An illustration of William Frederick "Buffalo Bill" Cody and Christopher Houston "Kit" Carson. Christopher Houston "Kit" Carson (1809-1868) was an American frontiersman and Indian fighter. Carson left home in rural present-day Missouri at age 16 and became a trapper in the West. He gained renown for his role as John C. Fremont's guide in the American West. Carson also played a minor role in California's Bear Flag Revolt during the 1846-1848 Mexican-American War. He died at age 58 in 1868, from an abdominal aortic aneurysm. William Frederick "Buffalo Bill" Cody (1846-1917) was a United States soldier, bison hunter and showman. He was born in the Iowa Territory (now the U.S. state of Iowa), in LeClaire but lived several years in Canada before his family moved to the Kansas Territory. Buffalo Bill received the Medal of Honor in 1872 for service to the US Army as a scout. One of the most colorful figures of the American Old West, Buffalo Bill became famous for the shows he organized with cowboy themes, which he toured in Great Britain and Europe as well as the United States.