Thomas
S
Horn
Jr
Born in near Memphis, Scotland County, Missouri
Ancestors 
Son of Thomas S Horn
and Mary Ann Maricha (Miller) Horn
Brother of
Charles Horn, William Horn, Nancy (Horn) Adams, Martin Isaac Horn, Hannah May (Horn) Williams, Austin H Horn, Mary Ambrosian (Horn) Simpson and Bertha Alice (Horn) Brown
[spouse(s) unknown]
[children unknown]
Died
at age 42
in Cheyenne, Laramie, Wyoming, United States [uncertain]
[uncertain]
Profile last modified
| Created 9 Aug 2014
This page has been accessed 4,645 times.
| Thomas Horn Jr was involved in the westward expansion of the USA. Westward Ho! Join: Wild Wild West Project Discuss: wild_wild_west |
Thomas Horn was a
Pinkerton National Detective
The Pinkerton agency was established
In the United States in 1850 by Allan Pinkerton
The Agency's motto was We Never Sleep
Thomas "Tom" Horn,[1] was an American Old West lawman, scout, soldier, hired gunman, detective, outlaw and assassin.[2]He worked for the National Pinkerton Detective Agency.Tom Horn was hanged in Cheyenne, Wyoming,on November 20, 1903 for the murder of Willie Nickel.
Biography
Tom Horn is one of the most colorful characters of the Old West. He is reputed to have killed 17 men while working as an Army Scout, cattleman, prospector, rodeo contestant, ranch hand, range detective, army packer, interpreter, tracker, Pinkerton Detective, and hired gun. He was present at the capture of Geronimo, Chief of the Apaches; in Cuba during the Spanish American War; and had peripheral dealings with the Butch Cassidy Gang. He is known to have participated in several range wars. He was convicted and hung for the murder of a minor child of a rival to a rancher for whom Horn worked.
Tom Horn
Thomas Horn's parents were Thomas S. Horn, Sr. and Mary Ann Maricha Miller, he was born in northeastern Scotland County, Missouri,on the 21 November 1860. The family farm of 600 acres was situated between the towns of Granger and Etna.
 | |
In his autobiography, Life of Tom Horn: Government Scout & Interpreter,[3] he tells of leaving his Missouri homestead, at the age of fourteen, heading west, never to see his family again. Tom described his employment with the railroad in Kansas, during which time he earned $21 for 26 days' work. He wrote of a job as a driver for the Overland Mail in Santa Fe for $50 a month and use of a rifle. He worked as a wrangler in Arizona for $75 a month, by which time he said he had outfitted himself with a good horse, tack and a rifle.
At the age of sixteen, he was hired by the U.S. Cavalry as a civilian scout under Al Sieber, chief of scouts for the Army, in the Apache struggles. Tom had already become fluent in Spanish, and Sieber hired him as an interpreter for $75 monthly wages. Sieber introduced him to life among the Apache, where he became fluent in their language, as well, and was nicknamed by the tribe as “the talking boy.” As he grew into manhood, Tom would not be called a “boy” by anyone. He was big, over 200 pounds and 6 feet tall in a day when the average man weighed perhaps 160 and stood 5 feet 6 inches. The first 5 years of Tom's Autobiography are contradicted by the 1880 census as it is shown he was still living with his parents in Harrison, Scotland County, Missouri.[4]
Tom Horn was part of the expedition into Mexican territory on January 11,1886,the expedition was set up to track Geronimo,Tom Horn was the expedition's packer and interpreter.When the camp was attacked by Mexican militia Tom was wounded in the arm. It was at this time that Tom Horn killed his first man ,a second lieutenant in the Mexican Army in a duel . Tom Horn was present at Geronimo's final surrender, as an interpreter.
 | |
 | |
Tom worked in Arizona for a time as a deputy sheriff, where he drew the attention of the Pinkerton Detective agency, due to his tracking abilities. Horn accepted a job with the Pinkerton National Detective Agency in Colorado in 1891. Working out of the Denver office, he handled investigations in Colorado and Wyoming, in other western states, and around the Rocky Mountain area. Tom resigned from the agency, in 1894.
Robert,Allan and William Pinkerton
Tom was involved in the Pleasant Valley war of 1887, a three-sided struggle among large cattle outfits, rustlers and sheepmen in central Arizona. There, Horn first developed his alliance with big cattle interests. Over the course of the late 1890s he hired out as a range deputy, US marshal and detective for various wealthy ranchers in Wyoming and Colorado, specifically during the Johnson County War, when he worked for the Wyoming Stock Grower's Association.
 | |
 | |
Although his official title was always "Range Detective," he actually functioned as a killer for hire. Tom was alleged to have been involved in the killing of [5]Nate Champion and Nick Ray on April 9, 1892. In 1895, Horn supposedly killed a known cattle thief named William Lewis near Iron Mountain, Wyoming. Horn was exonerated for that crime and for another six weeks later,[6]the murder of Fred Powell.
In 1900, he was implicated in the murder of two known rustlers and robbery suspects in northwest Colorado. Just prior to the killings, Horn had begun working for the Swan Land and Cattle Company. He had killed the two rustlers, Matt Rash and Isom Dart, while he was following up on what became known as the Wilcox Train Robbery, and he was possibly working freelance for the Pinkerton Agency when he did so.
 | |
During his involvement in the Wilcox Train Robbery investigation, Tom obtained information from Bill Speck regarding the[7] death of Sheriff Josiah Hazen. He passed this information on to Charlie Siringo, who was working the case by that time for the Pinkertons. The information indicated that either George Curry or Kid Curry had killed the sheriff. Both outlaws were members of the Butch Cassidy's Wild Bunchgang, which was then known as "The Hole-in-the-Wall Gang."
Hole in the Wall Gang
Tom left that line of work briefly to serve a stint in the Army during the Spanish American War. Before he could steam from Tampa for Cuba, he contracted malaria. When his health recovered he returned to Wyoming. Tom was hired by [8] John C. Coble, to be a horse breaker, and a “stock detective” for the Swan Land and Cattle Company in Wyoming in 1892. On July 18, 1901, Horn was again working near Iron Mountain when [9].Willie Nickell, the 14-year-old son of a sheepherding rancher, was murdered.
 | |
Joe LeFors, a deputy U.S. marshal said that when he first met Horn at Frank Meanea's saddle shop, he found him rather inclined to brag. Joe LeFors brought Tom to the US Marshal's office, in 1902, six months after the murder on the pretenses of offering him a job, while court reporter Charlie Ohnhaus listened from the next room, and took notes in shorthand, Lefors guided Horn through a string of leading and often confused questions and responses until Horn allegedly said that young Willie Nickell was shot from about 300 yards, and then he boldly remarked, It was the best shot that I ever made and the dirtiest trick I ever done. I thought at one time he would get away.
Tom was arrested for the murder and spent more than 1 1/2 years in jail, where he wrote [10]his autobiography, detailing his life through the year 1894. He ends his story by saying, “I then came to Wyoming and went to work for the Swan Land and Cattle Company, since which time everybody else has been more familiar with my life and business than I have been myself.”
The trial started on October 10, 1902. The prosecutor in the case was Walter Stoll. In spite of testimony from an ally, Otto Plaga, that Horn was 20 miles from the scene of the murder an hour after it was committed, prosecuting attorney Walter Stoll, perceiving Horn's monumental ego, led Horn into stating that he knew the country better than anyone — day or night — and that a good man with a good horse who knew the country could ride from the site of the murder to the point where he was seen in an hour. With that statement, Horn destroyed his own alibi.
The trial went to the jury on October 23, and the jury returned a guilty verdict the next day. A hearing several days later sentenced Horn to death by hanging. Horn s attorneys filed a petition with the Wyoming Supreme Court for a new trial. However, the Supreme Court upheld the decision of the District Court and denied a new trial. Horn was given an execution date of [11]November 20, 1903, which was carried out in Cheyenne.
Tom Horn has the distinction of being one of the few people in the "Wild West" to have been hanged by an automated process. A Cheyenne, Wyoming architect named[12]James P. Julian designed the contraption in 1892, earning the name "The Julian Gallows," which made the condemned man hang himself.
The trap door was connected to a lever which pulled the plug out of a barrel of water. This would cause a lever with a counterweight to rise, pulling on the support beam under the gallows. When enough pressure was applied, this would cause the beam to break free, opening the trap and hanging the condemned man. [13]Tom Horn was buried in the Columbia Cemetery in Boulder, Colorado on 3 December 1903.
Tom Horn's Headstone in Columbia Cemetery in Boulder, Colorado
Tom Horn passed the months between his trial and his execution braiding rope. It is said that he made the noose that hanged him.
It is still debated whether Horn committed the murder. [14]Chip Carlson, who extensively researched the Wyoming v. Tom Horn prosecution, concluded that although Horn could have committed the murder of Willie Nickell, he probably did not. According to Carlson's book Tom Horn: Blood on the Moon, there was no actual evidence that Horn had committed the murder.
Tom was last seen in the area the day before the murder, his alleged confession was valueless as evidence, and no efforts were made to investigate involvement by other possible suspects. In essence, Horn's reputation and history made him an easy target for the prosecution. In 1993, the case was retried in a mock trial in Cheyenne and Horn was acquitted.
Research Note
For James "Jamie" Stott Killed in the "Pleasant Valley War". He was hung by a group of men and "Tom Horn" was supposedly one of them.
Sources
- ↑ Deseret Evening News - Tom Horn Deseret evening news November 20, 1903, Last Edition, Page 8, Image 8
- ↑ Ameican History - Allan Pinkerton and his Detective Agency - A Brief History of the Pinkertons by Martin Kelly
- ↑ Life of Tom Horn, Government scout and interpreter Author: Horn, Tom, 1860-1903. Edited by; J. C. Coble. Publisher: Denver, For J. C. Coble by the Louthan Book Company, 1904.
- ↑ United States Census, 1880 index and images, FamilySearch, Tom Horn in household of Thomas Horn, Harrison, Scotland, Missouri, United States; citing sheet 123A, NARA microfilm publication T9.
- ↑ Hoofprints of the Past.com - Cattle Industry Nate Champion
- ↑ www.Tom Horn Story.com - The Murder of Fred U. Powell That’s the man that killed Daddy.
- ↑ Officer Down Memorial Page - Sheriff Josiah Hazen - Converse County Sheriff's Office, Wyoming End of Watch - Sunday, June 4, 1899
- ↑ Elorose.Schopine.com - John C. Coble
- ↑ www.Tom Horn Story.com - The Killing of Willie Nickell - I Think the Intention Was To Get Me In Place Of The Boy -Kels Nickell, Willie’s father
- ↑ Historynet.com - Autobiography Thomas Horn misunderstood misfit
- ↑ Executed today - November 20th On this date in 1903, Tom Horn hanged in Cheyenne — a frontier legend lost in the post-frontier world
- ↑ Rare Newspapers - Tom Horn hanging Item # 599540 NOVEMBER 21, 1903
- ↑ Find a Grave - Burial -Columbia Cemetery ,Boulder,Boulder County,Colorado, USA Plot - In the South-central area of the cemetery Find A Grave Memorial# 506
- ↑ www.Tom Horn - Author of Tom Horn: Blood on the Moon - Dark History of the Murderous Cattle Detective
See also
- Absolute Astronomy - Facts on Tom Horn
- Tutorgigpedia - Thomas Horn
- Tom Horn.com - Tom Horn innocent.
- Thrilling Detective - Tom Horn
- Wyoming Mercantile and Book Ranch - Tom Horn - The Man Who Hanged Himself
Allen, Henry Wilson, "I, Tom Horn", ISBN 978-0803272835, University of Nebraska Press (April 1, 1996)
Ball, Larry D., Tom Horn: In Life and Legend. Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press, 2014. ISBN 978-0-8061-4425-2
DeMattos, Jack, "Gunfighters of the Real West: Tom Horn," Real West, December 1980.
Horn, Tom, Life of Tom Horn, Government Scout and Interpreter, Written by Himself, Together with His Letters and Statements by his Friends. Denver: The Louthan Book Company, 1904.
Krakel, Dean Fenton, The Saga of Tom Horn: The Story of a Cattleman's War. Laramie, Wyoming: Powder River Publishers, 1954.
Monaghan, Jay, Last of the Bad Men: The Legend of Tom Horn. Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill, 1946.
Sponsored Search by Ancestry.com
DNA Connections
It may be possible to confirm family relationships. It is likely that these autosomal DNA test-takers will share some percentage of DNA with Thomas:
It may be possible to confirm family relationships. It is likely that these autosomal DNA test-takers will share some percentage of DNA with Thomas:
-
~3.12%
~12.50%
Shawn Donley 
:
AncestryDNA
Comments: 1
Leave a message for others who see this profile.
There are no comments yet.
Login to post a comment.
Dan Sparkman
Horn-3826 and Horn-1975 appear to represent the same person because: Same parents, birthdates, careers, death dates.
posted
by Dan Sparkman
Rejected matches › Thomas Haren (abt.1858-aft.1901)
Featured German connections: Thomas is 21 degrees from Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, 25 degrees from Dietrich Bonhoeffer, 24 degrees from Lucas Cranach, 23 degrees from Stefanie Graf, 21 degrees from Wilhelm Grimm, 23 degrees from Fanny Hensel, 26 degrees from Theodor Heuss, 16 degrees from Alexander Mack, 30 degrees from Carl Miele, 19 degrees from Nathan Rothschild, 22 degrees from Hermann Friedrich Albert von Ihering and 23 degrees from Ferdinand von Zeppelin on our single family tree. Login to see how you relate to 33 million family members.
Categories: Columbia Cemetery, Boulder, Colorado | American Outlaws | Wild Wild West