John Wesley Hardin was born in Bonham on May 26, 1853. The son of a circuit riding Methodist preacher, John Wesley was named after the founder of Methodism.

But instead of following his father into the ministry, Wes Hardin became a prolific frontier mankiller.

When Wes was 2, the family moved south to the Moscow area, where the boy learned to handle guns as a hunter - and by shooting at effigies of Abraham Lincoln during the Civil War.

Wes engaged in his first serious combat at 11, stabbing another boy in the chest and back during a knife fight.

The boy lived, but Wes had revealed his killer instinct.

When he was 15, young Wes quarreled with a former slave named Mage in the vicinity of Moscow. Wes pulled a .44 revolver and pumped three slugs into Mage.

On the run from Reconstruction authorities, Wes hid at the farm of a friend. Learning that three soldiers were approaching to arrest him, he set an ambush at a creek crossing.

When the soldiers rode by, Wes fired both barrels of a shotgun, killing two of his pursuers.

The third soldier returned fire, nicking Wes in the left arm. The teenager drew his .44 and killed the man.

Several Confederate veterans of the area concealed the bodies, while Wes fled to Navarro County, where he had relatives. The 16- year-old killer taught school for a term at the secluded community of Pisgah Ridge.

The boy began to indulge himself in liquor, card playing, and horse racing - activities that invited frontier violence. He became involved in one shootout after another, usually triggering the first shots himself.

Early in 1871, the teenage fugitive headed for Louisiana. But when he reached the east Texas town of Marshall, he was arrested by a deputy sheriff.

It was decided to transfer Hardin and several other prisoners to Waco in the custody of two officers.

On the second night out, one of the guards went to a nearby farm house to procure feed for the animals.

Hardin produced a gun he had obtained from a fellow prisoner at the Marshall jail, shot the remaining guard, and fled the camp on horseback.

In 1872, Hardin wounded a man named Spites in Hemphill. That same year, Hardin was struck by buckshot during an altercation in Trinity City.

While recovering from his wounds, Hardin used a shotgun to drive away two officers from his Angelina County hideout.

Hardin finally departed east Texas - except for a 17-year prison term in Huntsville.

He killed more than a score of victims, but he was shot to death in an El Paso saloon in 1895.

O'Neal is retired from Panola College in Carthage and is a past president of the East Texas Historical Association. Scott Sosebee is executive director of the Association and can be contacted at sosebeem@sfasu.edu. Visit easttexashistorical.org.