Frontier Legends | Butch Cassidy | 4

In 1894, a young Utah ranch hand named Robert LeRoy Parker – already going by the alias "Butch Cassidy" – was convicted of horse theft and sent to a Wyoming penitentiary. It was a minor crime that set the course for a much larger criminal career. After his release, he went on to earn a fearsome reputation as the mastermind of a gang of outlaws known as the Wild Bunch, before he and his partner, the Sundance Kid, led lawmen on an international manhunt that would cement his place as one of the West's most enduring legends. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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• 0:00Lindsay Graham?

  Audible subscribers can binge new seasons of American History Tellers early and ad-free right now. Join Audible in the Audible app or by subscribing on Apple Podcasts.

• 0:17Lindsay Graham?

  Imagine it's the afternoon of August 13th, 1896. You're a teller at a bank in Montpelier, Idaho. You've just finished helping a customer, and now you're busy tidying up your counter. You hear the front door open and footsteps approaching. Hello and welcome to Idaho. As you look up, your voice falters. There's a broad-shouldered man with a bandana over his face, standing in front of your window. He waves a pistol at you as he shoves a canvas sack across the counter. This is a robbery. Put every dollar you have in this bag. You stand frozen, your mind racing. The robber slams his hand down on the counter. Move it. Panicking, you try to find an excuse not to hand over your customer's money. I'm afraid we're out of cash.

• 1:01Lindsay Graham?

  You're a damn liar. Let me see if this helps you think straight. The robber rears back and slams the butt of his gun into the side of your head. You fall forward, your elbows hitting the counter. Your vision blurs, and your ears ring. You hear voices arguing and briefly wonder if a sheriff has arrived to save you, but you know that can't be right. The closest sheriff is 100 miles away. After a moment, your vision clears and your ears stop ringing. You look up and see a second masked bandit standing near the door. That's who you must have heard. The two men were arguing about something. Robber closest to you glares at his accomplice a moment, but then turns back to you. Just fill the bag, or else. Okay, okay. You open your drawer and stuff the bills inside the bag, but your hands are shaking,

• 1:46Lindsay Graham?

  and you drop some cash on the floor. The bandit pounds his gun on the counter. In the bag, not on the floor. He cocks his gun. I'm sorry. Here, take my watch. You unchain the watch from your pocket, and the robber reaches his hand out to take it, but then hesitates. He looks back at the second robber by the door, who seems to be the one in charge, even though he's the smaller of the two. He gives a small but noticeable shake of his head, and the first robber pulls his hand back. Aw, keep it. We're not here for your money, just the bank's. Now move. He spring back into action, shoving the remaining bills from your drawer into the sack as fast as you can. And when you finished, you hand over the bag of money. Satisfied,

• 2:27Lindsay Graham?

  the two bandits run outside and jump on a pair of horses. You slump to the floor, exhausted. As he tried to catch your breath, you wonder what the robbers could have been arguing about. You had the distinct impression that the first robber wanted to kill you, but the second man talked him out of it. He's definitely the reason you still have your watch. So whoever those outlaws were, they seem to have a very peculiar sense of right and wrong.

• 2:55Speaker 01

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• 3:39Speaker 02

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• 4:22Speaker 02

  have given up on my mom, but I never will. Listen to My Mom's Murder wherever you get your podcasts. Audible subscribers can binge all 10 episodes early and ad-free right now. Join Audible in the Audible app or by subscribing on Apple Podcasts.

• 4:45Lindsay Graham?

  From Audible Originals, I'm Lindsay Graham, and this is American History Tellers: Our History, Your Story.

• 5:07Lindsay Graham?

  By the late 19th century, the American frontier was in a period of rapid transformation. For decades, the federal government had struggled to enforce the nation's laws in the remote territories of the West, giving rise to rowdy lawlessness. But by the 1890s, the railroad had made travel more accessible, and law enforcement was finally beginning to catch up. Still, one group of outlaws was determined to continue running amok. Dubbed the Wild Bunch by the press, they operated from Montana to Texas, rustling cattle, holding up banks, and robbing trains. Between jobs, they hid out among the natural rock formations of the rugged, isolated landscape. And the clever mastermind behind many of the Wild

• 5:48Lindsay Graham?

  Bunch's schemes went by the name of Butch Cassidy. He had a magnetic personality, but under the surface, he was a man genuinely torn between the outlaw life he lived and the legitimate life he seemed to want. Operating by a complex moral code entirely his own, he would ultimately achieve legendary status as an outlaw with a conscience. This is episode four in our five-part series on frontier legends: Butch Cassidy.

• 6:18Lindsay Graham?

  Robert Leroy Parker, later known as Butch Cassidy, was born on April 13th, 1866, in a remote settlement in the southern part of the Utah Territory. He was the first of 13 children born to English immigrants Anne and Maximilian Parker. Anne and Maximilian's parents had joined the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in England, but they faced persecution, mostly stemming from their practice of polygamy. So in 1856, when Maximilian was 12 and Anne was 14, they and their families boarded ships bound for the United States. Their ultimate destination was the Utah Territory, where the Mormon leader Brigham Young had established a refuge for his followers. But life in the Utah Territory was harder than

• 7:00Lindsay Graham?

  they expected. Summers were boiling hot and winters brutally cold. The land was difficult to farm, and Maximilian and Anne faced numerous setbacks. During one especially bad winter, their entire herd of cattle froze to death. Another year, fierce winds blew away all their newly planted seeds. Unable to support his family by farming, Maximilian was forced to look for additional work. He guided Mormon pioneers traveling to Utah, delivered mail, and worked construction. These jobs often took him away from home for long stretches of time. And in his absence, Anne also pitched in, taking work on other people's ranches, milking cows, and churning butter. As a result, their children were often left to fend for

• 7:42Lindsay Graham?

  themselves, including their oldest, Robert Leroy, whom they called Roy. As a child, Roy watched as the persecution his family had fled in England followed them to Utah. Roy's grandfather, who had two wives, was frequently forced to hide from U.S. Marshals looking to arrest him for bigamy. In one instance, he was charged with mail fraud for stealing stamps, though he complained that the charges had been trumped up to punish him for having more than one wife. Little Roy was confused by what he saw as the senseless persecution of his grandfather, a harmless old man doing nothing wrong. So he came to distrust the law and soon developed his own sense of right and wrong. Then, when Roy

• 8:23Lindsay Graham?

  was 12, he traveled to town to buy a new pair of blue jeans. But by the time he arrived, the general store was closed. Not wanting to have to make the long trip again, he broke in, took the pants, and left a signed IOU on the counter. Roy believed that this was a reasonable solution, but the store's owner did not agree and made a complaint to the local sheriff. When the sheriff came out to the Parker home and demanded the money for the pants, Roy's father Maximilian confronted Roy about what he'd done. But Roy didn't understand the problem. He explained that he had left the signed IOU clearly demonstrating that he hadn't stolen anything. He couldn't believe that the sheriff had wasted his time taking the storekeeper's complaint seriously. Worried about his son's cavalier attitude

• 9:06Lindsay Graham?

  toward the law, Maximilian decided what Roy needed was a change of scenery. So the following year, when Maximilian took a job on a horse ranch 85 miles away, he took Roy with him. Roy was strong for his age and skilled, both on horseback and with a branding iron. So even at 13, Roy was considered a valuable asset on the ranch. For the next several years, he continued to work as a ranch hand, mending fences, branding, and helping to drive cattle, further honing his skills. When he was 17, the ranch where Roy was working hired a new hand named Mike Cassidy. He was only about a year older than Roy, but he was far more worldly. Until recently, the area where Roy lived was populated almost

• 9:46Lindsay Graham?

  entirely by Mormons, who had strict rules against alcohol, extramarital sex, and other temptations. But after silver was discovered in Utah in the early 1880s, more and more outsiders like Mike Cassidy had begun moving there. And unlike the sober and reserved Mormon men Roy knew, Mike was a smooth talker who walked with a swagger and could hold his liquor. Mike and Roy quickly became close, and Roy looked up to him like a big brother. But what Roy didn't know was that as well as being an experienced ranch hand, Mike was also a skilled cattle rustler. Cattle theft was a huge problem throughout the West. Because large ranch owners dominated the business, it was nearly impossible for new

• 10:27Lindsay Graham?

  arrivals to rise above the level of ranch hand. With no path of upward mobility and poor pay, many resorted to making money in ethically dubious ways. But Mike rustled on a different scale than the typical ranch hand. In fact, not long after he arrived, Mike stole a whole herd of cows and enlisted Roy to help him drive them to a remote spot in the Henry Mountains about 100 miles away. Many large ranch owners looked the other way when a few cows here and there went missing, considering at the price of doing business. But this time, Mike had rustled too many cows for the rancher to ignore. So Mike needed to get out of Utah, and quickly. Roy wanted to go with him, but Mike insisted that they part ways, telling his friend he was too good to go on the run with him.

• 11:11Lindsay Graham?

  But rustling cattle with Mike had given Roy a taste of a more exciting life, and he didn't want to stay in Utah, barely scrimping by like his parents. So in April 1884, just a few days before his 18th birthday, Roy said goodbye to his family and headed off in search of adventure. For the next several years, he traveled around the West, taking work at cattle ranches in Wyoming and Montana while also rustling cattle. Three years later, in 1887, Roy arrived in Telluride, Colorado. Shortly after he got there, he met a man named Matt Warner in a bar. Warner owned a horse named Betty, who had the look of a worn-out nag, but in reality, she was fast. At the time, Colorado was known as a horse racing hotspot.

• 11:54Lindsay Graham?

  So Warner and Roy teamed up, taking advantage of Betty's unimpressive appearance to hustle gamblers out of money. They traveled around the state, racing local champion horses and taking bets. Over and over, other owners would assume their beautiful stallions could easily outrun Betty, but over and over, Betty crossed the finish line first. Warner and Roy raked in the winnings. Along the way, they were joined by a third man, a professional cattle rustler named Tom McCarty. But as word of Betty's prowess spread, it became harder to find people willing to bet against her. So McCarty came up with another idea for how to make money. On July 25, 1889, the trio walked into the San Miguel Valley Bank in Telluride, Colorado, and robbed it.

• 12:39Lindsay Graham?

  McCarty held up the teller at gunpoint, while Roy and Warner ran behind the counter and filled bags with all the money they could grab. Then they jumped on their horses and galloped out of town, hightailing it to an isolated part of southeastern Utah known as Robber's Roost. The large rock formations in this rugged canyon country of southern Utah made for an effective place to hide out. And when they finally counted the money they'd stolen from the bank, they discovered they'd made away with over $20,000. So even though they successfully hid out around Robber's Roost through the summer of 1889, in the fall, they spotted a four-man posse nearby and decided it was time to go their separate ways. Roy headed north to Wyoming, and by the time he arrived there in 1890, he was going by a new name: Butch Cassidy,

• 13:24Lindsay Graham?

  a tribute to his former mentor, Mike Cassidy. Under this new alias, Cassidy used his share of the San Miguel Valley Bank robbery to buy a horse ranch in central Wyoming. His goal was to breed horses, but soon, horses from other ranches in the area mysteriously started going missing. After one owner got a tip that Cassidy was headed west with a herd of stolen horses, he arranged for a posse to go after him. The men caught up to Cassidy in Auburn, Wyoming, on the western border of the state. Cassidy was convicted of horse theft, and in 1894, he was sentenced to two years in the state penitentiary. But after serving 18 months, Cassidy applied for a pardon and was granted a hearing in front of the governor. There, he was prepared to make his case.

• 14:11Lindsay Graham?

  Imagine it's January 1896 in a courtroom in Laramie, Wyoming. You're the governor of the state, and today you're hearing applicants for pardon. A shifty-looking cattle rustler with beady eyes stands in front of you. He swears he won't break the law again, but you don't believe him. Besides, you've recently been criticized for granting too many pardons, so today you're determined not to be too lenient. All right, well, I've heard your plea. Pardon denied. A clerk escorts the man out of the room before leading another prisoner in. You sit back in your chair as a stocky man with thick eyebrows and a dimpled chin makes his way to the front of the room. He gives you a courteous nod. Uh, let's see here, Butch Cassidy? That's me. All right, Mr. Cassidy, tell me why you think you should be pardoned.

• 14:55Lindsay Graham?

  Well, I've served three-quarters of my time. I don't see how a few more months behind bars is going to make much of a difference when it comes to learning a lesson. And have you learned your lesson? I'd say so. And what will you do if I let you out early? Well, I have some property in Colorado that needs looking after. I'd go there. You study the man. You're not sure he's telling the truth about owning property in Colorado, but there is something in the way he carries himself that makes him seem different from the others. Well, you're young. You seem smart. If you go straight, follow the law, you could still make something of yourself. Will you give me your word that you'll quit stealing horses or anything else? Cassidy looks away for a second, then fixes his eye on you. I'm afraid I can't do that. Excuse me?

• 15:39Lindsay Graham?

  Well, who's to say what might happen in the future? I don't want to give you my word if I don't know for certain I can keep it. I can make you another promise, though. Yeah, what's that? If you pardon me, I swear I'll never break the law in the state of Wyoming ever again. You have to suppress a smile. You can't help it, you like this man. You want to give him a chance, and if he sticks to his word and stays out of Wyoming, then no one can say you didn't protect the citizens of your state. Uh, well, if you break your promise, we'll lock you back up and just throw away the key. You understand that? I understand. All right. Pardon granted.

• 16:14Lindsay Graham?

  You watch as the stocky young man saunters out of the courtroom a free man. You hope you find out what happens to him one day. You just have a feeling it's going to be something special.

• 16:28Lindsay Graham?

  As soon as he was freed from the state penitentiary in Wyoming, Cassidy knew exactly where he was headed. He'd given his word not to commit another crime in Wyoming, and he intended to keep that promise, but there were plenty of other places to look for trouble. Because while he was in prison, Cassidy's appetite for money and adventure had only grown, and he'd had plenty of time to concoct ambitious new schemes that he hoped would earn him more money than the San Miguel Valley Bank robbery. And now that he was free, he was ready to put his plans into action. But he knew that if he was going to succeed, he'd need help, and it couldn't come from just anyone. He'd need to put together a crew, one as brazen and fearless as he was, and he knew just where to find them.

• 17:13Lindsay Graham?

  On January 1, 1892, a young Irish immigrant named Annie Moore became the first person processed at the new immigration station on Ellis Island. For the millions who followed her, this small island in New York Harbor would become the place where their American dream would either begin or end. Hi, I'm Lindsay Graham, the host of the podcast American History Tellers. We take you to the events, times, and people that shaped America and Americans, our values, our struggles, and our dreams. In our latest series, we trace the history of Ellis Island. For more than three decades, it served as the gateway through which millions of hopeful immigrants entered the United States. But as the nation struggled to decide who belonged, some would find the gate shut to them. Follow American History Tellers wherever you get your podcasts.

• 17:58Lindsay Graham?

  Audible subscribers can binge all episodes of American History Tellers early and ad-free right now. Join Audible in the Audible app or by subscribing on Apple Podcasts.

• 18:07Speaker 03

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• 18:44Lindsay Graham?

  In July 1896, Butch Cassidy took a job at a ranch outside Montpelier, Idaho. But he wasn't alone. With him were two new associates, Elsie Lay and Bob Meeks. After he'd been released from the Wyoming State Penitentiary, Cassidy had headed for Brown's Hole, a notorious outlaw hideout in Utah where he recruited Lay and Meeks. And now with them on board, he was ready to put his latest plan into action. In their downtime from the ranch, Cassidy and the men would head into Montpelier, ostensibly to grab a drink at the general store. But really, they were there to case the town's bank. After careful observation, they learned when the bank was the least busy and worked out where to plant fresh horses along their escape route

• 19:27Lindsay Graham?

  so they could stay ahead of anyone who came after them. Then they assigned roles for each of them to play during the robbery. When Cassidy was confident they had worked out all the details, they made their move. On August 13, 1896, Meeks stayed with the horses while Cassidy and Lay marched into the bank, wearing bandanas to conceal their faces and brandishing their guns. Lay confronted the teller while Cassidy stood by the door and kept the few customers inside calm and quiet. But when Lay hit the teller with the butt of his gun, Cassidy intervened and insisted that no bystanders be hurt during the theft. He had no interest in stealing from individuals, just the bank, and he worried that any real violence would give law enforcement one more reason to come after them.

• 20:12Lindsay Graham?

  In the end, no one was seriously harmed and the three bandits got away with over sixteen thousand dollars in cash and coins. But Cassidy was just getting started. Several months later, he and Lay concocted a plan to rob the Pleasant Valley Coal Company in Castle Gate, Utah. Like before, Cassidy and his accomplices got jobs at a nearby ranch and then spent months planning the heist. They obtained the fastest horses they could find and trained the animals not to spook at the sound of shouting and gunfire. And then they made sure to plan multiple escape routes in case one was blocked. Then with everything prepared, around noon on April twenty first, eighteen ninety seven, a train car carrying the payroll for the coal company rolled into Castle Gate.

• 20:56Lindsay Graham?

  As two workers carried the bags of cash from the train to the office, Cassidy and Lay confronted them with guns drawn. They grabbed almost nine thousand dollars in cash and gold before riding out to their hideout at Brown's Hole near the Wyoming border. After this Castle Gate robbery, Cassidy and his companions knew the smart thing to do was to lay low for as long as possible. But after a few months, they became restless, so they decided to hit the town. They headed just over the state line into Wyoming where they drank and danced and otherwise caused a ruckus. The men ended up spending so much money that no one in town really objected to their rowdy celebration. But their wild party had drawn attention, and not long after, mentions of Cassidy's gang started popping up in newspapers.

• 21:41Lindsay Graham?

  By this time, Cassidy had amassed a network of associates who he pulled in on various jobs. But while some newspapers claimed there were five hundred bandits working under him, the true number was likely closer to a dozen. These men were drawn to Cassidy's natural charisma and respected him for his cleverness and attention to detail. Each time he planned a job, he would pick and choose who he wanted. The newspapers and locals referred to the loosely organized group by a variety of names, including the Hole-in-the-Wall Gang, after one of their hideouts, but the name that ultimately stuck was the Wild Bunch. One member of the Wild Bunch was Harry Longebaugh. Born in eighteen sixty seven outside Philadelphia, at the age of fourteen, Longebaugh had left home and headed west.

• 22:23Lindsay Graham?

  Like Cassidy, he'd been looking to escape a life of poverty and found work as a ranch hand. But ultimately, four years later, a brutal winter swept through the Great Plains, causing nearly all the cattle to freeze to death. As a result, the ranch Longebaugh worked for shut down. So now, desperate and out of money, he stole a horse and a gun, but he was caught and convicted in Sundance, Wyoming, to two years of hard labor. When he was released in eighteen eighty seven, rather than being reformed, Longebaugh had decided he preferred the outlaw life and adopted a new nickname, the Sundance Kid. Shortly before the Castle Gate robbery, he fell in with Butch Cassidy and the Wild Bunch. For the next year, after every crime committed in the West, whether it was a bank robbery, cattle rustling, or train heist,

• 23:09Lindsay Graham?

  reporters speculated that it was the work of Cassidy and his crew. Then in March eighteen ninety eight, two members of a posse chasing an escaped fugitive were shot and killed not far from where Cassidy and some members of the Wild Bunch were hiding out. Cassidy's crew was not involved in the shooting, but the event sparked public outrage nonetheless. After years of chaos in the West, the public was fed up with violence. Powerful ranchers were tired of their cattle being stolen, bankers were tired of getting held up, and the railroad companies were tired of their trains being robbed. So in an attempt to appease their constituents, the governors of Colorado, Wyoming, and Utah announced that they would work together to crack down on bandits and outlaws.

• 23:51Lindsay Graham?

  Realizing his usual hideouts were no longer safe, Cassidy decided he needed to find somewhere else to lay low. So in the spring of eighteen ninety eight, Cassidy and his friend Elzy Lay started working at a ranch in New Mexico. Cassidy was a skilled ranch hand, and the ranch's owner, a man named William French, took a liking to him. But even while Cassidy was ostensibly laying low, he couldn't resist planning another heist. In the early hours of the morning on June second, eighteen ninety nine, a tall man, now thought to be the Sundance Kid, flagged down a Union Pacific train outside Wilcox, Wyoming. When the train slowed, five men with guns, including Elzy Lay, appeared.

• 24:31Lindsay Graham?

  They forced the driver to separate the engine car from the express car and then blew up the express car with dynamite to open the safe. When it was all over, the thieves rode away with approximately thirty-six thousand dollars. Cassidy was credited as the mastermind of the scheme, but there is some debate whether or not he participated personally in the actual robbery. If he did, he was breaking the promise he made to the governor of Wyoming to never commit another crime in that state. Regardless, the owner of Union Pacific was furious that his train had been destroyed and hired the Pinkerton Detective Agency to track down the criminals responsible. Because the United States did not have a national police force at the time, companies often took it upon themselves to hire private detectives to track criminals across state lines.

• 25:15Lindsay Graham?

  And the Pinkertons were considered the most elite of these agencies, with a reputation for being relentless when it came to hunting down outlaws. Meanwhile, Cassidy continued to work on William French's ranch, but Elzy Lay wanted more action. And in July eighteen ninety nine, he and a handful of other men robbed a Colorado and Southern train not far from Folsom, New Mexico. The take of this heist was beyond anything Lay and the others could have dreamed of. They secured seventy thousand dollars from the safe, the equivalent of over two and a half million dollars today. But as they were making their getaway, the gang was cornered by a sheriff's posse. A gunfight broke out and the sheriff and two deputies were killed. Lay and one of the other outlaws were seriously wounded.

• 25:58Lindsay Graham?

  Lay managed to get away, but a month later, he was arrested near the Texas border. He was convicted of robbery and murder and ultimately sentenced to life in prison. And Lay wasn't the only member of the Wild Bunch whose time on the outlaw trail was running out. Bob Meeks, who had helped Cassidy and Lay with the Montpelier bank robbery, was behind bars. And Harry Longebaugh, the Sundance Kid, had been involved in a train robbery gone wrong. While he had gotten away, two other members of the Wild Bunch had been killed. One by one, Cassidy's fellow outlaws were going down. Still, he continued to lay low at French's ranch. But one day, while Cassidy was away from the ranch, moving a herd of cows, a Pinkerton agent showed up, demanding to speak to William French about one of his ranch hands.

• 26:47Lindsay Graham?

  Imagine it's late eighteen ninety nine in southern New Mexico. You're the owner of a cattle ranch and you're in your office working on some accounting. Lately, you've been feeling like things are really humming, and much of that is thanks to your trail boss, Jim Low. He's well-mannered and truly gifted when it comes to herding cattle across the long dusty trails. You're deep in the numbers, so you startle at a knock on the door. A man walks in, removing his black bowler hat. He's tall with dark hair and a thin mustache. Sorry to bother you, but are you the owner of this ranch? I am. How can I help you? I'm with the Pinkerton Detective Agency. I'd like to ask you a few questions. Oh, of course. Yeah, come on in. You offer him a seat and the detective pulls out a photograph of his coat pocket, placing it on your desk.

• 27:32Lindsay Graham?

  It shows five men in suits and derby hats grinning at the camera. Now, do you recognize any of the men in this picture? Oh, yeah, that one there's Jim Low, my trail boss. What's this all about? Well, I'm afraid his name isn't Jim Low, but rather Butch Cassidy. Your mouth drops open because you know that name. Everyone knows that name. He's one of the most notorious outlaws in the country. Oh, no, that can't be right. It can be. We caught a man passing bills traced to the robbery up near Wilcox a few months back. He tipped us off that Cassidy was here. Oh, I'm telling you, that's not possible. The man I know is incredibly honest. In fact, once he started working here, not one cow's been rustled. You know how it goes. Most trail bosses pick a few for themselves, but not Jim, not Jim Low. You must be mistaken.

• 28:17Lindsay Graham?

  Well, we've heard that from others. Apparently Cassidy has some kind of rule about never stealing from someone he works for. Well, regardless, I don't believe it's him. Let me ask you some more questions. As a trail boss, does he hire hands who come and go? Yeah, but that's normal. At times, do you catch them laughing and talking like old friends? Sometimes, but hard work it bonds men. Well, I've got news for you. Those men are not strangers. They're associates in his gang. Look, even if what you say is true, if you come to arrest him, it's no use because he's not here. Well, I wouldn't be foolish enough to try to arrest him on my own. No, I don't know what kind of fight he'll put up. I was just here to follow up on a lead. But now that you've confirmed he's here, I'll be back with more men.

• 28:59Lindsay Graham?

  And I'd be careful if I were you. Cassidy can be charming, but he is an outlaw, and he's dangerous.

• 29:07Lindsay Graham?

  The Pinkerton man puts his hat back on and you walk him to the door in a daze. Jim Low can't be Butch Cassidy. But even if he is, you're not going to help him apprehend the man you come to know and trust. You're determined to warn Low or Cassie or whatever his name is that the Pinkertons are on to him. You never thought you'd protect an outlaw, but you can't help it. You like the guy.

• 29:32Lindsay Graham?

  By the time the Pinkerton agent left, ranch owner William French was convinced his favorite trail boss was indeed a notorious outlaw. But French felt a peculiar sense of loyalty to his employee, and when Butch Cassidy returned to the ranch, French warned him about the Pinkerton detectives' visit. Cassidy told French not to worry and calmly began making plans to move on, but there was no denying it. The walls were closing in. Cassidy had been to prison before and he had no desire to go back. So determined to remain a free man, he came up with a plan. In early nineteen hundred, Butch Cassidy returned to Juab County, Utah, where he'd grown up, and walked into the sheriff's office. He knew everything hung in the balance. If his plan worked, he could put his outlaw days behind him and start fresh.

• 30:16Lindsay Graham?

  If it didn't, he would likely spend the rest of his life behind bars.

• 30:26Speaker 04

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• 31:09Speaker 04

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• 31:26Speaker 03

  You stepped out for your morning jog, except it's not your usual morning jog. You started listening to an epic sci-fi book on Audible. Thirty chapters later, you've accidentally run a half marathon. You've lost track of how far you've run, somewhere just past the city limits. You can't stop. You have to find out what happens next. Then it's over. The universe seems bigger. You feel different. You feel like you have no idea where you are. Audible, stories that speak to you.

• 32:04Lindsay Graham?

  Imagine it's an early winter morning in 1900. You're the sheriff of Juab County, Utah, and you've just released the last man from the drunk tank. You're sitting at your desk pouring yourself a cup of coffee when you hear the door open and you can't believe your eyes. Roy, is that you? The man grins. Hello, Sheriff. It's been a minute, hasn't it? The last time you saw Roy Parker, he was a skinny teenager. Now he's all grown up, and everyone around here knows that he goes by the name Butch Cassidy. Cassidy gestures to a chair in front of your desk. May I? Yeah, of course. Have a seat. What are you doing here, Roy? Well, here's the truth, Sheriff. I'm tired of living on the run. I've seen the future. Most of my friends are dead or in prison,

• 32:47Lindsay Graham?

  and I've decided I want to go straight, to come home and do honest work. Oh, is that so? You think after all you've seen and done, you could lead a normal life? I do, and to prove it, I'm handing over my guns. Cassidy removes two pistols from his belt and places them on the desk. You raise your eyebrows. This is a significant gesture. He might actually be serious. All right. I'm listening. Tell me more. The way I see it, if I'm going to live on the right side of the law, I need a clean slate. I was wondering if you could help me get a meeting with the governor so I can ask for a pardon. Have you been convicted of a crime in Utah? No, never. Well, then I don't think you can get a pardon. I think what you mean is amnesty, when you're forgiven before being convicted of a crime,

• 33:32Lindsay Graham?

  kind of like when someone who's being chased by the law hides out in a church. You know, the church gives him amnesty. Well, I don't care what it's called. I just want to be able to settle down without worrying about ending up in prison. Never want to go back there. But you know, even if the governor grants you forgiveness for your past crimes, the amnesty would only apply in Utah, right? Well, that's better than nothing. Well, I'm just... Look, just don't get your hopes too high. The governor would have to take a big gamble and trust that you really are a changed man. Well, he wouldn't need to worry, because I always keep my word. Now, will you help me get a meeting with him or not, Sheriff? You look at Cassidy and see an expression of pure determination, and you know what it would mean to his family

• 34:16Lindsay Graham?

  if their son was no longer a wanted criminal. So you nod your head. It will probably come to nothing, but you'll help him get the meeting at least. Maybe the governor will surprise you.

• 34:29Lindsay Graham?

  Shortly after Butch Cassidy's return to Juab County, the sheriff there arranged a meeting with Utah Governor Heber Wells. Cassidy hoped that if he promised to go straight and made a plea for clemency, the governor might be willing to grant him amnesty for his past crimes. The sheriff vouched for Cassidy, saying that the outlaw was serious about reform, and the governor responded that he was open to the idea as long as Cassidy wasn't guilty of murder, and Cassidy swore that he had never killed anyone. But when Governor Wells had the Attorney General's office look through the records, they found that Cassidy was wanted for murder in Wyoming. When confronted with this news, Cassidy swore it wasn't true, but the governor was firm that he was a deal-breaker. Seething, Cassidy stormed out.

• 35:13Lindsay Graham?

  But Cassidy's hopes of going straight weren't completely dashed. A lawyer he consulted with came up with another idea for how to keep him out of prison. Instead of asking the states to forgive Cassidy's crimes, his lawyer approached one of the most powerful railroad companies at the time with a bold proposal. He suggested to the Union Pacific Railroad that they look past Cassidy's earlier train robberies and instead hire him as security, arguing that his presence alone would act as a kind of insurance and dissuade other outlaws from robbing the trains. And according to some accounts, officials from Union Pacific agreed to the idea. Cassidy's lawyer informed him of the potential job, and he was intrigued. They agreed that his lawyer would work out the details of the deal with Union Pacific,

• 35:56Lindsay Graham?

  then meet Cassidy 10 days later to go over everything at one of his old hideouts in southwestern Wyoming known as Lost Soldier Pass. But when the time came, a rainstorm delayed the lawyer's departure. Then he got lost trying to find Cassidy's remote hideout. When he finally arrived, he was a day late, and Cassidy was nowhere to be found. What the lawyer discovered instead was a note Cassidy had left accusing the lawyer of trying to trick him and telling Union Pacific to go to hell. Not long after, in August 1900, five men robbed a Union Pacific train as it was leaving Tipton, Wyoming. The heist was pulled off almost exactly the same way as a train robbery a year earlier in Wilcox, Wyoming. A bystander even said that he heard the robbers reference Wilcox.

• 36:41Lindsay Graham?

  So officials immediately placed the blame on Butch Cassidy and the Wild Bunch, including Cassidy's old pal, Harry Longbaugh, the Sundance Kid. It was clear that Cassidy had gone back on his promise to never commit another crime in Wyoming. And now, with no hope of amnesty in Utah and with his pardon voided in Wyoming, Cassidy realized he would forever be hunted by law enforcement. Believing that there was nowhere in the country he would be safe, he decided his only chance was to flee the United States altogether. He would go south to Argentina and make a new life. By all accounts, the landscape there was similar to the American West, with mountains, alpine lakes, and high deserts. And land was cheap there. He could start a cattle ranch.

• 37:23Lindsay Graham?

  But starting over in South America would require a significant amount of cash. So to raise the funds he needed, he spent the next several months pulling off more jobs, including robbing a bank in Nevada and holding up a train in Montana. By early 1901, Cassidy believed he finally had enough money to start over, and he wouldn't be going to South America alone. Longbaugh had decided to come with him. Together, these two men, along with a woman named Etta Place that Longbaugh had taken up with, made their way to New York and boarded a passenger ship destined for Buenos Aires. When they arrived, they deposited their stolen money in a bank, applied for land from the government, and proceeded to ranch it quietly for the next four years. But despite their best efforts, Cassidy and Longbaugh had not managed to outrun their past.

• 38:08Lindsay Graham?

  The head of the Union Pacific Railroad Company still wanted Cassidy to pay for his crimes, so he sent Pinkerton detectives to South America to hunt Cassidy and Longbaugh down. By the spring of 1905, Cassidy got word that Pinkerton agents were closing in, so he, Longbaugh, and Etta Place fled their ranch. Before long, they had robbed a bank in western Argentina, then crossed into Chile. But at some point along the way, Etta Place grew tired of the outlaw life and parted ways with the men. Cassidy and Longbaugh remained on the loose until November 1908, when they robbed a courier carrying the payroll for a mining company in San Vicente, Bolivia. Afterwards, they holed up in a boarding house outside the city, but the proprietor recognized the brand on one of their mules,

• 38:52Lindsay Graham?

  identifying it as belonging to the mine. Suspicious, he tipped off the police that he thought the payroll robbers were at his boarding house. On November 6, 1908, local law enforcement surrounded the boarding house, preparing to capture the robbers. But as the constable entered to make the arrest, Cassidy shot and killed him. A prolonged gunfight ensued. Cassidy and Longbaugh were vastly outnumbered and running out of ammunition. Then, at approximately 9:00 PM, police officers heard two gunshots, followed by silence. Fearing it was a trap, the police continued to shoot at the boarding house. And finally, at noon the next day, police entered and found Cassidy and Longbaugh's bodies. It appeared that Cassidy had shot the Sundance Kid, then himself.

• 39:37Lindsay Graham?

  Before they died, the outlaws had managed to kill 20 Bolivian law enforcement agents while injuring several more. It was the first time that Butch Cassidy was confirmed to have killed anyone in all his years of criminal exploits. The Bolivian authorities took the bodies away, and the two friends are believed to have been buried in unmarked graves in the San Vicente Cemetery. When news of their fate got back to the United States, many people who had known Cassidy and Longbaugh refused to believe that they were dead. Instead, they were convinced it had been a clever ploy by Cassidy to throw off his pursuers. And up until the 1930s, people claimed to have seen Cassidy and Longbaugh in all manner of places. As time went on, Cassidy and Longbaugh were remembered as regional folk heroes,

• 40:21Lindsay Graham?

  but to the wider world, they largely fell into obscurity. That changed in 1969 with the release of the film Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, which transformed Cassidy and Longbaugh from largely forgotten outlaws into American legends. Butch Cassidy was a brazen thief and a fugitive, but to the people who knew him, he was never a villain. In the end, his contradictions were what made him legendary. He believed he could be an honorable man while living entirely outside the law.

• 40:53Lindsay Graham?

  From Audible Originals, this is episode four of our five-part series on frontier legends for American history tellers. On the next episode, after rising from a poverty-stricken childhood in Ohio, Annie Oakley becomes one of the most celebrated sharpshooters in America, dazzling audiences with feats that seem to defy the laws of physics. But Oakley is determined to show the world that she's more than just a girl with a gun.

• 41:19Lindsay Graham?

  American History Tellers is only possible because of listeners like you, so thank you. And don't miss an episode. Be sure to follow American History Tellers on Audible or wherever you get your podcasts. Audible subscribers can binge new seasons of American History Tellers early and ad-free right now. Join Audible in the Audible app or by subscribing on Apple Podcasts. And to find out more about me, including my other podcasts, my live show, the history tours I'm arranging, and all sorts of other things, go to historyishuman.com. That's historyishuman.com.

• 41:54Lindsay Graham?

  If you'd like to learn more about Butch Cassidy, we recommend The Outlaw Trail by Charles Kelly, Butch Cassidy: The True Story of an American Outlaw by Charles Leerson, and Butch Cassidy: A Biography by Richard Patterson. American History Tellers is hosted, edited, and produced by me, Lindsay Graham, for Airship. This episode is written by Austin Rackliss, edited by Dorian Marina. Senior producers, Alida Rosansky and Andy Herman. Managing producer, Desi Blalock. Audio editing by Mohamed Shazib. Music by Throm. Sound design by Molly Bond. Executive producer for Audible, Jenny Lauer-Deckman. Head of creative development at Audible, Kate Navin. Head of Audible Originals North America, Marshall Louis. Chief content officer,

• 42:35Lindsay Graham?

  Rachel Kiyats. Copyright 2026 by Audible Originals LLC. Sound recording copyright 2026 by Audible Originals LLC.

• 43:01Speaker 04

  He lurks in shadow. He slips into dreams. He casts no reflection. Audible presents Bram Stoker's Dracula: How You've Never Heard It Before, with a new full cast audio thriller starring Jonathan Bailey as Dracula, Ella Purnell as Mina Harker, and an A-list cast, including Maggie Gyllenhaal as Van Helsing, Amy Lou Wood as Lucy, David Johnson as Dr. Seward, and many more. When Mina's fiancé Jonathan Harker vanishes in Transylvania, Mina pieces together letters, diary entries, and chilling testimony to hunt the predator

• 43:40Speaker 04

  stalking those she loves, only to discover Dracula's already hunting her. Audible's Dracula invites you to welcome literature's most shadowy figure into your home. Listen to the new audiobook adaptation of Bram Stoker's Dracula, only on Audible.