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The year was that of our Lord 1865. Many things had happened and many things were yet to come. None were really important except to historians, with the possible exception of what was about to happen to Ben Alan Davis.

The War Between the States had just ended, and word had it that Andrew Johnson was the new President of The United States of America. The first workable steamboat, developed by John Fitch, was seventy-eight years in existence. Eli Whitney’s Cotton Gin was seventy-two years old. The California gold rush was seventeen years ago, and the Colorado gold rush was fourteen years in the past. The Remington, New Model Forty-Four Revolver was seven years old, and the Starr Double Action Army Forty-Four handgun had been on the market five years. James Butler Hickok was twenty-eight and would be shot to death in eleven years, at the age of thirty-nine. Billy The Kid was only five years old, and a long way from killing his reputed twenty-one men. John Wesley Hardin was twelve, and had not even begun the useless slaughter of forty-four men. Bill Longley was only fourteen, and had not killed any of his eventual thirty-two men. Clay Allison was approximately eighteen, a real slow starter, who ultimately killed fifteen men in gun battle. Sir John Alexander MacDonald was two years from being the first Prime Minister of Canada. The Shelby County War in Texas was twenty-five years ago. And Benjamin Alan Davis was ready to reenter the United States in search of gold.

Ben Davis was thirty-eight years old. Originally, from the hill country of Georgia, he migrated west to South Texas with his poor, Welsh emigrant parents. At thirteen, he was already a top gun hand, and as Texas history will attest, he was as quick at getting his handgun into play, as he was a dead shot.

The Shelby County situation offered young Ben an opportunity to earn big money, while displaying his natural gift. Unbeknownst to the young Davis boy, the Shelby County thing was purely political, and eventually riled the citizens to Vigilante frenzy. In the course of a very short period, fifty men were either shot or hanged in Shelby County, Texas.

The entire State of Texas was in confusion in eighteen-forty, what with the problems with Mexico, the Comanche, the Apache and this Shelby County situation. There was talk of a newly organized outfit, dubbed The Texas Rangers, and the people they were putting on the payroll were known to be fearless, courageous and merciless.

Ben Davis was young, arrogant and aggressive, but he was by no means stupid. He rode home one morning after a busy night of killing squatters, to say good-bye to his folks; and left Texas behind as only a memory.

Ben had both pockets full of gold, a good horse and a desire to live. He also left with a fair case of humility as his new riding partner, for finally, even in his youth, he realized that he was definitely not indestructible.

It was five years and many hair raising adventures later, that an eighteen year old Benjamin Alan Davis left the United States in his wake, to enter the country which was to be his home for the next twenty one years. Being born and partially raised on a wooded mountain in