Bring Me the Head of Joaquin Murrieta: The Outlaw Gang Leader Who Terrorized California and Launched the Legend of Zorro

By John Boessenecker

New York Times bestselling author and award-winning historian John Boessenecker--as seen on Netflix's Wyatt Earp and the Cowboy War--debunks over 150 years of myth surrounding the Wild West's most notorious Latino bandit, Joaquin Murrieta

The story of Joaquin Murietta is the stuff of legends--in the face of adversity, the Latino outlaw embarked on a noble career as a rebel, fighting against injustice. He later became popularly known as "El Patrio" (the Patriot) and the "Robin Hood of El Dorado." However, though Joaquin Murietta remains a folk hero to many, his checkered past has been hidden behind layers upon layers of myth--until now.

Joaquin arrived in the gold mines in 1849, and his brother-in-law, Claudio Feliz, turned to crime, driven by far more sinister ambitions than righteousness. By the following year, Claudio Feliz and Joaquin Murrieta ruled over one of the biggest and bloodiest outlaw gangs of the Old West. Despite Murrieta's grisly death, members of his gang continued to raid and kill for more than twenty years thereafter.

Bring Me the Head of Joaquin Murrieta tells the infamous story of Joaquin's life, his bloody career and his gruesome fate. With careful research and never-before-told stories of the violent trail Murrieta and his gang left in their wake, award-winning author and definitive Wild West historian John Boessenecker separates fact from fiction in this gripping portrait of the California Gold Rush era, for readers of Tom Clavin and H. W. Brands.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1335007032
• ISBN13: 9781335007032
• Release Date: October 2025
• Publisher: Hanover Square Press
• Length: 384 Pages