Quotes of Billy the Kid, His Friends, and Enemies

This section of my page lists several well-known, and some not very well-known, quotes of Billy the Kid, as well as quotes from some of his friends and enemies. If there's a specific quote you would like me to add, just e-mail me.

Special thanks to Betty Jay (bettyle@wcta.net), who suggested many of the quotes found on this page.

• ''Of course you know, George, I never meant for those birds to reach Lincoln alive.''---Billy the Kid to George Coe in regards to the deaths of Frank Baker and Billy Morton.
• ''Advise persons never to engage in killing.''---Billy the Kid, to a reporter after his capture at Stinking Springs.
• ''At least two-hundred men have been killed in Lincoln County during the past three years, but I did not kill all of them.''---Billy the Kid to a reporter for the Daily New Mexican newspaper after his capture at Stinking Springs.
• ''Hello Bob!''---Billy the Kid to Deputy Bob Olinger seconds before he killed him with his own shotgun, April 28, 1881.
• ''There's many a slip 'twix the cup and the lip.''---Billy the Kid.
• ''He never seemed to care much for money, except to buy cartridges with; then he would much prefer to gamble for them straight. Cartridges were scarce, and he always used about ten times as many as any one else.''---Frank Coe, referring to Billy the Kid.
• ''Oh, nothing. It was a game of two and I got there first.''---Billy the Kid to Milnor Rudolph in reference to the killing of Texas Joe Grant.
• ''People thought me bad before, but if ever I should get free, I'll let them know what bad means.''---Billy the Kid to a reporter from the Daily New Mexican after his capture at Stinking Springs.
• ''I wish...I wish...''---Charlie Bowdre to Sheriff-Elect Pat Garrett as he dies from a bullet wound fired by one of Garrett's posse at Stinking Springs, December 23, 1880.
• ''Pat, you son-of-a-bitch, they told me there was a hundred Texans here from the Canadian River! If I'd a-known there wasn't no more than this, you'd never have got me!''---Billy the Kid to Pat Garrett, immediatly after stepping out of the rock house at Stinking Springs and surrendering to Garrett's posse.
• ''Hello, doc! Thought I'd just drop in and see how you fellers in Vegas are behavin' yerselves!''---Billy the Kid to his friend Dr. J. H. Suftin, as he is taken by the Garrett posse into Las Vegas.
• ''What's the use of looking on the gloomy side of everything? The laugh's on me this time. Is the jail at Santa Fe any better than this? This is a terrible place to put a fellow in.''---Billy the Kid to a reporter in the Las Vegas jail after his capture at Stinking Springs.
• ''Aw, you ain't worth killing.''---Billy the Kid to John Chisum after Billy threatened to kill Chisum if he didn't pay him for fighting in the Lincoln County War.
• ''You're a damned liar! We all three shot at him. You and me fired one shot apiece and the Kid twice!''---Dirty Dave Rudabaugh to Billy Wilson in reference to the killing of Deputy James Carlyle after Wilson told Deputy James Bell that he didn't shoot at Carlyle.
• ''There's a mighty well-heeled man coming this way!''---John Middleton to the rest of the Regulators in reference to Buckshot Roberts approaching Blazer's Mills, April 4, 1878.
• ''I'm not afraid to die like a man fighting, but I would not like to be killed like a dog unarmed.''---Billy the Kid in a letter to Gov. Lew Wallace, March 1879.
• ''Billy never talked much of the past. He was always looking into the future.''---Frank Coe.
• ''Joe, I've been there too many times for you.''---Billy the Kid to the freshly dead Texas Joe Grant, January 10, 1880.
• ''¿Quien es? ¿Quien es?''---Billy the Kid's last words, allegedly, July 14, 1881.
• ''Aw, go to Hell you long-legged son-of-a-bitch!''---Tom O'Folliard to Sheriff-Elect Pat Garrett shortly after Garrett mortally wounded him, December 19, 1880.
• ''I don't care to open negotiations with a fight, but if you'll come at me three at a time, I'll whip the whole damned bunch of you!''---Billy the Kid to Jessie Evans, Jimmy Dolan, Billy Campbell, and Billy Mathews after Evans suggested to his companions that they kill Billy on site.
• ''Billy, if harm comes to you two, they'll have to kill me first.''---William McCloskey to Billy Morton in reference to the Regulators, shortly before they were both killed by the Regulators.
• ''What John? What John?''---John H. Tunstall's last words to John Middleton, just after Middleton told Tunstall to flee from the approaching Morton posse, February 18, 1878.
• ''I knew them both well and, in my opinion, Garrett was just as cold and hard a character as the Kid.''---Paulita Maxwell, referring to Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid.

• ''Hurry up, boys, my knife is sharp and I feel like scalping someone.''---Willam Morton to the members of his sub-posse only a few hours before they killed John Tunstall on Feb. 18, 1878.
• ''Because I had the power.''---Sheriff William Brady, when asked why he arrested Fred Waite, Constable Atanacio Martinez, and William Bonney.
• ''William Bonney was incarcerated here first time December 22, 1878; second time March 21st, 1879, and hope I never will be again.''---Billy the Kid, as he wrote on the wooden door of the Lincoln County jail/pit.
• ''I have no wish to fight any more, indeed I have not raised an arm since your proclamation.''---Billy the Kid, in a letter to Gov. Lew Wallace, dated March 12, 1879.
• ''If you could trust Jesse Evans, you can trust me.''---Gov. Lew Wallce, in a letter to Billy the Kid, dated March 15, 1879.
• ''In return for your doing this [testifying], I will let you go scot free with a pardon in your pocket for all your misdeeds.''---Gov. Lew Wallace to Billy the Kid, March 17, 1879.
• ''A precious specimen named ‘The Kid,’ whom the sheriff is holding here in the Plaza, as it is called, is an object of tender regard. I heard singing and music the other night; going to the door, I found the minstrels of the village actually serenading the fellow in his prison.''---Gov. Lew Wallace, in a letter to Secretary of the Interior Carl Schurz, March 31, 1879.
• ''I’m outlawed and it wasn’t long since I was a law and old Pat an outlaw. Funny thing, the law.''--Billy the Kid to Heiskell Jones, 1880.
• ''I have done everything that I promised you I would and you have done nothing that you promised me.''---Billy the Kid, in a letter to Gov. Lew Wallace, dated March 4, 1881.
• ''I can’t see how a fellow like him should expect any clemency from me.''---Gov. Lew Wallace to the Las Vegas Gazette, April 27, 1881
• ''Experience is a good but slow teacher and I think if I keep my mind, I will let every man do his own fighting so far as I am concerned and I will do my own.''---Charlie Bowdre in a letter to Joseph C. Lea, December 15, 1880.
• ''I wasn't the leader of any gang. I was for Billy all the time."---Billy the Kid to a Las Vegas reporter after his capture at Stinking Springs.