Texas Commission On Law Enforcement 6330 U.S. Highway 290 East, Suite 200 Austin, Texas 787 "are hereby inducted on April 20, 20013 " PEACE OFFICERS IN PENDING STATUSFOR THE MEMORIALAs of July 31, 1998The Commission currently has files on the officers listed below who we believe have died in the line of duty. Law enforcementagenices, families, and friends of the officers are asked to help document the life and career of each officer, as well as the fatalaccident. Please contact Ms. Jayne Tune at the Commission if you have any corrections, comments, or additional informa-tion. Brown County Sheriff's Office Charles Webb May 26, 1874 (date of death) This man is NOT listed on the 1870 Brown Co., TX Census Index. NO Webb was. John Wesley Hardin had been a killer since his teen age years. From 1867, when he stabbed a fellow student in the schoolyard until his death in 1895 he continued a life of "gentlemanly" violence. He never killed a man, he said, who didn't need killing. In May 1874 he killed Charles Webb, deputy sheriff of Brown County. From that time, Hardin was constantly pursued in Texas. John Barclay Armstrong, the Texas Ranger known as "McNelly's Bulldog," asked to be allowed to arrest the notorious gunman. He pursued Hardin first to Alabama, then to Florida, then confronted him and four of his gang on a train in Pensacola on July 23, 1877. In the affray that followed, Armstrong killed one of Hardin's men, rendered Hardin unconscious with a blow from his handgun, and arrested the remaining gang members. Hardin was tried at Comanche for the murder of Charles Webb and sentenced, on September 28, 1878, to twenty-five years in prison. During his prison term he made repeated efforts to escape, read theological books, was superintendent of the prison Sunday school, and studied law. He was pardoned on March 16, 1894, and admitted to the bar. He was killed the next year. Armstrong was also one of the men involved in killing Sam Bass at Round Rock in 1878. <A HREF="http://www.tsl.state.tx.us/treasures/law/">Rangers and Outlaws - Texas State Library</A> In March of 1874, Hardin and his older brother Joseph aided Billy and Jim Taylor in their assassination of the leader of the Sutton faction, Bill Sutton, as he boarded a boat in Indianola on his way to New Orleans. After Bill Sutton’s murder, Hardin put together another cattle drive and journeyed to Comanche to say goodbye to his family. On May 26, he was celebrating his winnings from a horse race, drinking at the Comanche saloons, when he met up with deputy sheriff Charles Webb from neighboring Brown County. Webb was killed and the crowd turned against Hardin and his companions. Hardin escaped but his father, brother Joseph, and other kinsmen were arrested. Joseph Hardin and two cousins were taken from jail at night and lynched. Hardin, vowing to avenge his brother’s death, fled Texas followed by his wife and daughter. Under the name of J. H. Swain he relocated in Florida among his wife’s relatives. He later moved his family to other Bowen relatives in Pollard, Alabama across the Florida border. John Wesley Hardin, Jr. was born August 3, 1875. A daughter, Callie, (later renamed Jane Martina and called Jennie) was born July 15, 1877.  <A HREF="http://www.flex.net/~hardin/wesbio.html">wesbio</A> Greenleaf Cemetery: gravesite of Charlie Webb, Brown County Deputy Sheriff killed by outlaw John Wesley Hardin.