For those interested in ordering my new book, you can receive a discount by doing so through email.

Black Gun, Silver Star
The Life and Legend of
Frontier Marshal Bass Reeves
A Reader
By Art T. Burton
In The Story of Oklahoma, Deputy U.S. Marshal Bass Reeves appears as one of “eight
notable Oklahomans,” the “most feared U.S. marshal in the Indian country.” That
Reeves was also an African American who had spent his early life as a slave in Arkansas
and Texas made his accomplishments all the more remarkable. Black Gun,
Silver Star tells Bass Reeves’s story for the first time, sifting through fact and legend
to discover the truth about one of the most outstanding peace officers in late-nineteenth-
century America—and perhaps the greatest lawman of the Wild West era.
Bucking the odds (“I’m sorry, we didn’t keep black people’s history,” a clerk at one
of Oklahoma’s local historical societies answered to a query), Art T. Burton traces
Reeves from his days of slavery to his soldiering in the Civil War battles of the
Trans-Mississippi Theater to his career as a deputy U.S. marshal out of Fort Smith,
Arkansas, beginning in 1875 when he worked under “Hanging Judge” Isaac C.
Parker. Fluent in Creek and other southern Native languages, physically powerful,
skilled with firearms, and a master of disguise, Reeves was exceptionally adept at apprehending
fugitives and outlaws and his exploits were legendary in Oklahoma and
Arkansas. Black Gun, Silver Star restores this remarkable figure to his rightful place
in the history of the American West.
Art T. Burton is a professor of history at South Suburban College in South Holland,
Illinois. He is the author of Black, Buckskin, and Blue: African American Scouts
and Soldiers on the Western Frontier and Black, Red, and Deadly: Black and Indian
Gunfighters of the Indian Territory, 1870–1907.
July
384 pp. 6 x 9 32 photographs, 2 maps
$24.95* cloth 0-8032-1338-7 BURBLA
£18.95 UK
*Receive a 20% discount on this book ($19.96) when you mention source code AS61
race and ethnicity in the american west
Albert S. Broussard, Maria Raquel Cases, Dudley Gardner, Margaret Jacobs,
Delphine Red Shirt, and Benson Tong, series editors.
photo of deputy u.s. marshal bass reeves; courtesy western history collections, university of oklahoma library
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Congratulations! I very much look forward to reading the book.

--meursault

I just finished reading this book and I believe Art did a masterful job. He's presented his character through actual court case material, personal rememberances of old timers and family, and newspaper articles. The biography is more statement of fact than tribute to Reeves and no punches are pulled.
Bass had an exceptionally long tenure as a Deputy U. S. Marshal and made a few mistakes along the way. These are covered. But, so too, are the remarkable feats he accomplished.
Bass was a black man, a former slave, working an area dominated by Indian tribes who were either former slave owners or still healing from the fractures of the Civil War. The whites running loose and committing crimes in his jurisdiction were mostly from the southern states and highly prejudiced toward blacks. Bass moved through this country aided only by his wit, strength, and a winchester rifle and "earned" the respect of everyone there. No critic, then or now, has been able to show that Bass did not do good and bring law and order to the frontier. Art's rendering takes on all comers and their questions. The book is a heck of a good read and not the least bit painful.

Professor Burton's book about Bass Reeves combines thorough, meticulous scholarship on the details of Reeves' long career as a lawman with a most impressive general knowledge of the times in which he lived. The result is a biography unlikely to be surpassed.

A question that has long interested me, and is asked by this book, concerns the criteria of historical remembrance. Why, for example, is Wyatt Earp (to pick just one example) remembered and even celebrated to this day, when--at the very least--equally deserving historical figures, such as Reeves, languish in relative obscurity? Were history fair (and of course it is not) the reverse should be the case, as by any objective measure Reeves was the superior lawman. One is cynically tempted to conclude that too often subsequent historical recognition is far more a result of puffery than of merit.

Burton does an admirable job of reconstructing what can now be known about Reeves' remarkable life, and adeptly separates myth from fact along the way. This was a difficult task, as Reeves was illiterate, meaning that the record of his life is only indirectly available primarily through court transcripts, oral histories by others, and sketchy accounts in contemporary newspapers not often disposed to celebrate the accomplishment of a black man.

In addition, Burton is able to present new and significant information. I, for one, had not known that, toward the end of his career, Reeves was prominently involved in a spectacular shootout (every bit as dramatic as the OK Corral) in Muskogee with a deadly gang of religious fanatics. Until now, lawman Bud Ledbetter (the "Fourth Guardsman") got most of the credit for confronting these dangerous criminals.

Professor Burton notes that he's been working on this project, intermittently, for some twenty years--the result is worth the wait.

--meursault

I just finished reading this new book on Bass Reeves by Art Burton and it is absolutely fantastic. Very well researched and well written. Knowing Art personally over the past ten years, I know that researching the life and times of Bass Reeves is his passion and it definitely comes through in his biography of this great lawman.

I too have had the pleasure of reading this book.
Well worth your time if true western fact is your cup of tea!
Mr. Burton has done an excellent job.