Ohio)) William (Author at Arthur Westbrook Co. (Cleveland Ward

Project Gutenberg lists Ward, William as the author of at least two outlaw tales published by Arthur Westbrook Co. of Cleveland, Ohio: Jesse James' Bold Stroke; Or, The Double Bank Robbery and Jesse James' Desperate Game; Or, The Robbery of the Ste. Genevieve Bank. The available evidence points to a writer associated with the late dime-novel tradition, where sensational frontier and outlaw stories were a popular form of inexpensive entertainment.

Reliable personal details about Ward, William are hard to confirm from the sources I found. No clear birth-and-death dates, fuller biography, or well-documented author profile turned up in the material available here, so it is safest to treat the name as a lightly documented pulp-fiction byline rather than attach unsupported claims.

That scarcity of information is common for writers in the cheap-fiction marketplace of the period. Even so, the surviving works suggest a taste for brisk plotting, high-stakes robberies, and legendary Western figures—the kind of storytelling designed to hook readers quickly and keep the pages turning.