Over a period of decades in the 1800s, branches of my family moved nearly a thousand miles from the Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina to Nacogdoches, Texas. One of the first to make the trek was my 4x great-granduncle, Jacob Mast, who arrived there in 1828. Shortly after, he took a wife and started a family, his third child being Milton “Milt” Mast.
Milt was a farmer, waggoner, Confederate captain, retail merchant, and postmaster, eventually being elected as the sheriff and tax collector for Nacogdoches County. It was in his capacity as sheriff in 1877 that he gained particular notoriety. That June, in a Louisiana parish, Milt, with the assistance of a deputy and a constable, apprehended a man claiming to be Bill Jackson. But Milt knew this was no Mr. Jackson; rather, he was renowned outlaw “Bloody Bill” Longley, and ever since Milt had been made aware of his description and the reward offered for his capture, he was on Bill’s trail. Once he had his prisoner securely manacled, Milt whisked him back to Texas.
Bill Longley was born to devout, God-fearing parents and was a good-hearted, well-liked boy, who was baptized into the Christian church. Unfortunately, by his mid-teens, he had become quick-tempered and unpredictable as well as a crack shot with a six shooter. He had quit school and his chores at home and began drinking and living wildly. In the tense Reconstruction days following the Civil War, he and other young white men clashed with now emancipated blacks, and some of the subsequent murders that Bill committed (the first when he was seventeen) were racially motivated. For some time afterwards, he drifted among various states, gambling in saloons, robbing settlers, stealing horses, and committing more murders.
After an unsuccessful stint with the U. S. Cavalry in Wyoming Territory, which ended in court-martial and desertion, Bill returned to Texas, where, between 1873 and 1876, he committed four more murders. Although seven murders were officially attributed to him, he claimed to have killed thirty-two people.
Bill ultimately fled to Louisiana, where Milt Mast took him into custody. He was imprisoned at Giddings, Texas, tried in Lee County, and sentenced to death. While awaiting execution, he told many tall tales and made fantastic claims about himself and his exploits, including having been previously captured and lynched but spared when a lucky gunshot severed the rope he was hanging from.
Interestingly, while in jail, Bill wrote letters to Milt, and Milt answered them. In one such letter, Bill told Milt (who he referred to as “Captain”) that the people of Lee County had threatened his father’s life if he attempted to visit or employ a lawyer for his son’s defense. Bill also said Lee Countians wouldn’t even permit correspondence from his parents for fear they would saturate their letters with poison, enabling him to circumvent the public’s satisfaction of seeing him hang, but Bill said he would never be his own murderer.
In one of Bill’s letters, he mentioned Milt’s telling him that some of the citizens of Nacogdoches County felt sympathy for him and would be willing to sign a petition asking the Texas Governor to commute his sentence to life in prison. And while Bill expressed sincere appreciation for this demonstration of mercy and said a life sentence would be preferable to death, he felt that the overwhelming opposition against him would make it a futile endeavor. Bill believed he had not received a fair trial, “but it is done,” he wrote. “I have no friends, and everybody, it seems to me, [is] itching to hear the sounds of the hammer that is to drive the nails into my coffin.” Bill questioned what his future would be beyond the grave. Would it be one of happiness, or would there be eternal punishment? He stated that no minister ever came near him, and he had rarely read the Bible. “I have spent my life from a fifteen-year-old boy in the wildest parts of the country, and in the company of the most reckless class of men on earth. But with all, there has always been a spark of Christianity in my heart.”
Despite being apprehended by Milt, Bill wrote, “I still say, Captain, as I have always said, that I cherish no ill will against you for capturing me; I can’t blame any officer for doing his duty, but, on the other hand, if I had been armed at the time and had killed some of you, I should have looked at it in the same way. I would have believed that I was doing perfectly right.” Bill considered himself and Milt to be friends and guessed they would meet again when Gabriel blew his horn.
Following an unsuccessful appeal and a feeble attempt at escape, twenty-seven-year-old Bill Longley was led to the scaffold to “stretch hemp.” Around 4,000 spectators traveled by foot, horseback, buggy, and wagon to witness the event. Bill, cigar in mouth, spoke a few last words, stating that he regretted to die but knew he deserved it. He asked for forgiveness and said goodbye. Dropping through the trap door, six-foot Bill’s feet hit the ground, his knees bending. Law officers had to raise him three times in order for his body to swing clear. After eleven minutes, a trio of physicians pronounced him dead. Once his body was cut down, one of the physicians turned Bill’s head entirely around to verify that his neck had been broken, and a deputy repeated the test. The body was then placed in a coffin, transported west of town, and buried in a hillside cemetery.
But was Bill Longley really dead? Nine years later, his father stated Bill was alive. He claimed that Bill’s uncle had bribed the Lee County sheriff, and that a special leather harness concealed beneath Bill’s clothing had supported his weight and caught the noose on an iron hook, preventing his neck from being broken. After his “corpse” was taken to the cemetery, Bill arose from his coffin and left town. Some claimed to have later seen him in Mexico, others in Austin, and even others in Central America.
At least by 1937, there was talk of opening Bill’s grave. Attempts to pinpoint its exact location were made in the 1980s with some certainty of success in 1998, when remains were exhumed and sent to the Smithsonian Institution for DNA testing and skull reconstruction. Finally, in 2001, the announcement was made that the remains were, indeed, those of Bill Longley.
Twice hanged? Doubtful, but perhaps. Spared once from the rope? Maybe. Spared twice? Negatory.
As for Cousin Milt, the sheriff outlived the outlaw by nearly three decades, dying at Melrose, Texas in 1907.