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The first 8 issues of Billy the Kid comic books, published by Charlton, were surtitled Masked Raider and starting publishing in 1955. Masked Raider was then dropped from the title at issue # 9, and the series continued until issue # 153 in March 1983.
Billy the Kid (born Henry McCarty; September 17 or November 23, 1859 – July 14, 1881), also known by the pseudonym William H. Bonney, was an outlaw and gunfighter of the American Old West, who is alleged to have killed 21 men before he was shot and killed at the age of 21. He also fought in New Mexico's Lincoln County War, during which he allegedly committed three murders.
After killing a blacksmith during an altercation in August 1877, McCarty became a wanted man in Arizona and returned to New Mexico, where he joined a group of cattle rustlers. He became well known in the region when he joined the Regulators and took part in the Lincoln County War of 1878. He and two other Regulators were later charged with killing three men, including Lincoln County Sheriff William J. Brady and one of his deputies.
McCarty's notoriety grew in December 1880 when the Las Vegas Gazette, in Las Vegas, New Mexico, and The Sun, in New York City, carried stories about his crimes. Sheriff Pat Garrett captured McCarty later that month. In April 1881, McCarty was tried for and convicted of Brady's murder, and was sentenced to hang in May of that year. He escaped from jail on April 28, killing two sheriff's deputies in the process, and evaded capture for more than two months. Garrett shot and killed McCarty, by then aged 21, in Fort Sumner on July 14, 1881. | |
