The Night Luke Short Stepped Outside

Main Street. Fort Worth, Texas.

February 8, 1887

A few minutes after eight.

Luke Short comes out of the White Elephant Saloon.

Jim Courtright is waiting.

Longhair Jim. Former city marshal. Experienced gunman.

A man whose reputation usually gets there before he does.

Jake Johnson is there, too. He knows both men.

For the moment, everybody's talking.

They move a few feet north, near the entrance to a shooting gallery.

Short has his thumbs hooked in the armholes of his vest.

Then he lowers his hands.

In the account Short gives a reporter later that night, Courtright says:

“Well, you needn't reach for your gun.”

Courtright's hand goes to his hip pocket.

He starts to pull a pistol.

[Music Up]

Howdy. Chip Schweiger here.

Welcome to another edition of Way Out West.

Where the stories of the American West are told...

Cowboy wisdom is earned...

And the legacy of the American cowboy still rides on.

Imagine a gambler with polished shoes has stepped outside to meet a former marshal with a dangerous reputation.

Before we find out what happens next, 

remember you'll find additional resources for today's episode in the show notes at WayOutWestPod.com/luke-short/ 

[BUMPER MUSIC]

Welcome back.

We’re in Fort Worth in 1887.

First, you should know who these two men are.

And why this conversation has people down the street looking for a gun.

Chapter 1 – Two Men

Luke Short doesn't look like the man you ought to worry about.

He's small. Neatly dressed. Quiet.

The sort of fellow who makes sure his shoes are polished.

In fact, that's exactly what he's been doing earlier this evening.

Getting his shoes blacked at the White Elephant.

He'll tell the Gazette that somebody asked him then whether he was having trouble with Courtright.

Short said there wasn't any.

That's worth remembering.

Because somebody's worried enough to ask.

And Luke is worried about his shoes.

His friend Bat Masterson remembered a little man with very considerable nerve.

Masterson liked Luke. Keep that in mind when you hear his stories.

But he had good reason to know what happened when somebody mistook Short's size for an invitation.

Tombstone. 1881.

According to Masterson's later account, a gambler named Charlie Storms picks a quarrel with Short at the Oriental.

Bat knows both men.

He gets Storms away and takes him to his room.

Then he returns to explain to Luke that Charlie really isn't such a bad fellow.

And Charlie reappears.

There are people who make it difficult to recommend them.

Masterson says Storms grabs Short and goes for a pistol.

Short shoots him dead.

Six years later, the Fort Worth paper will remember that killing while describing Luke as quiet and gentlemanly.

Those descriptions aren't mutually exclusive.

Courtright has a different kind of presence.

Fort Worth knows him as the man who wore the marshal's badge.

He won the office in eighteen seventy-six by three votes.

Three.

A few different neighbors turn up, and this becomes somebody else's story.

He holds the job for three terms.

Then the voters turn him out.

But losing the badge doesn't make him harmless.

By eighteen eighty-seven, he's running a detective agency.

He's also recently escaped a much worse problem than an election defeat.

Murder charges in New Mexico.

Authorities had come to Fort Worth to take him back.

His friends helped him escape custody.

Eventually he returned to face the case, which ended without a conviction.

So the man waiting outside the White Elephant has been a lawman, a wanted man, and a detective.

And through all of it, a man people know can shoot.

The next morning's Gazette praises his ability with either hand.

The paper can scarcely believe a confrontation involving Courtright could end the way this one does.

But we're not there yet.

Chapter 2 – Fort Worth

Fort Worth has cattle money, railroad money, and plenty of places to lose both.

Head south and you'll find Hell's Half Acre.

But the White Elephant stands farther up Main Street, nearer the courthouse.

It's aiming for a better class of customer.

Good furnishings. Gambling upstairs.

A place where a prosperous man can enjoy himself while continuing to think of himself as prosperous.

Short has become closely identified with its gambling business.

Courtright has been part of the same sporting world.

These aren't strangers discovering they dislike each other.

So what brings Jim to Luke's door?

The familiar answer is protection money.

Courtright wants to get paid.

Short figures he can look after himself.

And that story wasn't invented a hundred years later to sell tickets to a reenactment.

The Dallas Weekly Herald reported an allegation that Courtright was using his detective business to squeeze money from gamblers, including Short.

An allegation. Not a receipt.

Masterson later described it as a dispute over a job.

Courtright wanted Short to install him as a special officer at the White Elephant.

Short didn't want him around the customers.

In Bat's telling, Luke would sooner pay Jim to stay away.

Which is a memorable way to decline an application.

And a fairly dangerous thing to tell this particular applicant.

Protection racket? Unwanted employment? A quarrel over influence and money?

We don't have the whole conversation.

But we do have a detective who wants something from a gambler.

And a gambler who won't give it to him.

[MUSIC ENTERS, LOW AND RESTRAINED.]

Now here's an odd detail.

Just before the shooting, Short has sold his interest in the White Elephant business to Jake Johnson.

That doesn't take Luke out of the building.

And it doesn't take him out of whatever is brewing with Courtright.

By about 7:30 on February the 8th, a man approaches policeman Bony Tucker.

He wants to know whether Tucker has two guns.

He says there's going to be trouble between Courtright and Short.

Tucker refuses to supply a weapon.

Later, he's near Main and Third, talking with his brother and another man.

He tells his brother to stick close.

If trouble starts, he wants somebody beside him he can count on.

Meanwhile, back at the White Elephant, someone calls Luke Short.

He goes to the vestibule.

Courtright and Johnson are there.

Short goes outside.

Chapter 3 – The Gunfight

We're back where we started.

Just north of the saloon entrance.

Beside the little shooting gallery.

Jake Johnson's account puts the men three or four feet apart.

Close enough to touch.

Short will say the conversation is quiet.

He brings up past transactions.

Courtright agrees, but there's no warmth in it.

Luke's thumbs are in his vest.

His hands come down.

Courtright warns him about reaching for a gun.

Then Courtright reaches for his own.

[BEAT.]

Short sees the movement.

His hand goes to his hip pocket.

He draws.

[ONE GUNSHOT.]

Down the street, Tucker hears it.

He starts running.

Another shot.

Then two close together.

A fifth as Tucker reaches Short.

[SHORT BURST OF STREET COMMOTION. FADE TO SILENCE.]

Luke is still standing.

Tucker dodges around him and grabs his pistol.

His brother helps secure him.

Then Tucker sees Courtright.

He's fallen inside the shooting gallery entrance.

His feet extend onto the sidewalk.

Tucker bends over him.

Speaks to him.

Courtright doesn't answer.

He's still holding a revolver.

Its chambers are loaded.

Jim Courtright hasn't fired a shot.

[TWO BEATS.]

Now, the famous version gives that first bullet an extraordinary job.

It strikes Courtright's gun hand and takes off his thumb.

Unable to cock the pistol, he tries to pass it to his left hand.

The border shift.

Before he can finish, Short shoots again.

Other tellings add a watch chain that catches the gun.

Or Short knocking or seizing Courtright's gun hand.

It's a terrific sequence.

But the next morning's newspaper gives us something less tidy.

The thumb injury is there.

Tucker reports a broken right thumb, a shoulder wound, and a bullet through the heart.

What isn't established is that the thumb was hit first.

Or that Courtright attempted that famous transfer.

Neither Short's account nor Tucker's describes Luke grabbing the gun hand.

The Gazette does report that officers examined Courtright's revolver.

Its cylinder wouldn't turn.

That leaves us with a damaged hand, a gun that wouldn't work when examined, and five shots from Luke Short.

We can't put every movement in order.

We can put Courtright in that doorway.

Still holding a loaded pistol.

Chapter 4 – Aftermath

Main Street fills with people.

The rumors start almost as quickly as the shooting stopped.

One says Courtright's detective partner, Charles Bull, fired in his defense.

Bull is arrested.

Then the story collapses.

The Gazette reports that he took no part in the shooting.

Short goes to the county jail.

When a reporter visits, Luke is calm.

He says the whole thing surprised him.

No previous disagreement.

He'd only been adjusting his clothing.

Remember that warning to Tucker half an hour before?

Other people certainly thought something was coming.

But Short's account, and Johnson's description of Courtright drawing first, give Luke a strong claim of self-defense.

He'll be released on bond.

The killing won't bring him to trial.

Courtright's body goes home to his wife and three children.

The next day's paper describes their grief.

For them, this isn't a famous gunfight.

It's the night he doesn't come home alive.

Fort Worth turns out for his funeral.

A procession remembered as stretching six blocks.

Short stays alive for another six years.

Marries Hattie Buck the following month.

Keeps gambling.

And survives another shooting, this time badly wounded by a shotgun.

Kidney disease finally kills him in eighteen ninety-three.

He's thirty-nine.

Both men are buried at Oakwood Cemetery in Fort Worth.

But leave them for a moment on Main Street.

Before the funerals. Before the retellings.

Earlier that evening, Luke Short had been getting his shoes polished.

An ordinary little errand.

Then somebody called his name.

Chapter 5 – Buster the Bull and the Cowboy Glossary

OK, before we ride out today, we’ve got one more thing.

[BULL SOUND]

Yep, that distinctive call from Buster the Bull means it’s time again for our Cowboy Glossary Term of the Week.

And this week’s term is… heeled.

In the language of the Old West, being heeled meant you were carrying a gun.

If somebody asked, “Are you heeled?” they weren’t admiring your boots.

They wanted to know whether you were armed.

And as we heard, a man could have polished shoes and still be heeled.

Chapter 6 – Thanks for Listening

Well, that’s all for this episode of Way Out West. Thanks for riding with me here.

If you enjoyed the episode, please follow, rate, and share the show with someone who loves the history, culture, and traditions of the American West.

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And while you’re there, take a few minutes to explore the Way Out West Journal, where we dive even deeper into the people, places, and history that continue to shape the West today.

That’s RideWayOutWest.com.

Until next time, this is Chip Schweiger, reminding you: a quiet man isn’t necessarily an easy man to frighten.

We’ll see ya down the road.