Roy Bean was born in Kentucky and became a trader in Mexico in 1848. He was mining in New Mexico when the Civil War broke out, and as a spy and scout he joined Texans in the command of Gen. John R. Baylor during the 1861-1862 Arizona-New Mexico Campaign. He organized an irregular company called the Free Rovers and in a narrow canyon took part in the capture of 800 Federals by 250 Confederates. After 1862 he was a Confederate freighter, hauling cotton from San Antonio to Matamoros and bringing wartime goods into Texas, including guns, ammunition, medicines, cloth, shoes, and food. In 1882 he began following railroad construction crews along the Rio Grande with a tent saloon. Cooperating with the Texas Rangers, he was appointed justice of the peace, known as the Law West of the Pecos, and tamed the rough frontier town of Langtry, where he spent the rest of his life. He became famous for unusual court decisions, including trying and fining a dead man for carrying a concealed weapon. The most widely celebrated event he staged was the Fitzsimmons-Maher world championship boxing match on a Rio Grande sand bar near his saloon in 1896. He held court in the saloon, where he displayed pictures of the Jersey Lily, the British actress Lily Langtry, whom he never met; she visited the town at his invitation, but only after his death.