DUANE
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Duane's take
Here's how the marker tells it, and I'll do my best to do it justice. It was February 6th, 1897, and Sheriff John L. Jones wasn't the kind of man who let stolen cattle walk off into the Hill Country without a word about it.
He rode out with five deputies, T. C. Taylor, Oscar Latta, John Gardner, T.
W. Frazier, and Bob Owens, twenty-one miles northwest, out to what's now the Rust Ranch. And out there, they found exactly what they were lookin' for.
Jim and Jourd Nite (brothers) and a man named J. C. Crane, all three of them in possession of cattle and horses stolen from James and Peter Paterson and John Gardner.
Now, when six lawmen ride up on you with the evidence right there in front of 'em, most men figure the arithmetic pretty quick. These three did not. What followed was a fight.
A real one. When the smoke cleared, Crane was dead, and Jourd Nite was dead, and Jim Nite was wounded but breathin'. They buried Crane and Jourd Nite right there at the scene of the battle.
The ground kept the secret of what happened that February day better than most men would have. Jim Nite recovered, which turned out to matter quite a bit. Come March 30th, 1897, a trial was held in the earlier courthouse that once stood on this very site.
Jim Nite stood before the court, and the jury convicted him. Sentenced him. And here's where it gets interesting: they sentenced him not as Jim Nite at all, but as John Underwood.
Whatever name the man was truly livin' under, the law found him out there on the Rust Ranch, and the law didn't forget.
What the marker says
(Site marked on Rust Ranch, 21 mi. NW) On Feb. 6, 1897, sheriff John L. Jones and deputies T. C. Taylor, Oscar Latta, John Gardner, T. W. Frazier and Bob Owens found Jim and Jourd Nite (brothers) and J. C. Crane with cattle and horses stolen from James and Peter Paterson and John Gardner. In following fight, Crane and Jourd Nite were killed while Jim was wounded. Crane and Jourd Nite were buried at the scene of the battle. Jim Nite recovered and later at his trial, March 30, 1897, (held in earlier courthouse on this site) was convicted and sentenced as John Underwood. (1968)