Showing results by author "Johnny D. Boggs" in All Categories

In 1913, on the 50th anniversary of the Lawrence, Kansas, Massacre, former bushwhacker Cole Younger stands before a preacher at a tent revival. "I was, I remain, and I will always be a wicked man," Younger states, taking a step toward salvation. And for a man like Cole Younger, there is much to confess.

Saddle tramp Sam MacKinnon is in trouble. Double-crossed by his partners after robbing a saloon and gambling hall, MacKinnon has been left behind in the mountains of southern New Mexico with busted ribs, a banged-up head, no gun, and no horse. And no chance - because aging lawman Nelson Bookbinder and his Mescalero Apache scout, Nikita - both made legendary by dime novels MacKinnon has read - are leading a small posse hot in pursuit of the bandits. Miraculously, MacKinnon escapes the law, finds his horse and rifle, and, despite his injuries, sets out on the vengeance trail.

Johnny D. Boggs turns the battlefield itself into a character in this historical retelling of Custer's Last Stand, when George Custer led most of his command to annihilation at the Battle of the Little Bighorn in southern Montana in 1876. More than 40 first-person narratives are used - Indian and white, military and civilian, men and women - to paint a panorama of the battle itself. Boggs brings the events and personalities of the Battle of the Little Bighorn to life in a series of first-hand accounts.

The Civil War is over. The future of the American West is up for grabs. Any man crazy enough to lead a herd of Texas longhorns to the North stands to make a fortune - and make history. That man would be Nelson Story. A bold entrepreneur and miner, he knows a golden opportunity when he sees one. But it won't be easy. Cowboys and bandits have guns, farmers have sick livestock, and the army's got its own reasons to stop the drive. Even worse, Story's top hand is an ornery Confederate veteran who used to be his enemy.

In The Big Fifty, another name for the famous Sharps rifle, reality of frontier life becomes brutally clear to 12-year-old Coady McIlvain. He falls in with a buffalo sharpshooter, and the two must survive the unforgiving terrain and hostile enemies.

Seventeen-year-old Silver King dreams of becoming a working cowboy. His mother, however, has pushed him to be a baseball player - and King certainly has the arm to be a star pitcher. When the National League forms a team in Kansas City in 1886, both mother and son get their wishes.

In West Texas Kill, the harsh lands between the Pecos River and the Rio Grande are ruled by renegade Texas Ranger Captain Hector Savage. Into this realm rides Ranger Dave Chance with a prisoner - a big-talking murderer - shackled to his side. An honest ranger, Sergeant Chance determines to deliver the locals from Savage’s bloody reign. But to succeed against such long odds, Chance must do the unthinkable - unshackle and arm his prisoner.

Fifteen-year-old Evan Kendrick has traveled from New Mexico Territory to Galveston with his father, Edward, who will be competing in a horse race that's offering a $3,000 prize to the winner. But a terrible accident seriously injures Evan's drunken father, forcing Evan to saddle up instead. This is no ordinary race. Running from Texas to New England, its course is 1,800 miles - maybe even longer - and Evan will be riding a barely half-broke mustang stallion that he and his father caught.

Sam Houston is a living legend in 1861. The hero of the Battle of San Jacinto, he had defeated Santa Anna to win independence for Texas back in 1836. He had twice served as president of the Republic of Texas, helped Texas join the Union, and served as senator and governor of Texas. Before settling in Texas, he had been a hero of the Creek War and governor of Tennessee. He had been friends with Andrew Jackson and Davy Crockett and had been adopted into the Cherokee tribe.

They sing songs about Matthew Johnson. The hero of dime novels, Matt won national fame during a range war in Idaho when he shot and killed an outlaw - and former saddle pal. But the past 17 years have been an alcoholic blur rather than a heroic journey. Gone are the days when he was a free-wheeling cowboy, swapping poems with his best friend on the cattle ranges. The West has modernized - and practically disappeared - when Matt arrives in Denver in 1894 as the newly appointed US marshal for the state of Colorado.

“Unparalleled in evoking the gritty reality of the Old West” ( Shootist), Johnny D. Boggs mixes adventure and realism with a torrid storytelling style all his own. In The Killing Shot, Deputy U.S. Marshal Reilly McGilvern is hauling criminals to Yuma when his prison wagon is attacked, and McGilvern is left locked inside to die. When another outlaw gang comes upon the scene, McGilvern thinks he’s lived to see another day - but his problems are just beginning.

Micah Bishop doesn't believe in miracles - until a derringer-packing nun busts him out of jail. But it's not Christian charity that's driving Sister Genevieve - she wants Micah to take her to a place called the Valley of Fire, deep in the most lawless and perilous part of New Mexico Territory. It was here where an order of nuns met their Maker, and it's Sister Genevieve's mission to see that they are given a proper funeral. Or so she claims.

Noah Benton, a teenager with a great memory, a head for arithmetic, and dreams of excitement, is hired along with his older brother to help drive a herd of Texas longhorns to Abilene, Kansas. But Noah's trail boss happens to be John Wesley Hardin, a notorious killer who thinks Texas lawmen won't look for a fugitive in a crew of hardworking cowboys. After Hardin sees a profit in Noah's ability to count and memorize cards in gambling dens, Noah's dreams of excitement quickly turn into nightmares - for Hardin will kill with little provocation.

I do remember my first love Mad Carter MacRae recalls in this memoir of his early life. Her name was Estrella O Sullivan. I met her the summer I turned 16 back in 1873. The summer of 1873 marked my last drive up what these days they call the Chisholm Trail and what some were starting to call it back then. It was the first time I tasted oysters and the only time I pinned on a badge. It was the summer of longhorns of miserable heat of friendship and betrayal and of murder. In the end it was the summer the whole world came crumbling down on our United States. My world crashed too.

Stranded in the Mojave Desert, Micah Bishop is about to cash in his chips for good when he's rescued by an unlikely savior. Whip Watson is hand-delivering two dozen brides to the silver boom town of Calico, where miners are going loco for companionship. Better still, Watson asks Micah if he'd help escort the wagons - and far be it for Micah to pass up both cash and some very pretty faces. But Micah doesn't know that Whip Watson has some killer competition.

William Lee Braden was no secessionist, no slave owner. In fact, when the polls opened in Jacksboro, Texas, on February 23, 1861, Braden rode 12 miles up Lost Creek from his small ranch not only to vote against secession, but on his ballot, right next to his signature, he wrote "For the Union forever". But come the fall of 1861, William Lee Braden rode off to join his brother Jacob in Harrisburg to fight, not for the Confederacy, but rather to defend the state of Texas from invasion and occupation. Braden left behind him his wife, Martha Jane Pierce Braden, and his six-year-old son.

The summer of 1873 marked Madison's last drive up what is now called the Chisholm Trail. It was the first time he tasted oysters and the only time he pinned on a badge. It was the summer of longhorns, miserable heat, friendship and betrayal, and murder. In the end it was the summer the whole world came crumbling down on the United States, and Madison's world crashed, too. The summer of 1873 was the year Madison watched a bunch of men die. One of them was a man he killed, an encounter one never forgets.

Jim Hawkins hardly said a word to anybody, but that all changed in the spring of 1920 when Hawkins took his young grandson, Henry Lancaster, along on a scouting trip. Scouting for memories. The man who rarely talked tells his grandson how he came to Montana from Texas as a young teenager with his pards Tommy O'Hallahan and John Henry Kenton, cowboys looking for country free of barbed wire, and how the winter of 1886-87 changed his life.

Tom Candy Ponting was no ordinary trail boss. He didn’t smoke, chew, cuss, or even carry a gun. Unlike his competitors, he learned how to herd cows on a farm back in England—and how to handle cowboys in bareknuckle prizefights. But his skills and know-how were really put to the test when he accepts a bet he might live to regret: lead a cattle drive from Texas to New York City.

Three 12-year-olds, two notorious gunfighters, a half-crazed albino, and a grieving woman vie for $30,000 in gold coin, buried 20 years ago in treacherous Doubtful Cañon.