“ Don’t you cross the square with my watch Dave!” By way of an answer Tutt pulled his pistol and fired, as Hickok did the same.
Seventy-five yards away Wild Bill walked out of his hotel and threw down the gauntlet. Wild Bill wasn’t happy, but he allowed it with the warning, “Don’t let me see you on the street with my watch, Dave.” The next morning the streets were lined with the curious as Dave Tutt and a couple of his cronies were strolling down Main Street, with Dave flaunting Hickok’s pocket watch. His pocket watch had been part of the bet, and Dave insisted that he hold it against the debt of 25 dollars. Hickok and Tutt had been playing poker and Bill lost a big pot to the loud mouthed Tutt. They were both wooing the prettiest girl in town, their political sympathies were at odds, but it came down to a pocket watch. When confederate Dave Tutt bragged he could, “ Shoot a bird on the wing“, in Springfield, in 1865, former Union soldier, Bill Hickok was quick to reply, “ Did the crow have a pistol? Was he shooting back? I will be.“ There’s a number of reasons people say Hickok and Tutt fought.
Just weeks after the end of the Civil War, Wild Bill took the train to the end of the tracks in Springfield, Missouri. Wild Bill Hickok The prototype of the old west pistol fighter, Bill Hickok had the size, the sad eyes and the heroic exploits to make an impression on most any body. He told the Canadian judge, “ No jail can hold me, sir.” Over the next 4 years, Bill Miner, escaped 5 times. In 1906 the old cowboy was sentenced to life. From 1861 – 1911 Cowboy Bill robbed trains and stagecoaches in the American and Canadian West. Old Bill Miner Hands up! The first cowboy to utter these immortal lines was Old Bill Miner.