In 1876 the nation was stunned by the news of the Battle of Little Big Horn where the 7th Cavalry under the command of General Custer were defeated in battle by a coalition of Indian tribes. People were shocked that people considered savages could defeat the United States Army. The newspapers described the slaughter in graphic detail and government response was swift and deadly. All Indians would either go onto reservations or be killed. New forts were built on the frontier to do battle and push the Indians off their land. In Montana territory, Fort Keogh was built and not far away the town of Miles City took shape.
Joshua Brimley went to Texas just prior to the end of the Civil War. He was a tough, hard man willing to fight and take land. He pushed out the Indians and fought off bandits to build his Empire Ranch. He rounded up stray cattle and any other cattle he found, branded or not. If they were on his ranch, they were his cattle. The Empire Ranch was vast and before long he had established a town bearing his name. Joshua didn’t care which way the war ended because he would still have his land.
When Jack McKenna, Texas Jack, first met Grady Jones, he was a quiet family man with a wife and daughter. He fought in the Civil War on the Union side and after the war he became bitter and disillusioned. His marriage changed all that and he renounced violence and became Preacher Jones, a peaceful man of God.
Bo Avery and his friend, Charlie Bixby, led a wagon train to California in 1858. Bo had fallen in love with a girl named Kate who had left the train at Fort Hall. Kate, her sister, and her sister’s husband went on to the Oregon Territory to get established in the new country.
Bo promised Kate as soon as he was done with his obligation to get the wagon train to California, he would come to Oregon to be with her. When they got the emigrants to Sacramento, he and Charlie got their pay. Charlie wanted to go to San Francisco because he had heard so much about it and he wanted to see the ocean. Bo decided to go along and then make his way north to the Oregon Territory and find Kate.
In 1850, the United States was less than seventy-five years old. In the context of the long-established countries of Europe it was in its infancy. Yet the speed and development as a country was unprecedented. From the thirteen original colonies on the east coast, the country had now spread west all the way to the Pacific. The concept of manifest destiny had taken hold, and the millions of Indians living there were viewed as in the way of the nation’s progress. The discovery of gold in California created a boom of development on the west coast but between the east and west coasts lay the vastness of America, still wild, untamed and lawless. Between Independence, Missouri and California would be turbulent weather, unimagined hardship, disease, hostile Indians, bandits, and for many, death.
The American cowboy is an icon recognized worldwide. Cowboys represented courage, independence, self-reliance and the freedom of the new frontier. Western stories of the old wild west are a classic staple but if you believe there are no longer cowboys around, you’d be wrong. Cowboys are still very much a part of the American landscape and living the cowboy code is still their way of life.
When an Islamic terrorist known only by the name Allah’s Scorpion is hired by a radical Muslim sect to attack the United States with a weapon of mass destruction, the plan is only partially completed. Allah’s Scorpion escapes with a few men from the terrorist cell who are helping him. They flee to a place away from a major city where they believe the authorities will be looking for them and go to Montana.
Fort Smith, Arkansas sat on the border of Indian Territory in 1875. It was a rowdy place filled with brothels, saloons, and outlaws. It was said that there was ‘no law west of Arkansas’ and not much in Fort Smith. That changed when Judge Isaac Parker was appointed to the bench. Known as ‘the hanging judge’, Judge Parker was stern and unbending in his application of the law… his court often referred to as the ‘court of the damned’. The jail at Fort Smith where outlaws were held awaiting trial wasn’t a pleasant place to be and was considered to be ‘hell on the border’.
The Kansas/Missouri border was a dangerous place during the Civil War and in the years that followed. Kansas entered the Union as an anti-slavery State only months before the war started and was bordered by the Pro-slavery State of Missouri. ‘Border Ruffians’ like William Quantrill fought for the Confederacy while ‘Free Staters’ and ‘Jayhawkers’ fought for the Union. They were all guerrilla fighters led by men of often questionable morality. There was only some measure of legitimacy given to them by the Confederate and Union governments respectively because they claimed they were fighting for the same cause. The results on both sides was the same… people killed while towns were sacked and burned.
The Ranger is the prequel to the novel Texas Jack!
This brand new adventure follows the story of a young man named Britt Logan who is a member of a wagon train on the way to Oregon in 1852. He and his parents are among just a few non-Mormons in a Mormon wagon train heading to the Salt Lake Valley. Their plan was to leave the train at the South Pass and head to Oregon with another train, but when Britt’s parents are killed by an influential member of the church, Britt finds himself on the run.
Texas Jack: The Bank Robbers: A Novel of the Old West (A Texas Jack Western) Paperback – August 13, 2020
The fast-paced, action-packed third Western adventure in the new “Texas Jack Western” series from Mark Marchetti!
Phineas Todd was a strange little man. He arrived in Filo, Texas many years before the Civil War and was a familiar fixture in Filo since he was the president of the only bank in town. Even when he was young, for some reason he just seemed to be older than his years. He was known in town simply as ‘Old Finny’ and was loved by the townspeople, in spite of his quirky ways.
For many of the town’s people and ranchers in the area, it was ‘Old Finny’ who had helped them navigate the hard times during the war and after. He was the wealthiest man in town yet lived like a pauper, his only interest being the welfare of the town. Receiving the love and respect of the town’s people was the only thing he believed was of value. Unknown to the town’s people was the secret of his past in the days before he came to Filo.
When four bank robbers arrive in town, led by the notorious gunman Russell Blye, the world of ‘Old Finny’ and the town gets turned upside down. The former Sheriff, Tommy Vee, comes out of retirement and recruits ‘Texas Jack’ McKenna to track down the robbers and bring them to justice.
As a longtime friend of ‘Old Finny’, Jack knows his secret… and doesn’t want it revealed. As they set out to hunt down the outlaws, Jack and Sheriff Vee discover they each have a different vision of how justice should be served… the legal way and the ‘Texas Jack’ way.
