Outlaw Bill Cook's Buried Gold

By Robert F. (Bob) Turpin

Cherokee outlaw and gang leader Bill Cook turned rogue at a very young age. He and his younger brother Jim joined with a famous Indian outlaw and cold-blooded killer, Cherokee Bill Goldsby, to form the notorious Bill Cook-Cherokee Bill gang of outlaws. Together they were responsible for numerous killings and train, stage, and bank robberies in the Cherokee and Creek Nations. In the Ardmore train holdup, in addition to the loot taken from the passengers, the outlaws took $62,000 from the express car in greenbacks, gold coins, and silver coins.

With a sheriff's posse in close pursuit the gang split up to later meet at the Creek Nation hideout. Bill Cook, carrying the loot, decided to bury it in a patch of manganese boulders near Delaware Creek on the old Kildare ranch southwest of Clarita, Oklahoma, at a place referred to as McMillan pasture. Later the area became the old Dodson and Simmons farms. A number of hunters have supposedly searched the area but a find has never been reported.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lulu.com
• Release date: Oct 19, 2014
• ISBN: 9781312605541

Book preview

Outlaw Bill Cook's Buried Gold

Outlaw Bill Cook’s Buried Gold

by Robert F. Turpin

Copyright

© 2014 by Bob Turpin – All Rights Reserved

ISBN: 978-1-312-60554-1

No part of this book may be copied or reproduced in any form without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages for review purposes.

Dedication

To the folks who like to read about the Old West.

First Days

When word came that the Bill Cook gang of outlaws intended to hold up the Butterfield Stage between Tahlequah and Ardmore in Oklahoma, Dick and Zeke Crittenden of the Indian Lighthorse Police Force quickly organized a large posse. Their informer had sent word the gang was waiting for the stage in the home of Cook’s half-sister, Ludy Martin. The Martin farm was located on Fourteen Mile Creek, a few miles west of Tahlequah, capital of the old Cherokee Nation.

The posse hurried to the place referred to as the Halfway House. A few hundred yards away in the timber they dismounted and slowly approached the one-room log building. As they reached the edge of the clearing a volley of shots greeted them. Sequoyah Houston, a sergeant of the Indian police, was killed instantly, a bullet to his head, and two more men were