National Register Listing

Lincoln Historic District

U.S. 380, Lincoln, NM

The story of Lincoln, New Mexico, duplicates that of most of the cow towns that sprang up on the advancing cattlemen's frontier in the years following the Civil War. Like its counterparts throughout the West, it was a business and social community serving surrounding ranges. To it drifted cowboys, badmen, gunfighters, rustlers, soldiers, and famous lawmen. It was a scene of courtroom battles, public executions, and gunfights. As in other parts of the cattle country, conflict over water, government beef contracts, and grazing rights engendered b ad feeling. At Lincoln one of the famous feuds for which the cattle frontier is noted reached its dramatic climax. The Lincoln County War of 1878 brought the rival Murphy-Dolan and Tunstall-McSween factions into armed conflict which lasted for five months. It ended in a three-day gun battle on the streets of Lincoln, and resulted in a half-dozen killings. Involved in the Lincoln County disturbances were John S. Chisum, the greatest cattle baron of the region, and General Lew Wallace, territorial governor of New Mexico. Another prominent figure in the war was William H. Bonney, "Billy the Kid." Three years later, in 1881, the Kid made a dramatic escape from the county jail at Lincoln, killing his two guards in the process. But he himself was shot and killed several months later at old Fort Sumner by Pat Garrett, Sheriff of Lincoln County. Aside from its exciting and dramatic history and its importance to the development of the cattle industry of southeastern New Mexico (over 300,000 cattle were on this range during the 1870's and 80 T s), Lincoln's historical value lies in its state of preservation. It is probably the best preserved surviving example of a frontier cow town. At Lincoln a considerable part of the town of 1878 has survived comparatively untouched by modern additions, and.it has retained much of its historical setting and atmosphere of a cow town. Included in the surviving structures are the adobe-brick Murphy-Dolan store, originally built in 1874, which in 1880 became the Lincoln County Courthouse, and the Tunstall-McSween store at other end of the town. These structures were the headquarters of the two rival factions in the Lincoln County War. Both of these and five other historic structures and sites in the town are owned and administered by the Old Lincoln County Memorial Commission, established by the State of New Mexico to preserve and develop these historic structures.

Local significance of the district:
Listed in National Register of Historic Places in 1966.