How deadly was the Wild West?
score:12
It depends on how you define "deadly." In relation to the number of inhabitants, very deadly. Even in absolute numbers, rather deadly
Tombstone, Arizona is a good case in point. (This was the site of the celebrated fight at OK Corral between sheriff Wyatt Earp and some bandits.) At its peak, the town had about 10,000 inhabitants. It also had something like 110 saloons and 14 gambling halls, that is, more than one saloon for every 100 people, and 1 gambling hall for every 700 people, according to the Wikipedia article. It was also a microcosm of the Civil War, with frequent fights between southern-born Democratic leaning "cowboys," and northern-born, Republican-leaning mine and business owners.
These were hard-drinking, hard-living people that got into more than their share of gunfights. Other factors involved: This was a very disproportionately masculine group, even in a country in which the majority of the population in the 19th century was male. This group of people were disproportionately young adult; neither children nor old people thrived in this kind of an environment, although there was some of each.
As another poster pointed out, a "Wild West" annual murder rate of 165 per 100,000 was more than 15 times higher than a "city" rate of 10 per 100,000 around the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries. In absolute numbers, that would translate hypothetically into 16.5 murders a year in Tombstone, versus 50 murders per year for say, Chicago's 500,000 residents around 1880. Another poster pointed out that the average for Tombstone was closer to 10 per year, relative to a peak population of 10,000, which would still be high.
Upvote:9
For Tombstone with 10,000 inhabitants:
between 1879 and 1884, about 300 people died in Tombstone. It is recorded that 121 died from old age, natural causes, 2 died in childbirth, 5 died committing suicide, 7 were killed by Apaches, 10 were hanged, 8 legally and 2 were lynched, 5 died by drowning, another 16 died of other types of accidents, 21 died from some sort of disease which includes 10 infants or young children, and in the years 1879 to 1884 there were a total of 52 people who died by gunshot, knife, or some sort of blunt instrument.
Someone else cited Dodge City with murder rate of 125 murders per 100,000 adults per year. The population of Dodge City in 1880 was 996 people (doubled in 1890), so one murder gives the rate of 100 per 100,000 people, difficult to say what would it be if count only adults.
Upvote:10
There does seem to be data - not surprising, as while the West was Wild, it wasn't completely lawless and there would at least have been records made of shootings and murders:
From Homicide Rates in the American West on the Ohio State University Criminal Justice Research Center website:
To appreciate how violent the West was, we need to consider not only the annual homicide rate, but the risk of being murdered over time. For instance, the adult residents of Dodge City faced a homicide rate of at least 165 per 100,000 adults per year, meaning that 0.165 percent of the population was murdered each year—between a fifth and a tenth of a percent. That may sound small, but it is large to a criminologist or epidemiologist, because it means that an adult who lived in Dodge City from 1876 to 1885 faced at least a 1 in 61 chance of being murdered—1.65 percent of the population was murdered in those 10 years. An adult who lived in San Francisco, 1850-1865, faced at least a 1 in 203 chance of being murdered, and in the eight other counties in California that have been studied to date, at least a 1 in 72 chance. Even in Oregon, 1850-1865, which had the lowest minimum rate yet discovered in the American West (30 per 100,000 adults per year), an adult faced at least a 1 in 208 chance of being murdered.
Of course, there's a possibility of under-reporting, but even the above statistics show it was a pretty violent period compared to now. Current rates are considerably lower.
Although, to get a true fix on the issue, we would need to be able to compare global rates at the time (was the Wild West more violent than the Eastern seaboard or Europe, for example), and comparisons from before and after the period in question (was the Wild West period more violent than the 30 years preceding or following it - discounting the Civil War and World War I).
More post
- 📝 Which city has had the most name changes?
- 📝 Did Watt or another inventor have a dream about ball bearings?
- 📝 Effects of the Berlin Wall on modern-day Germany
- 📝 What role did the Ancient Samurai heritage play on Modern Japan during WW2?
- 📝 Who were the pre-Celtic inhabitants of Western Europe?
- 📝 In what respect could Italian Renaissance be considered a phase of romanticism?
- 📝 Is there any documentation of the use of scientific knowledge or technology in pagan temples?
- 📝 How have African countries kept the boundaries divided by colonists and countries unified for decades, despite the many ethnical groups and conflicts?
- 📝 Were the NKVD hated by the regular army like the SS was?
- 📝 What was the military age in Romania between the world wars?
- 📝 What was the status of Shia Muslims in the Ottoman empire?
- 📝 What's the difference between Country Born and Mulatto people in the 18th century New England?
- 📝 Did Portuguese fisherman visit New England prior to 1492?
- 📝 Which European towns or cities are architecturally most similar today to how they would have been in 16C-17C?
- 📝 Could the Soviet Union have continued fighting World War II without Caucasus oil?
- 📝 Why did the French insist on reclaiming Indo-China after WWII?
- 📝 Constantine the Great created the Chi-Rho from the Greek word for "Christ". Why choose Greek over Latin, even though he was Roman?
- 📝 How did women's roles and rights change during the early Republican period in China?
- 📝 Why was there an Anglo-Saxon law banning sheepskin covered shields?
- 📝 Why are some school systems from September–July versus others that go April–March?
- 📝 How much did a good sword cost in Medieval Western Europe?
- 📝 Is the Tokugawa escape scene in Clavell's "Shogun" historically accurate?
- 📝 Did the House of Representatives during Meiji Era exercise their powers?
- 📝 Why did the Japanese attack the Aleutians at the same time as Midway?
- 📝 Is the story of Plato's arrest at Aegina plausible?
- 📝 How did Hitler behave towards all those whom he knew in his childhood and youth after he rose to power?
- 📝 Looking for Cato quotes/anecdotes
- 📝 What technological/economic factors triggered the Industrial Revolution?
- 📝 Where does Herodotus discuss judging the wisdom of decisions by the evidence at hand vs. the consequences?
- 📝 What are the themes of post-WW2 Polish immigration to the United States?
Source: stackoverflow.com
Search Posts
Related post
- 📝 How deadly was the Wild West?
- 📝 How and why was the boundary between West and East Berlin decided to be where it was?
- 📝 How was security on the Silk Road between China and the West maintained?
- 📝 How did slavery become permissible in the French West Indies when it was forbidden in France?
- 📝 How could West Berlin had access West Germany/world while the wall was up?
- 📝 How serious was Fermat's statement about the ancients?
- 📝 How and when was the modern company ownership structure invented?
- 📝 How was the United States able to produce excellent tanks in 1942?
- 📝 When the Portuguese began the exploration of the West African Coast, did they believe the Indian Ocean was an enclosed sea?
- 📝 What was the economic basis for West Berlin?
- 📝 Why was sugar cultivation more profitable in the Caribbean/Brazil than West Africa?
- 📝 How popular was the Soviet Union?
- 📝 How difficult was to escape from a naval battle after engaging into one during the Age of Sail?
- 📝 How likely is it that any non-Celtic language was spoken in the British Isles when the Romans invaded?
- 📝 How significant was the Fall of Constantinople as an event leading to the Age of Exploration?
- 📝 How difficult was it to spoof the sender of a telegram in 1890-1920's in USA?
- 📝 How was the modern geographic boundary between Europe and Asia decided?
- 📝 How was the Luftwaffe able to destroy nearly 4000 Soviet aircraft in 3 days of operation Barbarossa?
- 📝 How common was smoking in first half of the 20th century?
- 📝 How advanced was the satellite technology during the Yom Kippur War?
- 📝 How did the monks whose job was to copy books react to Gutenberg's printing press?
- 📝 How close was the Soviet Union to collapsing during WW2?
- 📝 Before the Land Bridge Theory, how was human presence in the Americas explained?
- 📝 How was life in the Iron Age different from life in the Middle Ages?
- 📝 How was beer production affected by the war during WW2?
- 📝 How was armour rusting in the rain handled throughout history?
- 📝 What was the legal status of an East German once he had reached West Germany?
- 📝 How common was marriage between nobles and peasants in the Middle Ages?
- 📝 Approximately how much travel time was saved by the opening of the Suez Canal in 1869?
- 📝 How were the West Berlin air corridors negotiated?
