After learning about this book from a Greg Ellifritz post about books written about or by real old West gunfighters, I found a rare first edition copy signed by the author.

Studying the Historic Gunfighters

The book was published in the UK by Robert Hale. Hale’s company published Westerns in the UK from 1936 to 2020. Many of those titles are still available as e-books on Amazon.

The “Lee Shippey” to whom the book is signed, is likely a Los Angeles Times columnist specializing in human interest stories.

The book is a lot like Charles Askins’ autobiography “Unrepentant Sinner“, in that Ganzhorn was in a lot of gunfights, and freely admits that he “thrilled to the buck of a sixshooter in my fist”.

From the NY Times 1959 review of this book, back from the days when Westerns were at their peak popularity, and reading (and reviewing) books about “gun violence” meant something different than it does today.

In this story of his life of violence the late Jack Ganzhorn (he died in 1956, age 78) permits the reader to witness some forty of his killings. These he calls “six-shooter killings.” and they do not include men who fell before his deadly guns when he was a soldier in the Philippine insurrection. He piled up some fifteen victims in a single wild night during that conflict.

https://www.nytimes.com/1959/11/22/archives/marked-for-violence-ive-killed-men-an-epic-of-early-arizona-by-jack.html

From the Kirkus Review site:

I’ve Killed Men, an autobiography of one of the fast-draw men of the Western frontier, has as many accounts of killings and brawls as the title suggests. Mr. Ganzhorn was undoubtedly a remarkable man right up until his death in 1956 at the age of 78. The book is remarkable if you consider that the author was practically illiterate until maturity. Along with his own feuding and fighting, there is a dramatic description of a forest fire in Minnesota where hundreds died- and he escaped, and of the San Francisco earthquake and fire which he too survived. A book for men who have outgrown the straight western.

https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/a/jack-ganzhorn/ive-killed-men/

Another summary: Memoirs of the “fastest man on the draw”, who grew up in Tombstone, knew Wyatt Earp, worked as a gambler, scouted for General Funston in the Phillippine Insurrection, acted in Hollywood, and worked undercover for Remington Arms.

A sample of Ganzhorn’s writing from the 1910 book:

Amazon shows copies of this book available in different formats, including an edition printed in 2022.

According to his Wikipedia entry, he appeared in silent films as an actor and wrote several stories for the Western pulps

Filmography

• Thorobred, 1922 – as Blackie Wells
• The Iron Horse, 1924 – as Thomas C. Durant (uncredited)
• Fightin’ Odds, 1925 – as Dave Ormsby
• Thank You, 1925 – as Gossiping Man (uncredited)
• Hawk of the Hills, 1927 – as Henry Selby
• The Apache Raider (1928) – as Breed Artwell
• The Valley of Hunted Men (1928) – as Frenchy Durant
• Hawk of the Hills, 1929 – as Henry Selby

Of all of his films, the only one that appears to have survived is the 1929 edit of the Hawk of the Hills serial, trimmed down from 3+ hours to a one hour short feature. You can watch the colorized version on youTube.

He also wrote for Western pulp magazines at various times between the 20’s and 50’s.

Publications

• I’ve Killed Men, by Jack Ganzhorn, Robert Hale Limited, 1910
• Damnation Ranch, by Jack Ganzhorn, The Golden West Magazine, September 1929
• Gamblers Guns, by Jack Ganzhorn, Super Western, December 1937
• Leaden Justice, by Jack Ganzhorn, Wild West Stories Magazine, November 1935
• The Worm, by Jack Ganzhorn, Real Western Stories, February 1956
• Lone Star Western, by Jack Ganzhorn, (Australia) #12, 1950s

As a collector of Western pulp magazines from the 20’s-50’s, I checked all my usual sources to see if any of these issues were available for sale. I was able to find a copy of Super Western from December 1937. Ganzhorn’s story in that issue is a real life account of yet another of his gunfights. The complete story is reprinted below.

Ganzhorn’s writing style is similar to the pulp authors of that era. While he’s not as well known as Wyatt Earp and Bat Masterson, he lived a similar life, including giving up the “gunfighter life” transitioning into a movie and writing career later in his later years.