Joe Bedford (1861-1907) was an American outlaw of the Wild West from Lockesburg, Arkansas. He was one of Micah Bell's lieutenants after Bell formed his own gang, but he was killed in a shootout with John Marston at Mount Hagen in 1907.
Biography[]
Joe Bedford was born in 1861, and he became known as an outlaw and murderer of the Wild West, associating himself with the likes of Micah Bell, Cleet Fenwick, and Samson Finch.
By the 1890s, he was based out of a cabin near Lockesburg, Arkansas, and, in 1898, he was accused of a murder which made Bedford paranoid. Shortly after, the Arizona Kid came calling to his house in search of work, and a nervous Bedford hired Arizona to kill a group of rival outlaws who had been slandering him. Arizona murdered all of them at Fort Brennand, and Bedford would go on to employ Arizona as a hired gun.
In 1899, he was hired by Micah Bell to join the Van der Linde Gang for the robbery of a US Army payroll train, and he played a minimal part in the heist. He later helped defend Micah against Arthur Morgan when Morgan accused Bell of treason, and, after the Van der Linde gang was disbanded, he joined Bell's outfit in the Rockies. In 1907, the late Morgan's friend John Marston and his associate Sadie Adler headed to Mount Hagen to confront Bell, and, in the ensuing shootout, Bedford and his allies were promptly gunned down and killed by Marston.