It all started with an argument about the ill treatment of a horse and led to a gun battle in the streets of Thermopolis. Only one outlaw had a gun, the other defended himself with a coffee mug.
It was 1903 and the gossip of the showdown spread through Wyoming over the telephone wires and was published in nearly all the papers. The details were muddy, but one thing was clear, popular outlaw Tom O’Day was in a gunfight without a gun.
The Likable Outlaw
Tom O’Day was a Wyoming outlaw who went by the nickname “Peeps” O’Day. Along with one of his best friends, Walt Punteny a.k.a. Wat the Watcher, he was a known member of the Hole in the Wall gang and would often act as a lookout.
He also found ‘work’ as a bank robber, cowboy, ranch hand, horse thief, cattle rustler, and expert horseman.
The Wyoming Tribune called O’Day the good-natured but misled Irishman and the Casper Tribune agreed.
In 1903, the Casper Tribune wrote, “The people of Casper consider him harmless and have been considerably amused at the effort of the press to make a bad man of Tom O’Day. He fails miserably to live up to his newspaperdom reputation.”
The Cody Enterprise, however, wrote, “Tom O’Day is a notorious outlaw and one of the quickest guns of the west.”
It was well known that “bad men” and notorious stories sold newspapers so O’Day would often make the papers of the day with his exploits, even the unintended ones, and they would often be inflated.
However, this story is strange enough that not much exaggeration was needed.
The Argument
The February 3 edition of the Wyoming Tribune reported that the gunfight all began over breakfast in Thermopolis.
O’Day, who owned several racehorses, had hired Lew Bagby to take care of one valuable steed. The two men were eating breakfast together, when O’Day accused Bagby of mistreating the animal.
Bagby took offense of this insult and some newspapers reported that he stormed out, marching over to the butcher shop where he borrowed a gun.
The accounts vary greatly as the story hit the presses. Some earlier articles say the gun battle began immediately and later stories say that it was an ambush. All agree that O’Day was unarmed and that Bagby had the upper hand with a gun.
Even the reasons that a seasoned outlaw like O’Day was unarmed vary.
His friend, Walt Punteney, claimed that O’Day had rode into town and had been asked to turn over his revolver to the town marshal for “the good of the town” which O’Day had done with reluctance.
Punteney told aspiring historian and future movie actor, Tim McCoy, that instead of heading for his normal watering spot, Happy Jack’s saloon, O’Day went into an adjacent coffee shop-restaurant, which consisted of a tiny room with four or five tables and twice as many spindly chairs.
Tacetta Walker, in her 1930s book, Stories of Early Days in Wyoming: Big Horn Basin, said that O’Day entered a restaurant that had a saloon in the front part.
When O’Day came into the saloon, he took out his Colt 45, unbuckled his belt of cartridges and handed them over to the bartender to keep for him while he should eat his dinner.
The Gun
Punteney said that the gun used in the battle belonged to another member of the Hole in the Wall gang, Frank James.
James was jumpy and always on alert for trouble. As a precaution, he had sawed off the trigger of his revolver and created a fast-fanning machine. He carried it always loaded with six shots in the chamber.
The gun was well known in Thermopolis and folks called it a “quick-barkin’ pistol and a shooting machine”. You would shoot it by pulling back the safety rather than a trigger.
This was the pistol that Bagby had borrowed from the butcher shop.
The Shoot-Out
Punteney said that Bagby, who had been watching O’Day’s movements from behind a mannequin in the window of a haberdasher’s, slinked across the street, braced himself against the door and came flying into the restaurant, bellowing, “You’re in for it now, Tom!”
O’Day froze in his seat and stared, wide-eyed, as Bagby raised James’s pistol and prepared to fire.
Bagby had never fired a pistol without a trigger and the result was that as Bagby instinctively raised the pistol, cocked the hammer with his thumb into what had always been the locked position, and let go of the hammer.
The weapon discharged immediately, throwing a .45-caliber slug into the ceiling, the shock practically knocked Bagby off his feet.
O’Day, unfrozen by the noise, jumped from his chair. He knocked his table halfway across the room.
He is said by Walker to have snatched up his coffee cup, which was full of hot coffee, and thrown it full force at Bagsby. He then dashed behind the cook’s counter, where a tray of porcelain coffee mugs had been placed.
Grabbing the tray, he began hurling the mugs at Bagby and, to the accompanying sound of erratic, out-of-control shooting, hoots, howls, and shattering porcelain, drove his assailant into the street.
Bagby, realizing he had failed, ran down the main street of town and disappeared around a corner.
The Gossip Spread
“The laugh was on him,” Walker wrote. “He, a man with a gun, was running from another who had only dishes for weapons. He made the door, leaving the victory to O’Day.
“O’Day, laughing, then put on his pistol and swore never again to be so foolish as to play law abiding citizen.”
The Wyoming Tribune in Cheyenne ran the headline, “Queer Weapons Used By Brave O’Day When Shot:” and told the story of Wyoming’s favorite outlaw who had defended himself with dishes.
“Bagby was enraged by the charge (of mistreating the race horse) and whipping out a six shooter, shot O’Day through the face, inflicting a serious wound,” the paper wrote.
“O’Day sprang to his feet and Bagby continued firing until four bullets had left his gun. Though unarmed, O’Day made no attempt to escape, but seized cups and plates from the table and rained them on Bagby. Bagby took to his legs, followed by O’Day, but escaped down the street.”
The Cheyenne Daily Leader told its readers that Tom O’Day had been shot. They said that he was the man who had recently been tried and acquitted of the charge of robbing the Bridger, Montana Bank and had a reputation all over the western country for his dauntless courage.
The Tribune added that he had proved that courage once more during the “thrilling shooting affray” at Thermopolis,
The Rawlins Republican boasted that O’Day was a notorious character with a checkered career on the frontier. He had been shot at 500 times without being hit and was known to be absolutely fearless. This shootout was the first time O’Day had been wounded.
According to the Cheyenne Tribune, while still bleeding, O’Day turned himself into the justice of the peace, offering to pay a fine for disturbing the peace.
The justice is reported to have refused to consider this proposition and firmly believed that O’Day was right in the quarrel.
The next month, the Laramie Republic reported that Bagby was arrested and taken before Justice Irwin. Bonds were fixed at $1,000, which were immediately furnished and the defendant released.
As for O’Day, he was said to have left Thermopolis immediately following the shoot-out.
He continued to work with horses, although this work varied. Sometimes O’Day was racing these fast steeds and other times, he was off stealing them.
Jackie Dorothy can be reached at jackie@cowboystatedaily.com
