West was born in Fort Collins, Colorado on January 3, 1888 and later enlisted for World War I in California. After the war, he married Maggie Elizabeth Van Sickle of Southside on Christmas Day, 1932, and began working as a farm hand for Sam McCausland, the son of Civil War Confederate General
John McCausland. West died May 20, 1935, shot and murdered by Sam McCausland at West"s home during an altercation. West later died at a hospital in Gallipolis, Ohio and McCausland was convicted of second-degree murder. West is buried at the Van Sickle Cemetery in Southside, West Virginia, but his grave-site was lost as the cemetery became part of the Chief Cornstalk Wildlife Management Area in the 1970s.
The first attempt to rediscover West"s grave was 2012 by Jack Crutchfield of West Virginia Public Television’s “Obscurely Famous” series, however Crutchfield was unsuccessful.
Plans to reinter West"s remains at the Donel C. Kinnard Memorial State Veterans Cemetery in Dunbar, West Virginia are currently in progress.
