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Search - Doc Holliday: The Life and Legend

Doc Holliday The Life and Legend
Author: Gary L. Roberts

He was a study in contrasts: the legendary gunslinger who made his living as a dentist; the emaciated consumptive whose very name struck fear in the hearts of his enemies; the degenerate gambler and alcoholic whose fierce loyalty to his friends compelled him, more than once, to risk his own life; the sidekick whose near-mythic status has come to... more » rival that of the West's greatest heroes. More than 100 years after he died of tuberculosis at the age of thirty-six, Doc Holliday remains an enigma, a legend in the shadows, a brooding metaphor for the moral contradictions of life on the late-nineteenth-century frontier.

In Doc Holliday: The Life and Legend, the historian Gary Roberts takes aim at the most complex, perplexing, and paradoxical gunfighter of the Old West. Drawing on more than twenty years of research on his enigmatic subject, Roberts discovered numerous new primary sources in his quest to understand both what John Henry Holliday did and didn't do, and what these exploits meant to the elusive man behind the now-legendary deeds.

Roberts explores Holliday's idyllic, antebellum childhood in Georgia, where he was schooled in the manly virtues of independence, loyalty, proficiency with weapons of every kind, and above all, honor. He considers numerous explanations behind John Henry's sudden and drastic decision to abandon his large extended family and a promising career to move to Texas, where, in the parlance of the day, he "slipped from the path of rectitude" even as he clung to his profession and the ideals he had learned as a child. Roberts tracks Holliday's western ramblings from Dallas to Denver to Cheyenne to Dodge City to Tombstone, always in pursuit of the next game of chance and another shot of whiskey, his health on a deep, downward spiral, his gunfighter skills on the rise. Along the way he befriended (or made enemies of) such Western icons as Bat Masterson, Kate Elder, Curly Bill Brocius, and Wyatt Earp.

As you'll discover, there were as many conflicting opinions about Doc Holliday as there were people who knew him, or knew of him: To Earp, he was a "mad, merry scamp with a heart of gold and nerves of steel." According to Masterson, he "had a mean disposition and an ungovernable temper, and under the influence of liquor was a dangerous man." Newspapers called him everything from "a very mild-mannered man...genial and companionable" to a "shiftless bagged-legged character- a killer and a professional cut-throat." In this fascinating probe into the real life near-mythic figure, you'll meet the man who lived up to every one of these statements and more.

ISBN-13: 9780471262916
ISBN-10: 0471262919
Publication Date: 4/21/2006
Pages: 544
Rating:

Currently 3.1/5 Stars.

3.1 stars, based on 7 ratings

Publisher: Wiley
Book Type: Hardcover
Other Versions: Paperback
Members Wishing: 1
Reviews: Member | Amazon | Write a Review

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Amy H. (Glory68) reviewed Doc Holliday: The Life and Legend on 7/7/2010 + 36 more book reviews

Although I enjoyed knowing the history, the narrative ran a bit long and was presented in a very dry fashion. It was hard to keep reading through to the end.

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Genres:

Biographies & Memoirs >> General
Biographies & Memoirs >> Historical >> General
Biographies & Memoirs >> Historical >> United States >> General
Biographies & Memoirs >> Specific Groups >> Adventurers & Explorers
History >> Americas >> United States >> 19th Century >> Old West

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