It’s a Christmas giveaway featuring some

very badly-behaved women.

Enter now to win five books about women of the Old West who were

wicked to the core.

A parade of horse drawn carriages deposited fashionably dressed San Francisco citizens at the entrance of the Tivoli Theatre. A handsome couple holding hands and cooing as young lovers do, emerged from one of the vehicles. A figure across the street, hidden in the shadows of an alleyway, eyed the pair intently. Once the couple entered the building Tessie Wall stepped out of the darkness into the subdued light of a row of gas lamps lining the busy thoroughfare. Tears streamed down the svelte, blonde’s face. The pain of seeing the man she loved with another woman was unbearable.

Several hours before, Tessie and her ex-husband, Frank Daroux entertained passersby with a robust argument over the other woman in his life. After accusing the man of being a liar and a thief, Tessie begged him for another chance and promised to make him forget anyone else he was involved with.  Frank angrily warned Tessie that if she started anything, he would put her “so far away that no one would find her.”

The words he had said to her played over and over again in her head. “You’ve got my husband,” she mumbled to herself. “And you’ll get yours someday. It’s not right.” She chocked back a torrent of tears, reached into her handbag and removed a silver-plated revolver. Hiding the weapon in the folds of her dress, she stepped back into the dark alleyway and waited.

It wasn’t long until Frank walked out of the theatre, alone. Standing on the steps of the building, he lit up a cigar and cast a glance into the night sky. Preoccupied with view of the stars, Frank did not see Tessie hurry across the street and race over to him. Before he realized what was happening, Tessie pointed the gun at his chest and fired. As Frank fell backwards, he grabbed hold of the rim of a nearby stage. Tessie unloaded two more shots into his upper body. Frank collapsed in a bloody heap.

Tessie stood over his near lifeless frame, sobbing. When the police arrived, she was kneeling beside Frank, the gun still clutched in her hand. When asked why she opened fire on him she wailed, “I shot him, cause I love him, Damn him!”

To learn more about Tessie Wall and other badly behaved women like her read Pistol Packin’ Madams: True Stories of Notorious Women of the Old West.

It’s a Christmas giveaway featuring some

very badly-behaved women.

Enter now to win five books about women of the Old West who were

wicked to the core.

Doc Holliday’s paramour Big Nose Kate could never get a publisher to give her the big bucks she demanded to tell the story of her life, but that didn’t mean she didn’t collect material she wanted to use in a biography. Over the fifty years Mary Kate Cummings, alias Big Nose Kate, traversed the West she saved letters from her family, musings she had written about her love interests, and life with the notorious John Henry Holliday. Using rare, never before published material Big Nose Kate stock-piled in anticipation of writing the tale of her days on the Wild Frontier, the definitive book about the famous soiled dove will finally be told.

Kate claims to have witnessed the Gunfight at the OK Corral and exchanged words with the likes of Wyatt Earp and Josephine Marcus. There’s no doubt she embellished her adventures, but that doesn’t take away from their historical importance. She was a controversial figure in a rough and rowdy territory. What she witnessed, the lifestyle she led, and the influential western people she met are fascinating and represent a time period much romanticized.

To learn more about Kate read

According to Kate:  The Legendary Life of Big Nose Kate Elder,

Doc Holliday’s Love

It’s a Christmas giveaway featuring some

very badly-behaved women.

Enter now to win five books about women of the Old West who were

wicked to the core.

“In one corner, a coarse-looking female might preside over a roulette-table, and, perhaps, in the central and crowded part of the room a Spanish or Mexican woman would be sitting at Monte, with a cigarette in her lips, which she replaced every few moments by a fresh one.” Author, lecturer, and feminist Eliza Farnham – 1854

Blood spattered across the front of the dark-eyed, brunette gambler Belle Siddon’s dress as she peered into the open wound of a bandit stretched out in front of her. Biting down hard on a rag, the man winced in pain as she gently probed his abdomen with a wire loop. Pausing a moment, she mopped up a stream of blood inching its way across the crude wooden table where he was lying. Two men on either side of the injured patient struggled to keep his arms and legs still as the stern-faced Belle then plunged the loop back into his entrails. “How do you know about gunshots?” one of the rough looking assistants asked. “My late husband was a doctor and I worked with him,” Belle replied. “Is he going to die?” the other man inquired. “Not if I can help it,” Belle said as she removed the wire loop.

To learn more about Belle Siddons and other lady card players read

The Lady Was a Gambler: True Stories of Notorious Women of the Old West.

It’s a Christmas giveaway featuring some

very badly-behaved women.

Enter now to win five books about women of the Old West who were

wicked to the core.

A broad grin spread across Doc Holliday’s thin, unshaven face as he tossed five playing cards facedown into the center of a rustic, wooden table. His eyes followed a petite, gloved hand as it swept a pile of poker chips toward a demure, dark-haired beauty sitting opposite him. Lottie Deno watched the infamous dentist, gambler, and gunfighter lean back in his chair and pour himself a shot of whiskey. Doc’s steely blue eyes met hers and she held his gaze. “You want to lose any more of your money to me or is that it, Doc?” “Deal,” he responded confidently. Lottie did as he asked and in a few short minutes had managed to win another hand.

A crowd of customers at the Bee Hive Saloon in Fort Griffin, Texas, slowly made their way over to the table where Lottie and Doc had squared off. They cheered the cardsharps on and bought them drinks. Most of the time Lottie won the hands. The talented poker players continued on until dawn. When the chips were added up, the lady gambler had acquired more than $30,000 of Holliday’s money.

“If one must gamble, they should settle on three things at the start,” Doc said before drinking down another shot. “And they are?” Lottie inquired. “Decide the rules of the game, the stakes, and the quitting time.” Holliday smoothed down his shirt and coat, adjusted his hat, and nodded politely to the onlookers. “Good evening to you all,” he said as he made his way to the exit. Lottie smiled to herself as she sorted her chips. Holliday sauntered out of the saloon and into the bright morning light.

Historians maintain that it was only natural that Lottie Deno would have grown up to be an expert poker player—her father was a part-time gambler who had taught his daughter everything he knew about cards. She is recognized by many gaming historians as the most talented woman to play five-card draw in the West.

To learn more about badly behaved women on the American frontier read 

The Lady Was A Gambler.

It’s a Christmas giveaway featuring some

very badly-behaved women.

Enter now to win five books about women of the Old West who were

wicked to the core.

Legends has it that “Cattle Kate” (Ella Watson), who was twenty-seven and beginning to show a few signs of wear and tear, told friends she was going to pull up stakes and set up a crib in another town, since Cheyenne was no longer easy pickings.  “There’s no use pulling the wool over my own eyes, for the sad fate is, I’m not a young chicken anymore,” she is supposed to have said.  Her customers were beginning to throw their business to floozies who had come into the wide-open railroad town.  So Cattle Kate moved to Rawlings, a cow town in the Haystack Hills where, except for a few chorus girls who also showed mileage, a favor-selling lady on the decline might still have a chance.  Soon Kate, who was a bosomy brunette with a handsome face, quickly had all the customers she could manage.

There was a hitch, for the cattle market was in a slump and cash money was scarce as hen’s teeth.  But this did not worry Kate.  She would simply homestead a grassland quarter-section, and stock it with mavericks which she would accept from her men in place of cash.  “When those little critters fatten up, I’ll get a nice price for them, you can bet on that,” she is reported to have said.  It was a sound idea, though in the end Kate paid for her actions with her life.

But the legend of Cattle Kate was created in the editorial room of the Cheyenne Leader for the benefit of the Wyoming Stock Growers’ Association.  Almost overnight, they transformed the real Ella Watson into the infamous woman bandit who killed one husband plus various other men, and had stolen more cattle than any man in the West.

To learn more about badly behaved women on the American frontier read Wicked Women:

Notorious, Mischievous, and Wayward Ladies from the Old West.