On the night of July 19, 1879, a man named Mike Gordon was shot in Las Vegas, New Mexico. He survived until the following morning, when his wounds killed him. Charges were filed. Then they were dismissed. The official record closed without naming a killer, leaving the question of who pulled the trigger permanently open — or so the documents suggest.
Legend, however, has never had much patience for open questions.
The popular account of that night goes like this: Gordon had shot up a saloon in Las Vegas where Doc Holliday was working the gambling tables. Holliday, a man who had already earned a reputation for violence in the frontier West, stepped outside and shot Gordon. First kill. First entry in a ledger that would continue to grow until tuberculosis finally claimed him in Glenwood Springs, Colorado. The legend is clean, causal, and satisfying. It also lacks any foundation in the historical record.