Youngers' Bend

Preface

Novels, and sometimes histories, are written from a few facts plus a great deal of fiction.  The life of Belle Starr was filled with so many exciting episodes, so many dangerous ordeals, that her life was so filled with the most exciting things ever recorded in the pages of history of the old west, that fiction is not needed.   In most cases just the facts of her life; her desires and accomplishments are all that is necessary to make the saga of her life a most interesting book for every history loving individual to read.  It is a true history of the old west.  There are not any of the old-timers still living who knew Belle Starr in person.  The contents of this book are not an accumulation of ideas and opinions gathered up overnight, but the writer was given this information by an old cowboy and Pinkerton man.  He had worked on a ranch east of the little town known as Texama, Oklahoma, located right at the west edge of what is known as Youngers’ Bend, in the old Indian Territory.  According to the old-timers, Belle Starr was an exceptionally fine looking woman, and she was among the most amazing, romantic women of American History.  Some proof  is that she was at one time a Confederate spy, although some doubt this.  There are lost periods of her life and the least known is the years she spent in her Youngers’ Bend hideout in the old Indian Territory.  This volume is dedicated to this period of her life of which so little is known.  Belle Starr was shot out of her saddle from ambush on or about February 3, 1889, on her way from Ft. Smith,

Arkansas, to her hideout in Youngers’ Bend.  She was waylaid by a man seeking vengeance  and also a fugitive from justice himself.  Her body lies in a marked grave on the banks of the Canadian River, about three miles southwest of the town of Porum, Oklahoma, in Youngers’ Bend, that she loved so well.  She died at the age of 41.  This book is dedicated to her life, the life of Belle Starr, known as the Queen of the Outlaws of the Southwest.