The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 70, July 1966 - April, 1967 Page: 533
728 p. : maps, ports. ; 23 cm.View a full description of this periodical.
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Book Reviews
gunman in Western history." Born in Madison County, Arkansas,
in 1839, he spent his years after 1858 on the Texas-New Mexico
frontier. In 1896 he was killed in El Paso, Texas, under circum-
stances still subject to dispute. The author presents an interest-
ing hypothesis that Selman may actually have been murdered,
although legal opinion at the time did not so hold. Similarly, the
commonly accepted view that Hardin was killed by a shot fired
into the back of his head is brought into question by a line of
reasoning, based upon recent professional examination of old
photographs, which tends to support Selman's contention that
he fired on the man in self-defense.
Metz has done a fine job of tracing and documenting this gun-
man's career of violence and, doubly to his credit, has avoided
sensationalism and romanticism in his presentation of material.
His style is interesting and straightforward, exhibiting an ob-
jective viewpoint that is sustained through the inclusion of con-
flicting accounts of those incidents whose facts remain in dispute.
He manages to enrich the bare narrative with vignettes of
frontier living that are in themselves valuable contributions to
cultural history. One finishes the volume with the hope that the
writer's obvious talents for research and writing will lead him to
broader and historically more significant subjects in the future.
He shows a sympathetic understanding of frontier conditions and
people that should be applied to a larger topic.
Unfortunately, the generally pleasing format of the book is
marred by numerous careless errors, individually insignificant
but harshly irritating in the mass. For example, on page 16, "He"
is used instead of an obviously intended "The." Again, on page
31, the use of "who" for "whom," coupled with the omission of
a necessary "he," creates a meaningless garble of words instead of
a sentence. The omission of the word "beef" from a sentence on
page 73 leaves an adjective in embarrassingly naked unemploy-
ment, and, on page 147, "proceeded" is used where "preceded"
was intended. These and other errors in the text are compound-
ed by similar lapses in the notes and bibliography. On page 2o8,
note 5 to Chapter 2 substitutes "Earl Van Horn" for "Earl Van
Dorn." In the bibliography, page 236, "Southwest" replaces
"Southwestern" in the Southwestern Historical Quarterly.533
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Texas State Historical Association. The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 70, July 1966 - April, 1967, periodical, 1967; Austin, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth101199/m1/561/: accessed April 25, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Texas State Historical Association.