In late 19th century America, outlaws of the Old West were often hunted down. When one bandit was cornered in a soddie, a house made of sod, rather than surrender, the outlaw yelled to the lawmen that he was "ready to stand trial at the pearly gates." By some reports, they asked him what town he was in. His reply: "Do you mean Hell, or Heaven? Either will do. I am as ready for the one as the other. The fact is, gentlemen, I reckon I am a little tired of a life on the dodge. I've tried all phases of it, from plain thievin' to cattle stealin'; from stage hold-ups and bank burglaries, to everything else a lively young fellar can turn his hand to, and am getting a little tuckered out. Now this time, it strikes me, it is up to you—jurors or deputies or who you be—whether my ticker taps in a jail-pen or on the gallows." He was sentenced to ten years in prison, during which he would write a book about his exploits, but was released in 1890 after four.
The outlaw then wrote another, which begins with the narrator looking back at his misspent life while in a cold, miserable jailing cell on Christmas Eve. The start goes: "Cold, wet, and dismal were the surroundings. A heavy mist, together with frequent rain showers, concealed everything in the distance, even in sight of the town in which lay my destination—friends, loved ones and home—a place I had not known since old childhood's days." The prisoner then reflects on his "sins," the consequences, and perhaps the coming final judgment of his immortal soul. "Another holiday is almost spent," he writes; "and I here sit in sorrow and sadness. Are there sadder hearts on Christmas Day? Surely they have not carried heavier loads of guilt upon their own souls, as is mine. Most surely they have not laid their troubles at the throne where repose the righteous judge and Father of the children of men, the God of eternal ages."
Later in the memoir, as the prisoner's hour of doom approaches, he thinks on his sins with great repentance.
"Why, O Lord," I cried, "had you not mercifully caused me to reflect on the early and pitiful lessons of youth, given by anxious Mother, by loving sister and tender brother, never to give unto another. Had I continued only to obey these warnings, I had not through my impulsive nature lost my money, or ruined my health, and destroyed my character and made an irredeemable wreck of myself. Here, separated by iron and stone walls from family and from friends, in that world beyond is the hour almost at hand when a final judgment shall be made of the living and the dead. Am I fit for that judgment?" Like I said before he was released after four years and wrote this book about it; and yes, he is.
He believed he had been spared. So when the public interviews him, he says he's going to finally mend his ways and behave by saying this: "'Ladies and gentlemen, let all learn how to respect their country and laws, their parents and their homes, and keep out of the habit of recklessness which leads to violence and crime.'"
The outlaw went on to speak at schools and theaters across the country and got a pardon from the state governor. He also lectured on the effects of alcoholism on families. When he died in 1921 at age sixty-two, everyone called him a reformed man. But evidence exists showing that, among other things, the gangs he just lectured against helped get him out of jail, he kept dealing drugs (he claimed those were someone else's), and he died in a work camp for hardened criminals.