Born in 1859, William Henry McCarty never knew his father. As a teenager, he followed his mother in a convoy of pioneers on their way west. Once in New Mexico, his mother died and the young man was left to fend for himself at the age of 15. He became a cowboy in Arizona and killed a man in self-defense. Convicted of murder, he escapes. From homicides to stories of cattle rustlers and bounty hunters, the whole mythology of the Wild West is embodied in Billy the Kid. Since King Vidor's "Billy the Kid" in 1930, the outlaw has fueled the imagination of some fifteen directors, the most memorable film being Sam Peckinpah's "Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid" in 1973.