Few would argue that Butch Cassidy would be at or near the top of any list of famous Old West outlaws. Matt Warner is not as widely known. But if not for Warner and his brother-in-law Tom McCarty, Butch Cassidy would not have achieved the notoriety that lasts to this day.
Much as Robert LeRoy Parker became Butch Cassidy, Matt Warner started life as Willard Erastus Christiansen. And, like Cassidy, Warner was raised in a Mormon family in small towns in Utah.
Believing he had killed another boy in a fight for the affections of a girl, Warner left home at age 14. He took a cowboy job on Diamond Mountain near Brown’s Hole in western Colorado—a job that turned out to involve more rustling than cowboying. He soon took up rustling and ranching on his own, concentrating on building a horse herd. He hooked up with Tom McCarty, already a well-established bandit, and they traveled through Colorado racing horses. Warner met Cassidy at a race, and they became friends.
McCarty knew there were quicker ways to make money and he and Warner planned to rob a bank in the prosperous mining town of Telluride, Colorado. They invited Cassidy to help pull off the robbery, thus introducing the young man to an outlaw life well beyond the penny-ante rustling he had participated in at times. Warner and Cassidy remained friends and occasionally committed other crimes together.
For a time, Warner robbed and rustled throughout the Southwest, hiding out in Robbers Roost, a Utah hideout, when he wasn’t on the run. McCarty and Warner relocated to Oregon, where Tom had family—brothers who were no strangers to banditry. The gang pulled off several successful, and sometimes lucrative, robberies across Oregon, Idaho, and Washington. Warner, by now married and with a baby, socked away his takings in the hope of going straight and building a ranch. But Matt was arrested, his wife left him, and a lawyer of questionable character used up all of Matt’s savings—some $20,000—getting him off.
He returned to Diamond Mountain and nearby Brown’s Hole and went to work rebuilding his abandoned ranch. Butch Cassidy was a frequent visitor as were other outlaws in the area, and Matt felt drawn back into a life of crime. A chance encounter with his father-in-law during a visit to Rock Springs for supplies put him in contact with his wife. He invited her to join him, and for about a year the happy family lived on Diamond Mountain.
Then his wife took ill with cancer, from which she later died, and the medical expenses overwhelmed Warner. He accepted a temporary job helping a prospector in the Uintah Basin relocate a camp—hired as a gunman to deal with other prospectors his employer believed intended to jump his claim. Warner killed two of the possible claim jumpers and wounded a third in a gunfight, resulting in his arrest for murder, and he was jailed in Vernal, Utah.
The supposed claim jumpers’ friends in town threatened to lynch Warner, while others there feared Matt’s friends—including Butch Cassidy and Elza Lay, who were hanging around town—would break him out of jail, so the trial was relocated to Ogden, Utah. Warner had no money to pay a lawyer and feared conviction and a long prison sentence. To alleviate that problem, Cassidy, Lay, and another outlaw robbed the bank in Montpelier, Idaho, and used the proceeds to hire a lawyer to represent their friend.
With the help of the attorney, Warner was convicted of manslaughter rather than murder, and was sentenced to a term in the Utah state penitentiary. Upon release, the governor made Warner an offer: give up his life of crime and go straight, and he would not be prosecuted for any past crimes. And he was to convince Butch Cassidy to turn himself in for a similar deal. Matt tried his best, but lacking means and money was not able to track down his friend.
Warner settled for a time and ran a saloon in Green River, Utah, then relocated to the mining town of Price, where his life took a decided turn—for the rest of his life he served the law. He was a justice of the peace, and spent decades as a Carbon County Deputy Sheriff. He also worked night patrol for the Price City Police.
At the same time, he was involved in numerous business ventures, including owning and operating two saloons, needing to earn a living and support his new wife and family. Warner never again ran afoul of the law, but never wore off his rough edges, getting up to innocent mischief now and then with rowdy friends. He also guided journalists and historians and others on expeditions into Robbers Roost.
Matt Warner died in December of 1938, leaving this note with his last will and testament (spelling and grammar in original): “I leve this world and I don’t think I have eny enemies I like every body hair in this town and I don’t think I have harmed any body their fore I rest easy in my box . . . let temptation of rongdoing cast aside, and share a life you will find peace of mind and happiness. That is sure. Love to you all, Matt.”
Utah historian R. B. Miller can be reached at writerRodMiller@gmail.com
