(Sweetwater County, Wyo. – January 21, 2025) A new article on WyoHistory.org, the online platform of the Wyoming Historical Society, explores the intertwined lives of two men well known in Sweetwater County history: outlaw Robert Leroy Parker—better known as Butch Cassidy—and his friend, Rock Springs attorney Douglas A. Preston.

“The Outlaw and His Lawyer: Butch Cassidy and Douglas Preston,” by Dick Blust of the Sweetwater County Historical Museum, chronicles the unusual relationship between one of the Old West’s most famous bandits and a prominent Wyoming attorney, politician, and constitutional signer.

Photo No. 1 – Robert Leroy Parker, alias Butch Cassidy, inmate number 187, Wyoming State Penitentiary.

Photo No. 2 – Douglas Preston and associates at the Sweetwater County Courthouse, Green River, 1898–1899. Preston is marked No. 4; Judge David H. Craig is No. 16. The table and balustrade are now part of the Museum collection.

Photo No. 3 – Douglas Preston’s law office at North Front and J streets in Rock Springs. Formerly an opera house, labor temple, and theater, it now houses a tattoo parlor.

Though Douglas A. Preston was a member of Wyoming’s Constitutional Convention of 1889, a signer of the state constitution, a legislator, and served two terms as Wyoming’s attorney general, he is best remembered for serving as legal counsel to one of the West’s most notorious outlaws.

Preston and Cassidy first encountered one another in Fremont County in 1891 when Cassidy was charged with horse theft and defended by Preston—unsuccessfully. Cassidy was convicted and sentenced to the Wyoming State Penitentiary, then located in Laramie.

In 1895, Cassidy secured a personal meeting with Wyoming Governor William Richards and requested a pardon, reportedly promising to commit no further crimes in Wyoming. Richards agreed, and Cassidy was released in early 1896. Seven months later, Cassidy and accomplices Elzy Lay and Bub Meeks robbed the Montpelier Bank in Idaho of approximately $7,000.

Over the next twelve years, Cassidy—along with Harry Longabaugh, the “Sundance Kid”—carried out numerous bank and train robberies before reportedly being killed in a shootout with authorities in Bolivia.

Preston’s relationship with Cassidy remains controversial. Despite a long and distinguished career that ended with his death in an automobile accident west of Granger in 1929, Preston reportedly laundered money for Cassidy and admitted the two met secretly at desert locations between Sweetwater County and Brown’s Park along the Utah–Colorado border. It was also said they occasionally met at Boar’s Tusk north of Rock Springs.

The full article can be read online at:
https://wyohistory.org/encyclopedia/outlaw-and-his-lawyer-butch-cassidy-and-douglas-preston

Additional WyoHistory.org articles related to Butch Cassidy include “Bub Meeks and a Wild Bunch Winchester,” available at:
https://wyohistory.org/encyclopedia/bub-meeks-and-wild-bunch-winchester

Meeks’s life after the Montpelier robbery was marked by continued misfortune. His rifle is currently on exhibit at the Sweetwater County Historical Museum.