Billy the Kid Billy the Kid Billy the Kid (born Henry McCarty September 17 or November 23, 1859July 14, 1881, also known as William H. Bonney) was an American Old West outlaw and gunfighter who killed eight men before he was shot and killed at age 21. He took part in New Mexico's Lincoln County War, during which he allegedly committed three murders. McCarty was orphaned at age 14. The owner of a boarding house gave him a room in exchange for work. His first arrest was for stealing food at age 16 in late 1875. Ten days later, he robbed a Chinese
Henry Lee IV rewarded him with a consular appointment to Algeria; the Senate, however, refused the confirmation. In his remaining seven years of his life, Henry Lee traveled abroad, dying in Paris, France. On 29 March 1817 he married Anne Robinson McCarty, daughter of Daniel McCarty and Margaret Robinson. Anne and Henry had one child, Margaret. Margaret was born in autumn of 1818, and died at the age of two in a tragic accident. Lee′s nickname of "Black Horse" — a pun on the nickname of his famous father, "Light Horse" Harry Lee — originated in a scandal two years after his daughter′s