Born: December 11, 1845
Died: September 18, 1882

A former Texas Ranger, Dallas Stoudenmire began his career as a well-respected U.S. marshal, but he soon acquired a reputation for drinking too much and shooting too freely. He has been remembered as one of the most sensational lawmen of the West—and as a man who sometimes stood on the wrong side of the law.

A confederate ranger

A Southerner by birth, Dallas Stoudenmire was born in 1845 in Aberfoil, Alabama. He grew up in a large family, and when the Civil War broke out in 1861, he didn’t wait long to join the fighting. Stoudenmire is reported to have joined the Confederate army in 1862, when he was just sixteen years old. (The Confederate army fought for the eleven Southern states that broke away from the Union in order to form their own government.) Although he received many severe...