Albert Jennings Fountain

Albert Jennings Fountain was a lawyer, Indian fighter, and Republican politician in Texas and New Mexico. Fountain and his 8yearold son Henry disappeared near White Sands, New Mexico, where only his wagon was left. Suspicion centered on two rival landowners, Oliver M. Lee and Albert B. Fall, but Fountain had made many other bitter enemies over thirty years in politics. The bodies were never discovered, and no one was ever convicted of a crime in relation to the disappearance.

Fountain was born on Staten Island, New York, on October 23, 1838, to Solomon Jennings and his wife Catherine de la Fontaine. He went to California as a young man and began calling himself by an Anglicised version of his mothers family name. He studied law in California, and was admitted to the bar in 1860. Working as a reporter for the Sacramento Union, Fountain travelled to Nicaragua in 1860 to cover the filibustering expedition of William Walker. Angering Walker by his reports, Fountain was arrested and sentenced to be shot. However, he escaped and returned to California.

Source: Wikipedia