Physical Traits

The Dropped Shoulder

Personal experience has led me to notice a trait that to my knowledge has never been discussed anywhere else.  Of course I have many photos of myself as a child, preteen and teen.  During those years of my life, my shoulders were even and proportionate.  When I entered the seventh grade I began my study of the saxophone which requires the right hand to be placed below the left.  I loved the sax and spent many, many hours practicing to become a rather outstanding player.  It was many years later while looking in the mirror I noticed I had developed a tendency for my right shoulder to hang just a bit lower than my left.  Indeed whenever I stand relaxed it is quite noticeable.   So I’ve gone back and looked at earlier photos of myself and I can see that tendency existed by the time I had entered High School, just 3 or 4 years into my saxophone study.  I have known other musicians who’ve exhibited the same condition. 











































What does all this have to do with Billy The Kid? 

Billy was known to be a skilled gunman.  Apparently he practiced a great deal during his formative years.  He was probably somewhat ambidextrous but we now know he preferred his right hand for pistol use.  Of course he is young in the tintype and the resulting dropped right shoulder is not as prominent as it had later become but it is definitely there.  Take a close look at the following comparison of photographs.  Over the tintype I have done some measuring.  The green lines are to be certain the measurements are taken at the same point along the width of the shoulders, equidistant from the center of his neck.  The blue arrows are all the same length and point to the center and then to the amount of slope visible on each shoulder. Notice the arrow above the right shoulder does not quite touch the shoulder.  Now follow along the red lines and you will see Brushy’s right shoulder is lower in virtually every photo where it would be visible.



We have no photos of the scars from bullet and knife wounds on Brushy’s body matching the locations where Billy The Kid was known to have been wounded.  Consequently many doubters question whether those scars were really present.  I have personally spoken to a living resident of Hico, TX, the last home of Brushy, who’s father had seen the scars.  William Morrison, Brushy’s legal representative, wrote about seeing the scars in his book, “Alias Billy The Kid”.  Morrison is also reported in the local newspaper to have viewed Brushy’s body in death where he again attested to the presence of those scars.  Click that pistol again to continue.

Continuing on the assumption if Brushy Bill truly was Billy The Kid there should be other physical traits that match up, I made a close examination of the photos looking for anything noticeable.  Two items demand consideration.

​How Billy The Kid Escaped Handcuffs

Billy The Kid reportedly had large wrists and small hands.  A trait that enabled him to escape handcuffs on several occasions.  Brushy also is claimed to have demonstrated this ability.  So I took a close look at the right hand in the tintype and the right hand in a photo of Brushy at 90 years of age.  I have outlined the shape of the hand in the tintype and placed it over Brushy’s hand.

​Notice the similar shape but also take note of Brushy’s thumb along the area where that part of his hand approaches his wrist.  The area appears to be a rather sudden and sharp curvature into the wrist and I believe is indicative of his ability to fold his thumb into the palm and make his hand smaller than his wrist.  Unfortunately this part of Billy’s hand covered by his sleeve in the tintype.  But witnesses did say Billy had the ability to escape handcuffs and I personally spoke to the son of a Hico, TX resident who reported seeing Brushy demonstrate the same feat.
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Further Evidence
Some years ago, I received an Email contact from a gentleman who made his living as an artist.  His training in drawing the human anatomy included knowledge to recognize specific types of hand structure.  He described the qualities of Brushy’s hand as it related to how the thumb was structured even including the term used to identify it.  I wish I still had that Email and the artist’s name but subsequent computer updates resulted in the loss of the document.  Nevertheless, I will share with you here that he described it as an extremely rare hand type that is detected in the hands of both Brushy and Billy.