howeenterprise.com
Monday, May 8, 2017
Texas History Minute
Page #10
The Bent Creek Band
to the North, supposedly at his father’s behest. He later claimed to have shot and killed three Union troops on their way to arrest him as they approached the home. However, no military records exist of the incident. Other records at the time suggest that a murder may have occurred in the area around that time. Because of poor records, conflicting accounts, and Hardin’s own tall tales and exaggerations, his exact record is shrouded in Dr. Ken Bridges mystery. He denied some deaths for which there was considerable Dr. Bridges is a Texas native, Former Howe boy Brent Hollensed (in Tom Bean orange) along with writer, and history professor. He evidence but bragged about the deaths of others for which no Larry Cox (left) were part of the Bent Creek Band that got many can be reached at evidence existed. compliments on Saturday at Founders Day. drkenbridges@gmail.com. Regardless, Hardin was on the run again, scrambling from place to The violence of the western frontier has alternately fascinated place and picking up a variety of jobs for money. At one point, he and repelled readers for Fifteen building permits were filed Howe in one year (75 in 2016). taught school in Navarro County. generations. Gunfights between with the City of Howe last week the law, outlaws, and even in-laws He also traveled with another which completes the total of 113 LGI has also constructed a small have since become tales retold for wanted man briefly before his lots purchased by LGI Homes in park on the premises entering the decades. Notorious gunman John capture. Summit Hill. Rex Real Estate development. Negotiations are brokered the deal which set a Wesley Hardin was one of the underway to dedicate the park to record for building permits for bloodiest of all. In his short forty- As he grew older, a mixture of the City of Howe. alcohol, a quick temper, and a two years, Hardin killed more than surly disposition landed him in a two dozen people across Texas. series of knife fights and gun fights that left a trail of bodies John Wesley Hardin was the second son of ten children born to a across Texas. He turned to gambling, which only deepened Methodist preacher and his wife. his problems with the law. He Hardin was born in the North allegedly shot out the eye of a man Texas community of Bonham in May 1853. His father, Rev. James to win a bet at the age of 16. In January 1870, he got into another Hardin, was a circuit rider preacher, having to ride from one gun fight with a man named Ben Bradley who had accused him of church to the next to deliver services on successive Sundays. It cheating at cards at a local saloon. He killed Bradley in the streets of was a difficult life for a man of Towash in Hill County; and faith as well as difficult on the Bradley’s associate, a man known family because of the long only as Judge Moore, disappeared distances and sometimes long shortly afterward. Hardin later absences, but the family always claimed to have killed Moore. had all the necessities. Several other fistfights and gunfights followed. By 1859, the elder Hardin had settled in Sumter in East Texas to establish a school and finally enjoy In January 1871, he was arrested in Harrison County on four a quiet life, something that the charges of murder and one charge younger Hardin would make extraordinarily complicated. All of of horse theft. One of the charges was allegedly for the murder of his children would eventually Waco Town Marshal L. J. attend this school. Hoffman. As he was being brought from East Texas to Waco However, from a young age, for the trial, Hardin escaped, Hardin was always in trouble of killing a state policeman in the some kind. At the age of nine in process. He was arrested in Bell 1862, he attempted to run away from home to join the Confederate County some weeks later and Army. At the age of 14 in 1867, he killed three more men, escaping got into a knife fight at his father’s once again. Before he even turned 18, Hardin had killed at least eight school, nearly killing a fellow student. His father had no choice men and possibly more. but to expel him. The next year, at He found work as a hand on a age fifteen, he killed for the first cattle drive on the Chisolm Trail time when he shot and killed a shortly afterward. While Hardin former slave named Maje managed to escape authorities in Holshousen following a fight. Texas for the time being, he still Following the death of Holshousen, found himself in gunfights on the way to Kansas. Hardin’s deadly Hardin hid out at his older brother’s house some thirty miles career was just starting.
Summit Hill pulls final permits
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