Wild Bill Hickok
Hickok(James Butler Hickok) (1837–1876), a United States scout, frontier lawman, and gambler. “Wild Bill,” with his long flowing hair and buckskin clothes, was one of the legendary figures of the Old West. A crack pistol shot, he was alleged to have killed at least two dozen men during his career as a scout and marshal.
Hickok was born in Troy Grove, Illinois. In 1855 he went to Kansas. At Rock Creek Stage Station he killed three members of the McCanles gang. (This fight was the first of his exploits to be widely publicized.) Hickok was an army scout during the Civil War and in the Indian wars of 1867–69. In 1869 he served as town marshal of Hays City, Kansas, and in 1871 became marshal of Abilene, Kansas, one of the most turbulent cow towns of the cattle-drive era. During 1872–73, he appeared in Buffalo Bill Cody's Wild West Show. In 1876 Hickok went to Deadwood in Dakota Territory. There, while playing cards in a saloon, he was shot in the back of the head by Jack McCall, a killer hired by outlaw elements of Deadwood.
Accounts that Hickok married Calamity Jane in 1870 have never been authenticated. He was married, however, to Mrs. Agnes Lake Thatcher, a circus owner, in 1876.