Brushy Photo Age 14 - Is it really him?

[Wayne Land]

A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away (lol) a respected adversary in the Brushy debate over on a different message board insisted that the photo of Brushy at age 14 was really not him, since it had been cropped from a group picture of members of the Clements family during a cattle drive. The group picture was never produced but the gentleman said it was in a book which he could not remember the name of, but said Leon Metz would know. I tried to contact Leon Metz but to no avail and to this day I have not found the alleged group photo. The fellow on the other site has since rode off into the sunset. I hope he is doing well but he no longer participates in the message boards and I do know he had taken ill. He said the picture was taken in the 1870's and thus "could not be Brushy since Brushy was born in 1879". You all know how that goes!

Well, since I believe Brushy was born in 1859 and might well have been in a photo at age 14 during the 1870's that included some members of the Clements clan and since I believe the photo is the spitting image of Brushy, then I see the photo as a possible smoking gun in the search for proof about Brushy "one way or the other".

Does anyone know the true origin of that photo? If it is indeed cropped from a group picture, does anyone know where the group picture could be found? If we had that photo and could verify it was taken in the early 1870's and could verify through photo analysis that the person in the picture was none other than Brushy, then we would have proof that Brushy was born well before 1879.

[lacowboy]

I remember Allan saying that on the other board. He would never produce any evidence that I recall. I also recall Allan getting the Brushy section of another board taken down just because he could and stated so and for no other reason. I also remember Allan saying a lot of things that he never backed up because he never seemed to be able to produce this friend who was supposed to have been in contact with Brushy's family. I wonder if this friend ever existed. I did hear he had been ill but i thought I heard he had recovered. That has been over a year ago as I recall.

[devinb]

YES—the image of the 14 yr old "Brushy Bill" is the same individual shown in a later moustached image of the more mature (clean-cut) "Brushy Bill" and is a perfect match with the iconic tintype of "Billy the Kid" (see my "Amateur Forensic Analysis" threads and judge for yourself). I'm 100% convinced