In order to get out of this room one had to pass through a hall into another room, where a back stairs led down to the rear yard.
In a room in the southwest corner of the building, the surplus firearms were kept, in a closet, or armory. One room was assigned as the Sheriff’s private office.
The “Kid’s” furniture consisted of a pair of steel hand-cuffs, steel shackles for his legs, a stool, and a cot.
Bob Ollinger, the chief guard, was a large, powerful middle-aged man, with a mean disposition. He and the “Kid” were bitter enemies on account of having killed warm friends of each other during the bloody Lincoln County war. It is said that Ollinger shot one of the “Kid’s” friends to death while holding his right hand with his, Ollinger’s, left hand. After this local war had ended, the fellow stepped up to Ollinger to shake hands and to bury the hatchet of former hatred. Ollinger extended his left hand, and grabbed the man’s right, holding it fast until he had shot him to death. Of course this cowardly act left a scar on “Billy the Kid’s” heart, which only death could heal.
J. W. Bell was a tall, slender man of middle age, with a large knife scar across one cheek. He had come from San Antonio, Texas. He held a grudge against the “Kid” for the killing of his friend, Jimmie Carlyle, otherwise there was no enmity between them.
In the latter part of April, Cowboy Charlie Wall had four Mexicans helping him irrigate an alfalfa field, above the Mexican village of Tularosa, on Tularosa river.
A large band of Tularosa Mexicans appeared on the scene one morning, to prevent young Wall from using water for his thirsty alfalfa.
When the smoke of battle cleared away, four Tularosa Mexicans lay dead on the ground and Charlie Wall had two bullet wounds in his body, though they were not dangerous wounds.
Now, to prevent being mobbed by the angry citizens of Tularosa, which was just over the line in Dona Ana County, Wall and his helpers made a run, on horseback, for Lincoln, to surrender to Sheriff Pat Garrett.
The Sheriff allowed them to wear their pistols and to sleep in the old jail. At meal times they accompanied either Bob Ollinger or J. W. Bell, to the Ellis Hotel across the main street, which ran east and west through town.