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Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid’s Escapades, and Other Lesser Known Historic Events

Khalid Elhassan January 21, 2020 33 min

William Carver - Butch Cassidy — Butch Cassidy, far right, The Sundance Kid, far left, and other members of the Wild Bunch gang. Wikimedia

33. The End of the Road For Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid

Contemporary reporting on Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid in South America. New York Herald

Early in 1905, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid robbed a bank in southern Argentina. Upon learning that a warrant had been issued for their arrest, they sold their ranch in May, 1905, and escaped to Chile. They returned to Argentina later that year and robbed another bank, then fled back to Chile. In 1906, they moved to Bolivia, and worked as guards for a mining company.

Two years later, in November 1908, they robbed a Bolivian mining company’s payroll, then fled to a small town where they lodged in a boarding house. The proprietor suspected them of being up to no good, and notified a nearby Bolivian army unit. On the evening of November 6^th, 1908, the boarding house was surrounded. A firefight erupted, during which the fugitives were outgunned and shot multiple times. Sundance was grievously wounded, so Cassidy shot him dead to put him out of his misery, then took his own life.

Written by

Khalid Elhassan

A lifelong history buff, I developed a particular passion for WW2 history as a child, when I spent hours listening to my grandfather, enraptured, as he recounted his wartime experiences in the British East African Campaign and with the British 8th Army in North Africa.

I graduated with a history BA from George Mason University, then went on to get a JD from the University of Virginia School of Law. After lawyering for a decade, I moved to sunny Rio de Janeiro and a less demanding career, opening a tourism agency in Copacabana.

A big chunk of my free time is spent blogging (you can follow me on Quora https://www.quora.com/profile/Khalid-Elhassan ) or freelance writing, mostly about my favorite subject, history.