [illegible] of misery, destined to that inevitable doom that awaits me sooner or later, but “Let the wide world wag as it will, I am still the same old rattling Bill.” Well, Captain, about eleven years ago I launched my boat upon that mighty river that leads to destruction, and without the least idea where it would land me. Of course you are aware that when once one gets under good headway going down this mighty channel it is very hard to check up. I have found that this great river has but one landing place, from its head to its mouth. The name of that place is Reformation-town, and after one passes Reformation-town there is no stopping place between him and 236  Chapter 18 eternity, no, none; but O, how few there are who get off at this landing! The reason of it is, the country looks beautiful on either side, and still more promising ahead, and on we go, until finally we begin to strike our boats against the terrible boulders and snags. Then it is we begin to see our companions wrecked and lost on either side of us; then it is that we see whither we are going. But, alas! too late, for we are then beyond the help of human hands. Then we cast a look or a thought back to our happy home, and Mother! Well, Captain, this is my condition, and I have lost my oars, so that now I can do nothing but fold my arms and sit back and “let-er [illegible],” but, at last, I am trying to concentrate my thoughts upon the great mystery of my unknown future, but, Oh, what strange...