Other ‘Kid’ in Butch Cassidy’s Gang Sentenced to 20 Years

Because he was played by Robert Redford in the popular 1969 film, the Sundance Kid is the member of Butch Cassidy’s “Wild Bunch” gang that the public remembers. However, there was another Kid in that gang who was actually a faster and deadlier gunfighter than Sundance: Harvey Alexander Logan, a.k.a. Kid Curry. Despite having killed nine lawmen in his career with his lightning-fast draw, the law finally caught up with Kid Curry on Nov. 30, 1902, when he was sentenced to a combined 130 years’ imprisonment for various bank and train robberies, with several sentences running concurrently; the total effect was a sentence of 20 years.

Here is how the Anaconda Standard (Anaconda, Montana) reported the news on Nov. 30, 1902:

Kid Curry Will Serve Twenty Years

His Sentences Amount to 130 Years, but Eight for Fifteen Years Each Are Concurrent, as Also Are Two [of Five] Years Each—He Will Join Ben Kilpatrick at Columbus Prison

Special Dispatch to the Standard

Knoxville, Tenn., Nov. 29.—Kid Curry was today sentenced to 20 years at hard labor in the federal prison at Columbus, Ohio. Judge Clark passed the sentence this morning shortly after court convened. The sentence given to Curry really amounted to 130 years, but the actual time that he will serve in prison amounts to 20 years, as some of the terms run concurrently. Eight sentences are for 15 years each, to be served concurrently, two for five years each, to be served concurrently.

There were imposed also 10 fines of $500 each, a total of $5,000. An attempt will be made to get the case before the circuit court of appeals at Cincinnati on a writ of error; and Curry’s attorneys will have a week to decide the matter and draw the papers in the case.

When Logan was sentenced, he had the same look on his face that he has carried all during the trial, and when asked by the court if he had anything to say why sentence should not be passed on him, he spoke in a clear voice without emotion. Not a tear or blush came to his cheek and he was apparently unmoved under the strain of expectancy.

At the beginning of the case this morning the defense attacked the character of a witness and the efforts were overruled and the matter dismissed. The same course was taken by the court with the motion for a new trial.

After considerable skirmishing between the attorneys, Judge Clark asked Curry if he had anything to say. He then spoke in a clear voice that could be heard all over the courtroom.

“No, I believe not, your honor, anything more than what my counsel has said,” he said.

There is no truth in the report that Marshal Austin’s life had been threatened by Curry or his friends. Curry will join Ben Kilpatrick, his assistant, who was sentenced at St. Louis.

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