Famous Confederate Veteran, Texas Ranger, and Provost Marshall


Dallas Stoudenmire
The Original Pocket Pistol Gun Slinger
Civil War Confederate Veteran
Texas Ranger
Provost Marshall
as portrayed by;
Joseph Topinka



Dallas Stoudenmire was a man who knew his tools and kept them sharp. A native of Alabama, he was a Confederate veteran of the Civil War, having been wounded four times while serving with the 57th Cavalry and the 33rd Alabama Regiment. Moving to post-bellum Texas, he had sharpened his sixgun work in the pay of the Texas Rangers' "B" Company.


Had Dallas lived 50 years later, Stoudenmire's square-jawed, handsome features, his broad-shouldered frame, and quiet, imposing presence would have made him a rival for John Wayne's seat as a movie hero. A humorless, serious sort, he likely would have scorned such play acting and continued to live by his guns.


Gordon Frost, a prominent El Paso gun collector and author, has obtained a .44 Colt for which he has convincing authentication as having belonged to Stoudenmire. One of the rare 1871-72 transition models that bridged the gap between the 1860 .44 Army percussion gun and the 1873 Peacemaker .45, the Stoudenmire revolver has been cut to 2 7/8"-inch barrel length, doing away with the front sight and ejector rod. Chambered for the .44 Centerfire cartridge, this seems a most likely gun to be carried in the pants pocket of a knowing gunman of the 1880s. Trimmer, with fewer projections to catch on clothing than 1873 Models, a pair of these big-bore belly guns would provide all the firepower needed for any but the most prolonged encounters. The Frost gun is said to have been removed from Stoudenmire's pocket at the time of his death and is persuasive evidence that not all westerners chose the Peacemaker Colt.


Whatever sixguns he carried, Stoudenmire used them with deadly precision. Johnnie Hale, a ranch manager employed by the Manning brothers, leaders of the gaming crowd, was on trial for the murder of two Mexican youths. Not caring for the way the court interpreter was translating the Spanish testimony of the witnesses, he buttonholed the linguist on the street during a court recess. Words were exchanged, and the accused murderer vented his spleen by jerking a Colt and killing the interpreter with a bullet through the head. Stoudenmire, standing nearby, ran toward the gunman, drew from his pocket, and snapped a shot at Hale which missed and killed a curious onlooker. Steadying a bit, Stoudenmire fired again, dropping Hale dead at the side of his own victim.
George Campbell, a friend of Hale, drew his gun and began retreating from the scene, muttering, "This is not my fight". Probably Campbell was just covering his departure and didn't intend to fire. Pointing a weapon in even the general direction of the two-gun lawdog was decidedly an unhealthy and foolhardy move. Stoudenmire dropped him in his tracks, leaving four men dead in five seconds, three of them victims of three rounds from the marshal's right-handed Colt.


Next, the ex-deputy marshal Bill Johnson, a fuzzy-minded lover of good bourbon, became convinced that it was his duty to rid the city of the dangerous Stoudenmire. Johnson, armed with a double-barreled shotgun, posted himself behind a pile of bricks in front of which Stoudenmire passed each night on his rounds. As the tough badgetoter passed, Johnson swayed to his feet and touched off both barrels, scoring the most costly two complete misses of his colorless career. Stoudenmire's hands flashed to his pockets, and Johnson fell for the long count, riddled with bullets.


Hollywood scenario writers and pulp magazine hacks have been largely responsible for the current concept of the western gunfighter. In attributing impossible gun skill to such fumblers as Doc Holiday and Mafia-type murderers as Bill Bonney, they have succeeded in glamorizing some pretty unsavory characters. At the same time, they have completely ignored a great many gunfighters who were at least as proficient as the Doc and the Kid and just as deserving of notice.
Dodge City and Tombstone were mere flashes in the pan when examined against the 20-year reign of the sixshooter in El Paso. The Mexican border country was then, and is today, the bailiwick of more genuine hardcases than any other locale west of the Mississippi. Take Bass Outlaw. Know as the Little Wolf, this pint-sized Ranger sergeant was both loved and feared by his friends. Sober, he comported himself as befitted his gentle upbringing. On the sauce, as he frequently was, the little lawman was contentious as only a confident gunman trained to violence can be.


The devotee of firearms may draw some valid conclusions from El Paso's bullet-spattered history. While the gunmen of that place were as good as the best of the time - all of them had survived many battles before arriving in the tough border town - nothing in their performances, with the possible exception of Dallas Stoudenmire, indicated that they were outstanding sixgun men. Their close-range encounters, often from ambush, suggested murder and assassination rather than an open contest of skill between men at arms. Examination of their widely diverse methods of carrying their pistols - Hardin's shoulder holsters sewed to his vest, Stoudenmire's pocket draw, the high-ride, pistol-in-the-front-of-the-belly style of Selman and Outlaw - all point to the fact that a fast draw was of small importance to these men. When disputes found them, their sixguns would already be clear of leather and, hopefully, pointed at an unwarlike portion of their opponent's anatomy.

Joseph Topinka: Living Historical Interpretation, in honor of;
Dallas Stoudenmire
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