Everything about Jack Mccall totally explained
Jack McCall (also known as
"Crooked Nose" Jack) (born in 1852 or 1853 in
Jefferson County,
Kentucky – died
March 1,
1877 in
Yankton,
Dakota Territory), killed
James "Wild Bill" Hickok, shooting him from behind, an act that among admirers of Hickok and students of Hickok's history has given rise to the phrase "the coward Jack McCall".
Life and murder of Hickok
Many of the details of McCall's life are lost. He was raised in
Kentucky with three sisters, but drifted west and became a
buffalo hunter. By 1876, he was living in a
gold mining camp called
Deadwood, South Dakota, under the
alias of Bill Sutherland.
On
August 2,
1876, in the
Nuttal & Mann's #10
Saloon in Deadwood, McCall shot Hickok in the back of the head with a double-action .45-
caliber revolver, shouting "Take that!" Hickok, in contrast to his normal habit of sitting in a corner to protect his back, on that day sat with his back to the door while engaged in a game of
poker. Ironically, the killing was apparently over McCall's drunken resentment of an act of generosity by Hickok, Hickok having offered McCall money to buy breakfast after McCall had lost it all playing poker the previous day. McCall claimed, however, that the killing was retribution for Hickok having previously killed McCall's brother in
Abilene, Kansas. McCall was found innocent after two hours deliberation by an impromptu court in McDaniel's Theater made up of local miners and businessmen, causing the
Black Hills Pioneer to editorialize:
"Should it ever be our misfortune to kill a man ... we'd simply ask that our trial may take place in some of the mining camps of these hills."
Escape and retrial
McCall then fled town to
Wyoming, where he bragged, at length, about the details of how he'd killed Hickok in a fair gunfight. Unfortunately for McCall, however, the Wyoming authorities refused to recognize the result of McCall's first trial on the grounds of Deadwood having been in
Indian Territory at the time and contended that McCall could legally be tried again. Because Deadwood was an illegal settlement, with no legally constituted law enforcement or court system, the federal court in Yankton, D.T. declared that double jeopardy didn't apply.
He was retried in
Yankton,
Dakota Territory, for Hickok's murder, and was hanged on
March 1,
1877 at the age of 24. McCall was the first person to be executed by United States officials in Dakota Territory. After his execution it was determined that McCall had never even had a brother.
Cultural References
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