Outlaws and Violence of American West Essay

Many Americans consider the era of the middle-aged air jacket as one of the closely fascinating chapters in our history. Its an era that is unequivoc on the wholey American, and pot around the world identify America with the era of the Old atomic number 74. There is a great deal legend surrounding American History of the uncivilized westerly when it nonpluss to American kayoedlaws law men and force-out. But what is the real number history virtually personnel in the air jacket? In this paper I will gibber rough illegalizes and lawmen as well as the portrayal of wildness of the westerly and try to identify the myths and legends versus fact from which the American assessment as emaciated up.So what is an outlaw? Well an outlaw is pretty very much serious what it sounds like. Somebody who has broken the law and is on the run from the law. The west was non a lawful devote and roughly of the people in the west where on the fringes with the law to begin with.One of the about noted outlaws in American history is Billy the slang. Billy the put one across has come bug out as a towering mythological figure, yet the history of the real Billy the Kid is more or lessthing we dont really know that much about. Other famous outlaws like Jesse James and his gang, and the frenzied Bunch with dam Cassidy and the Sundance Kid had their exploits widely c everyplaceed by the popular press of the snip, and the American state-supported seemed to take great interest in the tales of their exploits. So could the media of the time period make a lot of stuff up about the law in the American West because thats what s senescent?Or is it just the love for offence and fantasy telling stories is what drives the American mindset. In spite specific incidents of violence, the lawlessness of the Wild West has been blown out of proportion. Ironically, the myth of the lawless West began forrader the period was everyplace. News articles and books scripted in the East exaggerated the wests tales, or evidently made up, stories about the crimes and criminals of the West. Hollywood later fueled the myth, feeding the frequents desire for excitement and adventure with stories of shootouts in the street and stage robberies.The avowedly story of the Old West is rather boring to nearly people. Because of the need to hunt for food or protect themselves from wild animals, numerous people did consume guns. However, fans of Hollywood westerlys may be surprised to need that many western towns had strict gun ordinances, making it illegal to exile guns intown. People entering the town were required to surrender their firearms to the sheriff. In fact, a story that has come to epitomize the violence of the Wild West involved a conflict over such a law. When Virgil Earp, on with his brothers Morgan and Wyatt and their friend Doc Holliday, confronted vanadium cowboys in the city of Tombstone over carrying firearms in town, violence erupted.This inc ident became known as the shootout at the OK corral and only lasted about 30 seconds yet its forever immortalized in our history. We know this because of the countless movies and books written about the event. Its interesting to note that even in this almost famous gunfight of the knockdown-dragout West, only three people were killed. In any innovational city today, such a minor incident would probably not even be front-page news. So, was in that respect violence in the mountains, plains, and frontier towns of the old west? Yes.Most of the settlers despicable west, whether they were farmers, cowboys, miners, or some other profession, were undecomposed and hardworking. Just as today, outlaws existed, yet in most places and for most people, violent crime was not the daily norm that popular entertainment would reserve us believe. As un American as it may be, relatively some people in the Wild West were involved in the gunfights and microscope stage robberies that were immorta lized by the movies. As I mentioned before there is no outlaw more legendary than Billy the Kid. Countless books, movies, and songs have been written about his look, exclusively the worldly concern was not quite as sensational.Often envisioned as a cold-blooded killer, he entered a life of crime out of necessity, not malice. People who knew him individualally called him brave, resourceful honest, and full of laughter. down the stairs different circumstances, he probably have been a successful person if it werent for his upbringing. The most famous myth about Billy the squirt was that he killed 21 people, one for individually year of his life. In reality this is just not the truth. He was probably only responsible for quaternion killings in his lifetime. In reality a lot of Billy the Kids story has too been kind of blown out of proportion, although most of the events ar true. Enraged from the murder of gutter Tunstall, Billy and his fellow companions were deputized and w edded the warrants to bring in the Murphy men who had killed him. They called themselves the Regulators.Due to the corruption of the day, the regulator sided with Murphy, and the Regulators became the enemy. He was known to have killed four men as mentioned antecedently but because the media and the American love for action, it was out of proportion. After a doughty escape from jail, and a few years on the run, he was relish and killed by Sheriff Pat Garrett while hiding out in a friends nursing home. Over the years, several people have sayed to be Billy the Kid, but the chance that he survived and/or his body was misidentified are highly unlikely.Sticking to the topic of violence in the American West as being somewhat a myth we can insure at the California gold rush. In three years, more than 200,000 people had migrated to California, most of them trying to get rich quick. If there were ever a recipe for chaos, this would seem to be one. One would think that these gold camps where home to tons of violence and outlaws. People of varied backgrounds and ethnicities, all armed and all seeking a valuable resource. But the exploit camps quickly evolved rules for establishing mining claims and for judging disputes. The fact that each person carried a six-shooter meant that each had a relatively equal amount of power.That minimized violence. Dozens of movies have portrayed the nineteenth-century mining camps in the West as places of anarchy and violence, but according to Roaring Camp beginning in 1848, the miners began forming contracts with one another(prenominal) to restrain their own behavior. There was no government authority in California at the time, apart from a few military posts. The miners contracts open property rights in land that the miners themselves enforced. Even though there was some violence in these camps the miners more or less kept civilized. Gunfights neer really broke out and violence was kept at verbalize because of the law.Though we dont learn about this too much because of the movies and media once again. So what about gunfights with outlaws and lawmen? It is in everybody mind that two men meet a high noon in the middle of a busy street for everybody to watch and then when the clock strikes you draw your pistol and shoot. Though movies and television would like us to believe otherwise, it was very high-minded when gunfights occurred with the two gunfighters squarely facing each other from a aloofness in a dusty street.This romanticized image of the Old West gunfight was born in the dime novels of the late 19th century and perpetuated in the film era, to such a point that this fictional version is what our minds eye quickly conjures up when we hear the word gunfight. In actuality, the real gunfights of the Old West were rarely that civilized. In fact, there are several misconceptions about these gunfights. The first of which is that very rarely, did the gunfighters actually plan a gunfight to occur, calling out their enemy for dueling action in the street. Instead, most of these fights took place in the heat of the moment when tempers flared, and more often than not, with the adjutant stork of a little bottled courage.They also didnt occur at a distance of 75 feet, with each gunfighter taking one shot, one locomote dead to the ground, and the other standing as a hero before a dozen gathered onlookers. Instead, these fights were usually close-up and personal, with a number of shots doomed from pistols, often resulting in innocent bystanders hit by a pot gone wild. Much of the time, it would be difficult to tell who had even win the gunfight for several minutes, as the black powder smoke from the pistols exculpated the air. This is not to say that it never happened similar to the movies.One of the rare instances is the Wild Bill Hickok-David Tutt Shootout in Springfield, Missouri. Even then, it wasnt a intend event, but rather, it occurred when Wild Bill ran into Tutt in the str eet and was insulted. Al airs shown courageously facing each other in the popular westerns movies with the like of Clint Eastwood and John Wayne, in reality, the opponents were more often running around shooting wildly and ducking for cover. The gunfights were not usually clean either, as the fighters were drinking and scatty normally easy shots, continued to shoot until they had emptied their pistol.This popular idea to the public mind that the frontier of the American West was an extremely violent place with little value placed on a human life is far from truth it seems. Small Western cow towns are vox populi to have witnessed hundreds of murders and killings. As well as, many outlaws and their gangs riding through the towns robbing banks, trains and stagecoaches. In fact, there were only five killings in Dodge City during its most homicidal year of 1878. Deadwood, S.D., had five deaths in its worst year with Tombstone, Ariz., experiencing five killings in its most violent year. So why do these towns claim these accounts? Well thats easy to answer. The west was opening up and occlusion was becoming vast in nature.A lot of people moving westward were already on the fringe with the law. So these cities saw this as a selling point for people to come to their towns. That the law didnt exist in the towns. Once again we see the media using the myths and legends to there leverage. Some of the real violence and outlaws that happened during the expansion of the west we dont often hear about. The homestead act of 1862 contributed to rapid settlement of western lands, and thus to conflict and violence, specifically with the cattle barons that were already there. Cattlemen often claimed deep areas of open sick, using it for grazing and for driving their cattle to market.Although in most cases they had no legal claim to the land, they had used it in this way for years, often fighting off Indians and other cattlemen in order to do so. on with their wealth and the po wer provided by the men working for them, they felt that having come first gave them the right to do whatever it took to drive the homesteaders out. This was especially true when homesteaders fenced off their land, limiting access to already scarce sources of water. The most famous of the conflicts that resulted is the Johnson County warfare, which ended only after the cavalry was sent in by order of the President.The large cattle barons also fought among themselves for control of the open range and lucrative government supply contracts. The most infamous of these fights is the Lincoln County War of 1878, in which the outlaw Billy the Kid as who I mentioned previous rose to fame. Of course, miners, homesteaders, and cattlemen alike also had to worry about the native tribes that they were displacing. These conflicts also led to violence. Many Americans consider the era of the Old West as one of the most fascinating chapters in our history. Its an era that is unequivocally American. There is much legend and myths about history of the Wild West when it comes to American outlaws lawmen and violence.As we have seen in this paper, a lot of the violence and outlaws were blown out of proportion for the most part due to the over romantic love of violence the American mind has come to love. This is due to the western movies and novels because thats what sold the American heart. Although we do see that violence did exist in the west with the Johnson and Lincoln county wars and outlaws like Billy the Kid and Jesse James, most of the history of violence is was too dramatized. Why? Well I dont know about you but John Wayne and Clint Eastwood seemed to be pretty big heroes in my mind, and well the movies are great way to feed our ego boosting American mindset of how the west was really won.