Bass Reeves, born July 1838 in slavery in Crawford County, Arkansas, was the first black deputy U.S. Marshall west of the Mississippi, mainly in Arkansas and Oklahoma Territory. He and his family were slaves of Arkansas state legislator William Reeves.
When the Civil War began, he joined the Confederate Army with his owner at the time George Reeves. At some point he managed to gain his freedom but there are different accounts of how that happened. It is know he stayed in the Indian Territory, learning their languages until he was freed by the Thirteenth Amendment.
He was appointed deputy US marshal by James Fagan, a US marshal, who had heard about Reeves and his ability to speak several Native American languages.
He worked for 32 years in Indian Territory, bringing in some of the most dangerous outlaws then and never received any wounds. He even had to arrest his own son for murder.
When Oklahoma became a state, he became a Muskogee Police Department officer. That is where he died in January 1910.
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