Brushy's visit with relatives

[Texas Truth Teller]

1940 TX census, Jacksonville, Cherokee Co,
Martha V. Heath, age 66, widow

1940 TX census, Jacksonville, Cherokee Co,
Vada B. Emerson, age 41, widow
Eulaine F. Emerson, age 18
Neelaine Emerson, age 15
Paul Simeon Emerson, age 9

TXD/C #15781,
Vada Belle Emerson (28 Feb 1899 - 13 Mar 1977)
Father - Monroe Dudley Heath
Mother - Martha Vada Roberts
Informant - Rev. Paul Emerson

Excerpt, p. 42, “Brushy Bill, …..Just Another Billy the Kid Tall Tale?”.

email from Paul Emerson to Roy Haws
“I don’t remember for sure how old I was when Brushy (Oliver) came to see grandmother. I could have been a little older than 16, and we all knew he claimed to be Billy the Kid. Grandmother was glad to see him and he was nice. He was a small man (if I remember correctly), not too tall and he wore his cowboy clothes, boots, etc. I don’t remember him coming over to our house, but it’s possible he did. But I do remember my grandmother saying that he was not Billy the Kid. I think Eulaine and my boys really wanted him to be whether he was or not.

Paul Emerson”

[Texas Truth Teller]

“Brushy Bill…..Just Another Billy the Kid Tall Tale?”, Roy Haws, 2015, p. 43
Extract of letter dated 2 August 1986 from Paul Emerson to William A Tunstill:

“Dear Mr. Tunstill,
I have read your letters and the articles you have sent my sister, Eulaine Haws about Oliver (Brushy Bill) Roberts, who said he was Billy the Kid. You have certainly done a lot of research and worked hard and I find it very interesting and fascinating to say the least. I remember meeting Oliver Roberts ,who was my grandmother’s brother, not too long before my grandmother died. She was Martha Vada Roberts Heath, and was my mother’s mother. Oliver came to see her in Jacksonville, Texas, and I met him. He was a very “dikey” little man that paraded around in western clothes and cowboy boots, and said he was Billy the Kid. I wish I had listened more carefully to what he had to say, spent more time in his presence, but I was young and too busy I guess.

To be honest, my grandmother did not believe he was Billy the Kid and did not have confidence in what he said. She thought it was in the imagination of his mind. I do not personally know.

I am enclosing a copy of the newspaper clipping about his death that I found in my mother’s papers after her death. On the back is a note written by my aunt Cora Heath, Martha Roberts Heath’s second oldest daughter. She said, ‘O. L. Roberts was my MOTHER'S BROTHER. HE WAS AROUND 75 YEARS OF AGE WHEN HE DIED. He was not Billy the Kid.’………………………….
………………
(The letter continues for another 5 paragraphs.)

With personal regards from us, and a prayer that God will bless you, I am

Sincerely,
Paul Emerson, grandson of Martha Vada Roberts Heath."

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William A. Tunstill neglected to include this information in "Billy the Kid And Me Were the Same".