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Robert "Bob" Newton Ford
(1861-1892)
-- Born on January 31, 1862 in Ray County,
Missouri,
Bob joined the
James Gang in 1879. Mostly a "hanger-on" he did odd jobs and
held the horses for the gang during robberies. When an argument
erupted between gang members
Wood Hite and
Dick Liddell
in January, 1882, it quickly turned to gunplay with
Hite shooting
Liddell
in the right thigh and
Liddell
striking
Hite's arm. Calming watching,
Ford, a close friend of
Liddell's,
fired a single bullet at
Hite, striking him in the head. But it would be the killing
of
Jesse
James on
April 3, 1882, that would gain him the most attention, though not the
kind he wished for. At first he was charged with murder of both
Hite and
James
and sentenced to hang. However, he was quickly pardoned by the governor of
Missouri.
Though
Ford tried to profit from the
killing by taking the stage, he was ostracized as a traitor and
forever took on the moniker "dirty little coward."
But just ten years
later,
Ford himself was shot and killed by
Ed O. Kelly
while running a tent
saloon
in Creede,
Colorado on June 8, 1892. Ford's body was returned to
Richmond,
Missouri where he is interred in the Richmond City Cemetery.
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