I’VE WRITTEN ABOUT A BUNCH OF “BILLS” IN THIS column, including Bill Jordan, Curly Bill Brocius, William Collins, William H. Anderson, Billy Dixon, and Bill Doolin. Some were law abiding; some were outlaws. Well, Bill Longley may have been the bloodiest Bill of ’em all—and he certainly did not honor the law.
William Preston Longley was born on October 6, 1851, on Mill Creek in Austin County, Texas. He was raised on a farm and learned to shoot at a young age. By 1867 he had dropped out of school and taken up a “wild” life of drinking, carousing, and running with unsavory types.
In December 1868, at the age of 17, Bill committed his first confirmed murder, by shooting a former slave who was traveling on horseback with two…
