A Texas Cowboy, or Fifteen Years on the Hurricane Deck of a Spanish Pony by Charles A. Siringo (review)

314 Western American Literature But it would be unfair to judge the book solely on these merits. Allen’s study is important to western and economic historians as a pioneering survey of the company town and not as a “penetrating analysis of that peculiar in­ stitution.” The strength of the work lies in the questions it raises, and it will maintain its importance to western economic history only as long as they remain unanswered, for the data collected in the answering process will undoubtedly alter many of the tentative conclusions reached by the author. The cycle would then have run its course. Allen is to be commended for launching the process. T h o m a s F. A n d re w s , Pasadena College A Texas Cowboy, or Fifteen Years on the Hurricane Deck of a Spanish Pony. By Charles A. Siringo. (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1966. 143 pages, $1.70.) It is always a pleasure to encounter an old friend in fine new raiment, and to realize that he has lost none of his pristine vigor. This true-life classic of frontier days has of late been readily available only in a pocket edition whose small type on cheap paper adds nothing to the pleasure of reading. Thanks to the University of Nebraska Press this Bison Book is now available, in a modestly priced edition which takes full advantage of Carl Hertzog’s eye-pleasing typography and the striking illustrations of Tom Lea. The only serious fault to be found with the new edition is the lack of a good index. A Texas Cowboy reveals more than the life and adventures of a man who was an early-day cowboy detective. It paints a valid picture of life as actually lived on the cattle ranges of Texas and New Mexico. This was the first of the authentic cowboy biographies and was doubtless the inspiration which prompted the several other old-timers who later recorded their re­ collections. In content, and with more than a touch of showmanship, Siringo’s is probably the most noteworthy of these published reminiscenses. The book relates something of the life and death of Billy the Kid, a subject which Siringo was quick to recognize as a matter that had captured amazingly wide-spread interest. In later writings, notably his History of Billy the Kid, published in 1920, he took advantage of this popular thirst for stories about the Kid, and elaborated upon what A Texas Cowboy had said about this young outlaw. Charlie Siringo did not reach New Mexico until 1880, some two years after the climactic “Five Days Battle” at Lincoln which formally ended the Lincoln County War. However A Texas Cowboy, written less than four years after the death of Billy the Kid, may be taken as factually authentic as to accounts of happenings involving Billy the Kid in which Siringo himself took part. As to other matters concerning the Kid, Reviews 315 Siringo had to rely on what had been told him by Frank Stewart, Pat Garrett, and others with whom he was associated in the pursuit and cap­ ture; none of these could be considered unbiased, and much of their infor­ mation was obviously hearsay. Too, Siringo seems to have relied largely on the accounts of imaginative old Ash Upson whose book, Pat. F. Garrett’s Authentic Life of Billy the Kid, had been published three years before A Texas Cowboy appeared. Thus some of Siringo’s understandings regarding Billy the Kid are open to question in the light of other evidence, much of it documentable. In the main, however, what he has to say bears the stamp of accuracy; and his eye witness story of the final pursuit and eventual cap­ ture of Billy the Kid is generally accepted as perhaps the most accurate account of these happenings. The late J. Frank Dobie’s commentary on Charlie Siringo and his writ­ ings, which appeared as a note at the end of the last previous re-print of A Texas Cowboy (1951) is quite properly used as an introduction in the University of Nebraska Press edition. This is an “introduction” in the true sense of the word...