Billy the Kid in a Striped Cardigan Playing Croquet

There was only one photograph of outlaw William Bonney, also known as Billy the Kid, in existence -until now. A vintage photo collector bought a tintype at a Fresno junk shop in 2010 which has been verified by a team of experts at Kagin’s as depicting Bonney playing croquet during a wedding reception.

The latest photo, a 4 x 5 inch tintype, captures Billy the Kid surrounded by several members of his gang after a wedding, according to Kagin’s. The outlaws are surrounded by friends and family in Chaves County, N.M., in the summer of 1878. The company said a team spent a year dissecting the photo and determining the location, which required investigators to travel to the supposed site where it was taken.
“We found the old lumber underneath,” Jeff Aiello, who directed a National Geographic Channel documentary about the photo, told ABC affiliate KFSN. “We found those exact rock piers are still there.”

It’s not only precious because of the scarcity of pictures of Bonney, but also because it shows him with his gang, the Regulators. Kagin’s has already fielded some offers for the picture, and expect it to sell in the neighborhood of $5 million. See the full picture and read more about it at The Washington Post.