Tom Horn: Last of the Bad Men

'Confronting a character whose episodes were savagely dramatic, Mr. Monaghan avoided romantic gilding' - "New York Times Book Review". 'Jay Monaghan does an excellent job of retelling [Horn's] story...[He knew] the Tom Horn country at first hand, talked to dozens of oldtimers who saw Tom in the flesh, [collected] Tom Horn material for twenty or thirty years...Tom Horn ought to be the last word' - "Time". 'The last great folk tale of the last American frontier' - that's how Jay Monaghan describes the crimson career of Tom Horn, defender of property rights, soldier of fortune, range detective, professional killer.Tom Horn, who had chased after Geronimo and ridden the trains as a Pinkerton operative, was drawn to wherever the action was - ultimately to Wyoming as a hired gun for the cattle barons. Finally he went too far - and paid at the end of a rope in 1903. For years afterward, whenever a man was found murdered on the high plains, people said, 'Somebody tom-horned that fellow'. Jay Monaghan was a cowboy in Wyoming and ranch owner in Colorado.
His numerous books include "Civil War on the Western Border, 1854-1865" and "Custer: The Life of General George Armstrong Custer", both available as Bison Books. Larry D. Ball is a professor of history at Arkansas State University and the author of "Desert Lawmen: The High Sheriffs of New Mexico and Arizona, 1846-1912".