Heroines Of The Wild West You Wouldn't Want To Mess With

"Stagecoach" Mary Fields (1832-1914) spent her early life enslaved, but after the 13th Amendment was passed, she worked as a mail carrier (the first Black woman postal worker in history) as well as a laborer for a church in Cascade, where she did tough physical work and made 120-mile supply runs to Helena, MT. It was during one of these supply runs that Fields faced her toughest obstacle yet: ravenous wolves.

While out on the trail, the wolves came and went after her horses. She fought off the wolves with her shotgun and her revolver. This six-foot-tall, 200-pound Black woman was one of the bravest frontierswomen ever.

Cathay Williams refused to let her gender or race stop her from serving her country. During the Civil War, Williams wanted to fight on the front lines, but at the time, women weren't allowed anywhere near the battlefield as anything more than a cook, laundress, or nurse.

Wanting to actually fight, she disguised herself as a man, naming herself William Cathay, and was soon deemed fit for duty. By doing so, she became the very first African American woman to enlist in the army. Though she was hospitalized several times, no one ever discovered her secret.  

In 1898, two Oklahoma women by the names of S.M. Burche and Mamie Fossett, who were fearless and independent, shocked the state by being appointed United States Deputy Marshals.

The article announcing their new positions was very complimentary. Part of it reads:

That a woman should choose the vocation of professional thief taker in the most civilized portion of the land would be strange enough. It is infinitely more so when she chooses field duty on the worst territory in the Union. Criminals in Oklahoma and in Indian Territory, the district where these two girls - for they are maidens - must operate, are of the most desperate and dangerous class. More lives are lost among Federal officers in a year than in all the rest of the nation together. So it would seem that these girls possess metal of exceptional kind to willingly undertake such duties.

The two women served warrants and made arrests as any man could do, working in the Indian Territory.

Nobody knows where Eleanore Dumont came from exactly. Her unique accent had some guessing France, while others thought she originated from New Orleans. No matter where the mysterious woman hailed from, she turned up in San Francisco in 1849 and found herself working as a card dealer. A few years later, she moved to Nevada City, where she opened up her own elegant gambling parlor, serving champagne instead of whiskey and not letting in dirty, unclean men. She wanted a respectable place with respectable people. 

Her monstrous success led her to purchase a ranch and start raising cattle. She met a man named Jack McKnight who she thought she could trust and signed over her property to him so he could manage it. Unfortunately, McKnight was a con artist who absconded with all her money and left her in serious debt.

Not content to sit idly by, Dumont decided to hunt down McKnight. When she caught up with him, she killed him with two blasts from a shotgun. Her life never recovered from McKnight's treachery, but at least she got her revenge. 

Annie Oakley, who was born in 1860, will forever be remembered for her otherworldly sharpshooting skills that put almost everyone else (especially overconfident men) to shame. But one of the coolest things about Oakley is her dedication to her family. After her father passed, an eight-year-old Oakley went out with his rifle and started hunting game in order to feed her family.

She was a natural, and from there, her skills only continued to grow. She was able to turn her shooting skills into a full-fledged career, and the money she made showing off her extraordinary talent was enough to support her mother, her six siblings, and still have some left to donate to charity. 

She was known to perform amazing shots that nobody else could make, including shooting the end of a cigarette that was in her husband's lips, hitting the edge of a playing card from 30 paces, and even shooting targets while looking into a mirror. She was so renowned that she got to shoot a cigarette out of Kaiser Wilhelm II's mouth. Talk about trust!

After being born into a family of outlaws in approximately 1876, it was only natural that Laura Bullion followed suit. After a tough early life, she eventually joined the Wild Bunch, better known for producing Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, and rode with the infamous outlaws.

She blazed through the countryside, robbing trains and pulling scams until she was eventually caught. She was said to be tough and stubborn, which eventually earned her the nickname "Thorny Rose."