" He then gritted his teeth and said in rage, "I"ll get every s.o.b. who helped kill John if it's the last thing I ever do.".
This all started the Lincoln County War in which Billy played a leading role. This "war" was actually a struggle between two rival groups of businessmen and ranchers. Murders and depredations between the two groups built up to a three-day battle in Lincoln, New Mexico during July of 1878. Billy was a member of the group that shot Sheriff Bill Brady to death. .
Governor Lew Wallace offered a $500 reward to anyone that would capture William Bonney, alias "The Kid," and deliver him to any sheriff in New Mexico. In 1880, Lincoln County elected Sheriff Pat Garrett and a posse trapped the Kid and four companions in a hut at Stinking Springs. After a three day siege, the gang was captured on December 23, 1880.
Billy was convicted of murder, and was sentenced to be hung in Lincoln. However, on April 28, 1881, he escaped from custody, killing two guards. Garrett vowed he would get the Kid and spent three months tracking him all over New Mexico. Finally, on the night of July 14, 1881, he rode onto the old Maxwell ranch where he and the Kid had worked and spent many happy hours together. The Kid was visiting a young Mexican woman at the ranch and stepped out of the bedroom, into the moonlight, when he heard the hoof-beats of horses outside. Garrett, meanwhile, had entered the large ranch house, gone down a corridor, and entered the darkened bedroom. The Kid stood outside in the shadows, calling in a loud whisper in Spanish, "Quien es?.Quien es.Quien es?" (Who is it?) When no one answered, the Kid stepped back through the outside door to the bedroom. He turned to see his old friend, Garrett, holding a gun on him. The Kid was armed, according to Garrett's later report: "He came there (into the bedroom) armed with a pistol and a knife expressing to kill me if he could. I had no alternative but to kill him or suffer death at his hands.
