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- It is not my purpose to try to show him as the original gun slinger of the "wild and wooly" West nor to glorify him as a Robin Hood type but to trace his activities in Arkansas from the late 1850's until his death in 1869.
Baker was born in Tennessee, June 23, 1835. While still a small boy his parents settled on the south bank of the Sulphur River in Texas just a few miles from the Arkansas state line. Here Baker grew to manhood with little formal education but with a great deal of experience in brawling, fighting, drinking, and other types of amusements common to the frontier of his day.
On one occasion fighting broke out between Baker's gang and another group. Baker singled out a youthful member of the opposing gang and was about to plunge his Bowie knife into him when a friend of the youth hit Baker over the head with a tomahawk. Baker was carried unconscious to a neighboring house, from which it was months before he could be removed. Some think the blow on the head permanently injured Baker's brain, and they attribute much of his future escapades to the injury.
When nineteen years of age, Baker married Miss Jane Petty who lived across the state line in Arkansas. He continued his drinking and carousing until it led to serious trouble. Eight months after his marriage he horsewhipped an orphan boy by the name of Stallcup. The latter had Baker arrested and tried. At the trial an old man by the name of Bailey testified against him. Baker received a very light sentence and within a few days he rode out to Bailey's farm and shot him twice with a shotgun. Three days later Bailey died and Baker fled from the Sulphur River country with Bailey's son in pursuit.
- There is uncertainty about the next two years of Bakers's life, for
we have no record other than that of the desperado which of course is not
reliable. According to Baker he went into Indian Territory where he had
trouble that ended with his killing an Indian and a traveling companion.
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