He was described in "Tularosa: Last of the Frontier West" (ISBN 978-0826305619) as "magnificently muscled, straight as a young pine, catlike in his coordination".
"He had his mother's piercing black eyes which seemed to bore into you, and a chin like the rock of Gibraltar, but he always spoke softly."
(Sonnichsen) "Dee Harkey in his "The Life of a New Mexico Lawman - Mean as Hell" (ISBN 0-941270-60-2) stated he had many dealings with Oliver Lee and "so far as I know or ever heard, he always dealt on the square."
It also put him on the side of the Democrats, who were at odds with the Republican faction led by Colonel Albert Jennings Fountain.
The political party in the majority in the area was the Republican, and these were an extension of the Santa Fe Ring, a secret coalition of lawmakers determined to control public offices in the New Mexico Territory.
Colonel Fountain had gone to the Lincoln County court and obtained 32 indictments against 23 ranchers for theft of livestock or defacement of brands.
Garrett and posse engaged in a gunbattle with Lee and Gililland near Alamogordo at Wildy Well, with Deputy Sheriff Kurt Kearney being killed.
Lee's friend, Albert Fall and other Democrats offered to honor Otero, the Republican Governor, with the creation of a county named after him.
Oliver Lee later held office in the New Mexico Senate and continued operating his ranches until his own death in 1941, at the age of 76.